VC Vinod Khosla says US government could take 10% stake in all public companies to soften AGI blow

Vinod Khosla has a bold vision for how to reshape society to share the abundance created by AI technology. Speaking at the TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 conference on Tuesday, the Khosla Ventures founder suggested that the US government could take a 10% stake in all public companies and redistribute corporate wealth to the public at large.

As Khosla put it, the idea was spurred by President Donald Trump’s decision for the US government to buy a 10% stake in Intel. “When Trump bought 10% of Intel, I wondered if that was a good idea,” Khosla said on stage at Disrupt. “Take 10% of every company and put it in the National People’s Pool. That’s really interesting. Just take 10% of every public company.”

AI leaders have explored UBI proposals in the past, most notably in OpenResearch’s expansive study on cash payments, which was supported in part by Sam Altman. However, it is rare for a prominent investor to explicitly endorse a national stake in a private industry. Khosla acknowledged the controversy on stage, but said the extreme proposals were necessary to maintain social cohesion by disrupting artificial general intelligence.

“I will take criticism for this idea,” Khosla said. “But you know, sharing the AI ​​wealth is a really big need to level the playing field for everyone… We won’t need to do that in 15 years, but we have to take care of those people. And by 2035, we’re going to have a pretty deflationary economy.”

Khosla also warned that the rise of artificial intelligence will also lead to job displacement, requiring major societal changes. He added that for startup founders, this represents an opportunity to build, noting that there is a startup working on building artificial intelligence for every profession, such as accounting, medicine, chip design, auditing, marketing, entertainment, and others.

The venture capitalist also suggested that the nature of work will change in the age of artificial intelligence, as jobs performed by people today could disappear. He noted that work such as assembling a tire on an assembly line or working as a farmer “is not a job that humans should do.”

“This is slavery for survival,” Khosla said.