Sam Altman proposes a 32-hour workweek, new AI taxes, and a public wealth fund to cushion job losses and reduce inequality.
OpenAI released a sweeping 13-page policy blueprint on April 6, 2026, proposing what CEO Sam Altman compares to the scale of the Progressive Era and New Deal. The document, titled 'Industrial Policy for the Intelligence Age: Ideas to keep people first,' sketches an economic transformation centered on three principles: distributing AI-driven prosperity more broadly, building safeguards against systemic risks, and preventing concentrated economic power through widespread access to AI capabilities.
At the heart of the proposal sits a Public Wealth Fund modeled after Alaska's Permanent Fund, the most radical element of OpenAI's policy vision. Rather than funneling AI profits to shareholders, the fund would be seeded by contributions from AI companies themselves, then invest in AI firms and businesses adopting automation technology. Returns would distribute directly to American citizens as dividends, making citizens equity holders in the AI economy rather than casualties of it. Altman's framing rejects the false choice between productivity gains and employment stability.
The proposal attacks the tax code directly. OpenAI calls for a robot tax on automated labor while shifting taxation from payroll toward capital gains and corporate income. The logic is straightforward: as machines replace workers, the revenue base erodes unless tax policy evolves. Alongside this, the blueprint includes 32-hour workweek pilots subsidized by government, with the guarantee that workers maintain current pay levels. The goal transforms productivity gains into reduced hours rather than layoffs, keeping people attached to the workforce and the social fabric that employment provides.
Perhaps most striking are the automatic safety net mechanisms, which sidestep the legislative gridlock that has paralyzed labor policy for decades. When AI-related job displacement crosses defined thresholds, income support, wage insurance, and direct cash payments activate automatically without requiring new legislation. As labor market indicators recover, these programs wind down. According to reporting from The Next Web, this approach treats AI-driven disruption as a measurable phenomenon with policy levers already available, rather than a crisis requiring months of congressional negotiation.
Underpinning these economic proposals is an acknowledgment of darker possibilities. OpenAI explicitly warns of AI safety scenarios where dangerous systems become autonomous and self-replicating, unable to be easily recalled. The company estimates that AI-enabled cyberattacks could become feasible within one year, a timeline that has prompted calls for containment playbooks and government coordination. As Newsweek reports, these safety concerns inject urgency into the economic restructuring: the window to distribute the gains of AI broadly is narrowing, and the case for structural reform grows more pressing with each passing month.