I think you're pretty overconfident in your conclusions, but I also think this is an absolutely fascinating concept. I also see some places where you might be

I think you're pretty overconfident in your conclusions, but I also think this is an absolutely fascinating concept. I also see some places where you might be too pessimistic. For example, it seems relatively plausible that a machine-owned business could do things that require human workers for its primary functions. Just as an algorithm might be able to hire a lawyer, it could hire contractors to do other parts of the core business. All that's required is that all of the managerial tasks are automated. But I definitely think that this falls apart when you start thinking about the law. The business has to deal not only with lawsuits against itself, but also with enforcing its rights against other people. For example, in the self-owned-taxi example, what is to prevent someone from simply ripping the computer out of the taxi, wiping it, and then making off with a free car? What's to prevent a mechanic, hired to do basic repairs, from simply selling the car for parts? Preventing this requires that the machine can recognize violations of the law that hurt it, and then take legal action against the perpetrator. That sounds like strong AI territory. But once we're talking about strong AI, all bets are off. It's just a much less interesting proposal. It's not a particularly surprising conclusion that if you have machines with superhuman generalized intelligence, they'll probably end up owning and running businesses.