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Comment by wwind123 | Hacker News Reader

I agree UN sounds like a good organization to help distribute the wealth created by AI to the world. But this idea won't be considered by the current U.S. administration. In that case what other countries can do is probably to tax the AI companies at rates higher than regular companies.

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The USA helped form the UN as specifically the organisation to do exactly this kind of thing. It's a shame the current administration can't play nicely with others.

The current administration is also playing strange games about export controls (can we run Fable yet? Kinda. Maybe). I think if they keep this up they'll just be shooting the US AI industry in the foot and the Chinese models will take over as the frontier models.

Maybe the UN can levy the USA for this, and leave the USA to collect that levy from its AI companies.

The US formed the UN to distribute funds?

> Maybe the UN can levy the USA for this

The UN has no "levy" powers.

True, good point.

Do you really want countries like Saudi Arabia and North Korea to have a vote in wealth redistribution?

I suppose countries like KSA and DPRK would ask the same question about us.

Fortunately we don't have to care much about questions asked by shithole countries today because the UN is virtually powerless. Let's keep it that way.

at this point I'm just confused whether you are talking about north korea or the us

What's confusing you? Do you want Kim Jong Un to have a say in decisions affecting the US or how money is spent?

It's about how to benefit the entire human species, or at least to reduce human suffering across the board. If there is famine in North Korea, then the surplus food from the world flowing into there won't be an issue right?

Yes, that would be an issue because it allows the regime to divert more resources to weapons. In general major famines are always caused by corrupt or incompetent political leaders rather than lack of food.

Famine could be caused by drought or flood or other numerous things. When the country can't produce enough food, its people would need to rely on food from outside.

Yes, and when the local officials are corrupt or incompetent then little off that outside food aid reaches the people who need it. That's why giving food to a country like North Korea does more harm than good.

The UN is a terrible organization for that. It is a corrupt, morally bankrupt institution. Giving it any more power or legitimacy is not a net positive.

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