Bernie Sanders has proposed creating an American AI sovereign wealth fund that would give the public a direct ownership stake in the country’s largest artificial intelligence companies, The Washington Post reports.
Under the plan, major AI firms would transfer a significant portion of their stock into a publicly owned fund, allowing Americans to share in the wealth generated by the rapidly growing AI sector rather than concentrating those gains among technology executives, investors and large corporations.
The proposal would make the fund a major shareholder in leading AI companies, granting the public both financial benefits and a degree of influence over corporate governance. Revenue generated by the fund could be distributed to Americans through annual dividend payments while also supporting public investments in areas such as healthcare, education and housing.
Sanders argues that AI is built on decades of publicly funded research and collective human knowledge, and therefore its economic rewards should be shared broadly.
The idea arrives amid a growing debate over how to manage the immense wealth AI could create and how to address potential job displacement and rising inequality. Supporters see a sovereign wealth fund as a way to ensure that AI-driven prosperity benefits the public, while critics warn that large government ownership stakes in private companies could distort markets, discourage innovation and create concerns about government influence over the technology sector.
