The only elected official in D.C. whom I’ve heard voice a plan to solve the national debt is Rand Paul of Kentucky, a favorite whipping boy for President Trump because of his contrarian views.
Add Elon Musk to the list of contrarians like Paul.
Unlike the Senator who sees tightening of spending as the key to solving the national debt crisis, Musk sees AI (artificial intelligence) and robotics leading the way to a debt-free country.
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In a podcast interview airing yesterday, Musk said: “I think, actually, the only thing that can solve for the debt situation is AI and robotics.”
He sees a three-year timeline for AI and robotics to have their effect on the economy, specifically on productivity. Because Ai and robots are cheaper than humans, their use will result in deflation.
“If you have AI and robotics, and a dramatic increase in the output of goods and services, probably you will have deflation. That seems likely. Because you simply won’t be able to increase the money supply as fast as you can increase the output of goods and services,” he said.
“AI has not yet made enough of an impact on productivity to increase the goods and services faster than the money supply. The U.S. is increasing the money supply quite substantially with deficits that are on the order of $2 trillion, so you have to have goods and services output more than that in order to not have inflation.”
This is all a bit tricky, but what he is saying is that the U.S. can quit printing money to pay for goods because goods (consumer, military, you name it) will be vastly cheaper. Taxes will be suddenly sufficient for everything.
However, someone will have to pay the millions of people suddenly out of work, and presumably that will be federal government handouts.
Stay tuned. I’m sure he has an answer for that as well.
