Could AI Pay Americans $1 Million Each? New Think Tank Forecast Sparks Jim Chanos' SpaceX Jab: 'Seems Reasonable'

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The AI Futures Project, a non-profit initiative that forecasts the future of artificial intelligence, recently outlined a proposal for a citizen's dividend by the U.S. government following AI-induced unemployment.

In the AI 2040 Plan A, the non-profit says that by 2033, AI-induced unemployment would rise due to the advent of millions of AI agents boosting productivity.

"Across a variety of companies, there are now 60 million AI agents running continuously at 20x human speed," the project said. The non-profit then mentions a plan that involves the American government distributing the "majority of compute and robot permit fees as a Citizen's Dividend… to all American adults."

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The plan mentions the dividend starting at $45,000 per person in 2032, but climbing to $1 million per person by 2035 and $10 million by 2040. The plan also predicts AI reaching a labor share of 85% by 2035.

The initiative also predicts the U.S. government "distributing an average of $1,200 per person per year to the rest of the world's adult population" of around 4 billion people. The plan excludes China because it would be "experiencing a similar AI wealth boom." The plan says it will reach $10k by 2035.

Earlier, OpenAI was reportedly offering the President Donald Trump administration a 5% stake in the company amid CEO Sam Altman's past proposal for a universal basic capital model that involved distributing a small share of AI-generated wealth.

Taking to the social media platform X on Thursday, short-seller James Chanos weighed in on the predictions. "At about the same time $SPCX's valuation exceeds global GDP. Seems reasonable," he said, pointing to Space Exploration Technologies Corp..

At about the same time $SPCX's valuation exceeds global GDP. Seems reasonable. https://t.co/cdQb9SpHfR

— James Chanos (@RealJimChanos) July 9, 2026

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The comments come as SpaceX CEO Elon Musk had said that the company would be worth more than the entire planet in the future. "You don't seem to understand that SpaceX will be worth more than the rest of Earth if we accomplish our goals," Musk had said.

He had earlier also said that the limiting factor for AI was Earth-based data centers, touting Space as the only way to meaningfully scale AI.

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