Billionaire Vinod Khosla Suggests America Rethink Taxation In The Age Of AI

Billionaire investor Vinod Khosla suggested as many as 125 million people should be exempt from paying income taxes in the coming decades as artificial intelligence gets closer to eliminating a mass number of jobs, suggesting the government make up the lost revenue by relying on capital gains tax. Key Facts Khosla wrote on X the AI boom will require a "rethink of capitalism and equity" and suggested increasing capital gains taxes would allow the government to eliminate "the bottom 125 million taxpayers from the tax rolls." He also suggested eliminating certain tax breaks—like tax-free borrowing against unrealized gains—would help to make up the deficit. There are only about 160 million taxpaying Americans, and Khosla’s plan would exempt almost 80% of them from income taxes. Last year, Khosla suggested it may be necessary to implement a universal basic income for lower-income Americans whose jobs are eliminated due to AI automation, predicting 80% of jobs will soon be handled by AI. A video Khosla shared this week highlighted dozens of jobs being replaced by AI in his venture capital firm's portfolio, including personal assistants, financial analysts, doctors, accountants, customer service agents and more. Big Number 92 million. That's how many jobs will be displaced by AI by 2030, according to the World Economic Forum’s Future of Jobs Report 2025. Key Background Economic experts have been warning about the loss of jobs due to artificial intelligence automation for years. More than 50,000 jobs cuts in 2025 were blamed on AI, according to career services firm Challenger, Gray and Christmas, with another 20,000 in 2023 and 2024. Aneesh Raman, LinkedIn’s chief economic officer, said in a New York Times op-ed that AI is destroying the “bottom rungs of the career ladder,” eliminating entry level jobs and significantly cutting into the hiring of recent college graduates. Tech billionaires like Elon Musk and Bill Gates, as well as leaders like Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman, have all suggested artificial intelligence is on its way to automating a significant portion of white-color work and, in some scenarios, could eliminate the need for traditional jobs altogether. Last May, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei predicted AI could drive unemployment up 10% to 20% in the next five years. Women and people of color are expected to be disproportionately impacted by AI job automation. Crucial Quote “In my little group chat with my tech CEO friends, there’s this betting pool for the first year there is a one-person billion-dollar company, which would’ve been unimaginable without AI. And now [it] will happen,” OpenAI CEO Sam Altman saidlast year. Read the full story on Forbes: By Mary Whitfill Roeloffs https://www.forbes.com/sites/maryroeloffs/2026/02/17/billionaire-khosla-if-125-million-are-unemployed-by-ai-they-shouldnt-pay-taxes/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices