Anthropic, SpaceX and Trump Accounts: Where AI Wealth-Sharing Proposals Stand
Anthropic said on Sunday that it will commit 5% of its shares to the Anthropic Public Benefit Fund, subject to stockholder approval. The fund is a wholly owned LLC, and the board can add up to 2% more for every 50% rise in company value above a set baseline. Anthropic counts its co-founders' pledge to donate 80% of their equity and an employee matching program, in which about half of staff participate, and puts the total committed to the public good at roughly 20%. The company chose an LLC over a 501(c)(3) to allow large nonprofit donations or direct distributions to specific populations. It said none of the equity will be used for lobbying or political giving. Anthropic has separately committed $200 million to studying the labor market effects of AI.
Musk's Pledge and Trump Accounts
Elon Musk replied that Anthropic should give the shares directly to the public. On Monday he posted that he will give one of his SpaceX shares to every child in America next year, and called it "the first of many." At Friday's closing price of $146.03, one share for each of about 72 million Americans under 18 is worth roughly $10.5 billion, according to BigGo Finance. Musk has not said how the shares would be delivered, which ages qualify, or whether parents must claim them.
The closest existing channel is Trump Accounts, created by the One Big Beautiful Bill Act and opened for contributions on July 4. Treasury deposits $1,000 for citizens born from 2025 through 2028, and families, employers and others can add up to $5,000 a year, invested in U.S. equity index funds. Treasury says more than 6 million children have signed up, 1.4 million of them eligible for the seed deposit. Michael and Susan Dell pledged $6.25 billion last December to put $250 into accounts for 25 million children aged 10 and under, directed to ZIP codes with a median household income of $150,000 or less. SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell and her husband pledged more than $320 million in SpaceX stock for over 2 million children, and Trump said in an interview that he expected Musk to give SpaceX stock to the accounts. The Associated Press noted that the same law cut Medicaid and SNAP.
What the Cash Trials Show
OpenResearch, a lab funded by Sam Altman, paid 1,000 low-income adults in Illinois and Texas $1,000 a month for three years and compared them with 2,000 people receiving $50. Recipients spent more on essentials such as food, housing and transportation and worked about 1.4 fewer hours a week, and the extra spending did not appear to improve health (NBER paper). Finland's two-year trial paid 560 euros a month to 2,000 people. First-year results showed no employment difference and better well-being, and a later evaluation reported a small employment gain. In Kenya, the researchers behind GiveDirectly's 12-year study found that villagers promised 12 years of payments of about $50 a month did better than those promised two years, while lump sums funded larger investments. Baby's First Years paid 1,000 mothers either $333 or $20 a month, and at age four it found no statistically significant effects on the children across seven areas assessed. Alaska has paid a yearly oil-fund dividend since 1982. The 2026 payment is $1,200, including a $200 energy payment, and legislators have set the amount since 2017.
Proposals on the Table
Musk's own proposal is universal high income: federal checks at levels above subsistence, which he has called the best response to AI-driven unemployment, with AI and robotics output holding down inflation. Karl Widerquist of Georgetown University-Qatar told Business Insider that Musk is right about the falling GDP cost of a basic income but should focus on low wages instead of unemployment. Musk has also said Trump Accounts are a nice gesture but that saving will be unnecessary under universal high income.
Equity-based proposals fall under the name universal basic capital. Sen. Bernie Sanders introduced a bill that would transfer 50% of the equity of AI companies with at least $200 million in annual revenue to a public fund, which he valued at about $7 trillion, with annual payouts to citizens. Altman has proposed an American Equity Fund that would levy 2.5% a year on large companies and private land to pay every adult a dividend. Gov. Gavin Newsom signed an executive order in May directing state agencies to evaluate universal basic capital concepts. AI Weekly's write-up of an Atlantic essay on the idea notes that workers losing jobs now cannot live on a distant equity stake, and that people under financial strain may sell their shares cheaply.
Anthropic has said it will share the fund's governance structure, the valuation milestones that can add to its stake, and a public benefit report in the coming months.
