Bill Gates published a lengthy essay on his Gates Notes website about AI’s social impacts.

He aligns mostly with the Responsible AI camp, endorsing the idea behind the open letter ‘Pacing The Frontier‘ that calls for an AI slowdown, though he doubts such a slowdown would be sustainable.

He is excited about AI’s potential in science and healthcare but worried about labor displacement.

Two novel proposals stand out: a robot tax, where employers would pay taxes on automation similar to payroll taxes for human workers, and ‘Human Reserved’ jobs, where certain roles would be legally barred from AI automation.

Gates argues the current tax system incentivizes replacing people with machines, and a robot tax could slow that rush while funding retraining and safety nets.

He also suggests designating specific occupations as human-only, both for economic reasons (e.g., construction workers who cannot easily switch to elder care) and for human dignity (e.g.

, a robot should not deliver a terminal diagnosis). He acknowledges these ideas would reduce profits for major AI labs, which may explain why they haven’t been widely discussed.

Open questions remain about who would set such rules and what they would specify.