The core idea is genuinely simple. Large, profitable firms that see their earnings rise because of AI and automation commit a small, clearly defined share of those realised gains. The money doesn't come from thin air. Contributions are triggered only when a firm's audited AI or automation EBIT uplift crosses the 5% mark for two consecutive quarters. That threshold protects the 61% of companies that have no measurable EBIT boost yet. It's fair. You don't pay until you genuinely win.
Those contributions are then offset against the firm's existing Corporation Tax bill. For the company, it's a reallocation. Not a new burden. The money flows not into government coffers but into a regional AID Trust. A legally independent, professionally managed endowment. Think Norway's sovereign wealth fund, but built for the automation age.
Here's the critical shift that makes AID different from every transfer scheme out there. The levy pool isn't a checking account that gets emptied each year. It's an endowment. The Trust invests those contributions in a globally diversified portfolio - equities, bonds, real assets, perhaps even stakes in automation‑intensive firms themselves. The portfolio generates returns. Those returns pay the monthly dividend to displaced workers. The original corpus stays invested and compounds. Year after year. Decade after decade.
Let's use a rough illustration. Suppose major automation‑intensive firms in the US and Europe together earn about $800 billion in annual profit. Once they cross the EBIT trigger, a 7% cap on contributions would generate around $56 billion each year. Set aside 20% for administration, verification, payment rails, the citizen audit programme, and seeding baby bonds. That leaves roughly $45 billion that can flow into the endowment. Invested wisely, that $45 billion grows. In five years it's a much larger pool. In twenty years it's enormous. The dividend payments come from the annual returns, not from eating the principal. This is how you build a machine that gets stronger with time, not weaker.
The reference dividend for a fully displaced worker stays at $3,000 per month. $36,000 a year. It's anchored to the MIT Living Wage Calculator plus BLS data data. It's inflation‑indexed. In a typical year, with a blend of full and partial displacements, the Trust can support roughly 1.7 to 2.1 million people. And as more firms cross the profit threshold, the endowment grows. The 7% cap automatically scales the total inflow. No legislative fight required. That's a democratic safeguard in itself.
A portion of the levy - a small percentage - seeds a baby bond for every newborn citizen. That bond sits inside a universal asset account, invested in the same diversified pool as the Trust. It grows over a person's childhood and early adulthood. When they turn 18, they gain access for education, training, or a first home. But the account doesn't close. Tiny annual top‑ups from the endowment keep it growing throughout their life. This is automatic capital accumulation. Wealth that doesn't depend on having a high‑paying job or rich parents. It's Layer 2 and 3 capital ownership, built into the system from birth.
There isn't one giant global AID Trust. That would be a target too tempting for capture. Instead, we'll have a network of regional Trusts - for North America, Europe, and others as the system expands. Each Trust sets its own levy cap within the global treaty's ceiling, chooses its own investment managers, and runs its own tri‑chamber board with citizen, labour, and business representatives. Decisions about the reference payment and sector triggers happen at the regional level. The global treaty only locks in the non‑negotiables: profit‑threshold funding, the 7% ceiling, inflation indexing, baby bonds, and citizen voting rights. This is subsidiarity in action. Power stays close to the people it affects.