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It's actually trivial. AI apis are pretty streamlined by now. Just slap a tax on processed tokens and you're guaranteed to reach every AI agent out there. It al

It's actually trivial. AI apis are pretty streamlined by now. Just slap a tax on processed tokens and you're guaranteed to reach every AI agent out there. It already happens everywhere with sales tax for normal products. Just treat tokens as the product and create an extra tax for it.

katsura 11mo ago
How will that work with local/offline agents? They are getting better and better.
- marcyb5st 11mo ago
  Audits? Like it happens with licensed software. The issue is that if any country won't play ball with either not adding the taxes or by closing an eye, everyone is gonna put their datacentes there and become un-auditable. I guess the other countries can slap sanctions on them, but the people benefitting won't care really.
  - refurb 11mo ago
    Ohhh! Just imagine all the new IRS jobs and government powers that would be created!
scotty79 11mo ago
You could tax the energy and subsidize it for individuals. It's the ultimate resource that all business uses. But that would mean unscrupulous countries could tax their energy less and attract AI farms. So probably you need to tax imported tokens (and other goods) as well. There could be many benefits of taxing grid energy instead of labor.
- sigmoid10 11mo ago
  This is how sales tax already works. If you sell something to another country that has sales tax, you need to pay it irrespective of where you produced it.
integralid 11mo ago
I don't think you responded to the main concern. Let's say EU and US taxes AI tokens. India doesn't, so almost all prompting done by international companies now is outsourced to India, and still not taxed. Or do you tax AI companies and tax tokens "at source"? Then, obviously, they either lose competition with foreign (let's say Chinese) companies that do the same but are not taxed, or more likely all AI companies move out of EU and US.

katsura 11mo ago

How will that work with local/offline agents? They are getting better and better.

marcyb5st 11mo ago
Audits? Like it happens with licensed software. The issue is that if any country won't play ball with either not adding the taxes or by closing an eye, everyone is gonna put their datacentes there and become un-auditable. I guess the other countries can slap sanctions on them, but the people benefitting won't care really.
- refurb 11mo ago
  Ohhh! Just imagine all the new IRS jobs and government powers that would be created!

scotty79 11mo ago

You could tax the energy and subsidize it for individuals. It's the ultimate resource that all business uses. But that would mean unscrupulous countries could tax their energy less and attract AI farms. So probably you need to tax imported tokens (and other goods) as well. There could be many benefits of taxing grid energy instead of labor.

sigmoid10 11mo ago
This is how sales tax already works. If you sell something to another country that has sales tax, you need to pay it irrespective of where you produced it.

integralid 11mo ago

I don't think you responded to the main concern. Let's say EU and US taxes AI tokens. India doesn't, so almost all prompting done by international companies now is outsourced to India, and still not taxed. Or do you tax AI companies and tax tokens "at source"? Then, obviously, they either lose competition with foreign (let's say Chinese) companies that do the same but are not taxed, or more likely all AI companies move out of EU and US.