Incidentally, minimums, where earnings less than $X are increased to $X, are terrible and break incentives near the minimum. Much better are base incomes, guaranteed uniformly to even the wealthy.
Incidentally, minimums, where earnings less than $X are increased to $X, are terrible and break incentives near the minimum. Much better are base incomes, guaranteed uniformly to even the wealthy.
This is assuming that the robots are owned by a monopoly or a cartel. Such a case is an obvious candidate for government to step in and break them up.
On the other hand, if the robots are owned by companies that aggressively compete with each other, how much do goods cost when they're made by robots using robot-produced raw materials? The more humans we replace by robots, the lower the cost of goods will be and the easier it is for charity or government to provide them gratis to the public.
> The more humans we replace by robots, the lower the cost of goods will be
Most physical goods have two parts: materials and labor. Even if robots were to bring the labor cost to approximately zero, we still have the material cost. So you're right that you don't necessarily have to own the robots to successful, but you do have to own resources.
Even in the most pessimistic case where you have a valuable scarce resource with no substitutes then you have something to tax which will produce revenue that can be used to supply necessities to the public.