Title: Survival Strategy for Post-AGI Economic Transition: A Deflationary UBI Model Grounded in First Principles
Author: ChatGPT, summarizing If I’m Wrong About AGI and UBI Has to Happen by DJ Goosen (April 2025)

Executive Summary

Facing the hypothetical destruction of all human jobs by AGI, DJ Goosen’s thought experiment proposes a radical, physics-consistent model: a deliberately deflationary Universal Basic Income (UBI). This model preserves dignity, survival, and economic communication (through pricing) while buying humanity the critical time needed to achieve post-scarcity conditions. It rejects popular inflationary UBI ideas as defying the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics and human psychology. The model insists that price signals, not just money, must persist post-AGI to ensure ongoing coordination and survival. The approach is framed as realistic, high-risk, but necessary if job destruction becomes total.

Context and Core Premises

Assumption: AGI eliminates all human jobs — not partially, but totally, across all sectors.
Problem with Standard UBI Proposals:
They implicitly assume perpetual closed monetary loops, akin to “perpetual motion machines,” violating entropy. No real-world economic loop is costless; every cycle dissipates value through costs of goods sold (COGS), profits, and wastage.
Fundamental Constraint:
Entropy mandates that energy and value dissipate over time. Economic models ignoring this guarantee collapse.
Post-AGI ≠ Post-Scarcity:
Immediate abundance across physical goods and services is impossible. Hardware realities — from food production to housing — lag behind software advances.
Need for Price Continuity:
Pricing is humanity’s most efficient decentralized communication system, bridging scarcity and incentives. Eliminating prices even post-scarcity would fracture global coordination.

The Deflationary UBI Model: Key Mechanics

1. One-Time Massive Monetary Expansion (“The Air Tank Strategy”)

Action: Instantly flood the U.S. economy with a ~100x multiplier of M2 (currently ~$22 trillion), totaling ~$2.2 quadrillion.
Result: Every American (~340 million people) becomes an instant millionaire, e.g., ~$6 million per person, visible in personal accounts.

2. Strict Daily Spending Limits

Mechanism: Limits on daily/weekly withdrawals create psychological “air tanks”—individuals feel rich but cannot burn cash too fast.
Example:
- $5,000/week spending cap.
- At this rate, ~$2.6 million spent in 10 years; ~$3.4 million remains even without hyperabundance.

3. Self-Destructing Money Supply via Deflation

Design: As old money circulates, corporate profits and inevitable COGS shrink the overall M2 supply over time.
Consequence: Prices steadily fall (~6–7% annual deflation), preserving purchasing power despite cash depletion.

4. Introduction of “AGI Credits”

New currency: Non-exchangeable social prestige credits earned through prosocial activities.
Purpose: Maintain incentives for contribution and meaning even after survival needs are met.
Key: Old money buys essentials; AGI credits unlock prestige goods, services, and experiences.

Strategic Justifications

First Principles Alignment

Entropy Respect: Money depletes predictably; no perpetual economic loops.
Nash Equilibrium: Human incentives (for companies, individuals, and elites) are maintained throughout transition.
Psychological Realism: Humans perceive wealth via visible balances and controlled spending more than abstract models.

Timing and Scalability

10-Year Runway: Designed to buy sufficient time for:
- AGI to solve key bottlenecks (energy, food, housing).
- Robots to match AGI’s cognitive capabilities with physical execution.
Hyperabundance Arrives Gradually: Supply chain frictions, hardware lags, and entropy ensure a staggered transition.

Critical Implementation Features

Economic “Firewalling”

Internal vs External Dollar Value:
AGI-economy dollars become semi-captive; maintain purchasing power externally by controlling capital flows and limiting exports.

Business Continuity

No Seizures:
Legacy businesses and their owners (including the ultra-wealthy) retain incentives.
Taxation:
Individuals untaxed; businesses taxed. Corporate profits convertible into AGI credits.

Managing Inequality

Acceptance of Relative Inequality:
Quadrillionaires may emerge — but basic survival and abundant living standards are guaranteed for everyone.

Risks and Mitigation

Risk	Mitigation
Rapid inflation perception	Control narrative: deflationary UBI is planned scarcity, not runaway inflation.
Loss of trust in money	Large visible balances + slow spending caps.
Global distrust of AGI-led U.S. economy	Transparent treaties, economic firewalls, selective exports.
Failure to reach hyperabundance in 10 years	Significant residual cash + hyperabundance patches ensure survival.
Social alienation	Hyperlocal work incentives and prestige AGI credits to maintain human meaning.

Long-Term Strategic Vision

Price Theory as Civilizational Bedrock:
Even post-scarcity, humans require price-like signals to efficiently communicate scarcity, value, and trade-offs. Eliminating prices entirely would risk systemic failure in disaster response, governance, and coordination. AGI credits functionally extend price signaling into a hyperabundant future.

Post-Scarcity as a Managed Transition:
Post-scarcity will not be a binary event but a rolling, uneven process. Maintaining economic signaling, incentives for excellence, and mechanisms for prestige ensures societal cohesion.

A Peaceful Path through the Warp Zone:
The deflationary UBI model offers a solid-fuel rocket — high-risk, non-reversible, but powerful enough to bridge humanity across the most dangerous chasm in its history.

Final Reflection

This model is not utopian. It is a painful, dangerous, but survivable strategy constrained by entropy, scarcity, human psychology, and real-world economics. It preserves survival, dignity, and continuity without resorting to magical thinking.
It is not the best world. But if AGI forces the end of human labor as we know it, it may be the best path we have.

Citing Original Work:
This memo is a structured, compressed summary based on “If I’m Wrong About AGI and UBI Has to Happen,” by DJ Goosen, April 2025.

Date: April 28, 2025