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18th Feb 2017

Bill Gates: ‘If a robot takes your job, then it should pay taxes’

Rory Cashin

One of the world’s most technologically-minded (not to mention richest) people thinks that robots should be taxed just like their human counterparts.

The co-founder of Microsoft believes that if a robot replaces a human in doing a job, then that robot should be taxed at a similar level, with those taxes then being pumped forward into financing jobs in assisting the elderly or teaching school-kids.

Only a few days ago it was reported by Reuters that a similar EU robot tax was rejected, with the plan to take the money made from taxation to then be used in retraining the workers that the robots had replaced.

Talking to Quartz, Gates says “It is really bad if people overall have more fear about what innovation is going to do than they have enthusiasm. That means they won’t shape it for the positive things it can do.”

Clip via Quartz

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