Neil Reimer thinks AI money will return

I nonetheless cannot shake the phrases Neil Reimer mentioned throughout a roundtable dialogue I held in Athens in late Could. Talking at a vibrant new expertise pageant within the metropolis, he mentioned he had a “robust sense that some sort of redistribution goes to occur,” talking concerning the wealth accumulating round AI. he continued. “It might be voluntary or involuntary, however it is going to occur, and I hope it is voluntary,” he informed me, including that he thinks expertise leaders “can play a number one position in getting it carried out.”

To most individuals, that may sound like commonplace populism. For Rimer, co-founder of Index Ventures, one of the profitable enterprise companies of the previous 30 years, it appeared like a surprising factor to say publicly.

Reimer stepped away from day-to-day investing in 2021, spending a lot of his time in Athens, the place his spouse is from and the place his kids cherish their Greek passports. He confirmed as much as the interview sporting a rumpled button-down and denims, moderately than the quarter-zips and superb knitwear attribute of a lot of his colleagues. However Index’s latest returns have been distinctive, with the corporate elevating about $15 billion from outdoors traders since its founding, and final yr’s exits, together with Figma’s IPO and Google’s acquisition of cybersecurity firm Wiz, reportedly netting Index about $9 billion in earnings.

Reimer discovered a method to give again. He serves on the board of Endeavor Greece, which mentors entrepreneurs in rising markets, and served as chairman of Human Rights Watch from 2019 to 2025. In late 2021, he, his father, and two brothers donated $13 million to McGill College to renovate a campus constructing (now the Rymer Constructing) and set up a brand new Institute for Indigenous Research and Data.

Alternatively, his feedback on redistribution come at an odd time for philanthropy and donations. The Giving Pledge, a promise that Warren Buffett and Invoice Gates made in 2010 to get billionaires to donate half of their wealth to charity, is turning into more and more meaningless. The New York Instances reported in March that 113 households signed on within the first 5 years, adopted by 72, 43, and simply 4 in all of 2024. The report highlighted how philanthropy has grow to be outdated among the many tech trade’s wealthiest folks. (Observe for this text: “Elon Musk, the world’s richest man, believes that his enterprise istooth It is a charity exercise. ”)

This sample seems to carry even past pledges. In accordance with the Stanford Social Innovation Overview, whole U.S. charitable giving reached a file excessive of $592.5 billion in 2024, however the variety of Individuals really donating has declined for the fifth consecutive yr, dropping by 4.5% in 2024 alone. In 2000, two-thirds of households donated. About half now donate, and even rich households’ donations fell from 90% in 2017 to 81% final yr, based on knowledge from Financial institution of America and Lilly Household Faculties.

This sample additionally seems in Index’s personal portfolio, which incorporates Anthropic. Enterprise Insider not too long ago requested monetary planner Alex Caswell whether or not his newly rich shoppers, a lot of them Anthrop staff tied to efficient altruism, have dedicated to gifting away a big portion of their wealth. Anthropic donates as much as 25% of its staff’ inventory to charity, and whereas a few of Caswell’s shoppers benefit from that, he informed BI, most do not incorporate philanthropy into their plans in any respect. They centered on angel investing and beginning their very own firms. “Greater than a want to do charity work, that is what I see,” he informed the outlet.

Unsurprisingly, the absence of voluntary donations now faces makes an attempt to legislate the outcomes as a substitute. California voters will resolve this yr on a one-time 5% wealth tax on the state’s billionaires. Some folks, together with Google founders Sergey Brin and Larry Web page, have already moved their headquarters to South Florida to be safer.

OpenAI is reportedly contemplating going public in 2027, paradoxically partially as a result of if the tax passes, web price can be calculated based mostly on an individual’s world property as of the top of this calendar yr.

Naturally, there may be a lot opposition to a wealth redistribution measure of this magnitude, together with from Governor Gavin Newsom and economists who level out that many developed international locations have abolished related wealth taxes since 1990 in response to the antics of their rich residents.

Different choices on the desk are equally controversial. OpenAI is reportedly contemplating promoting a 5% stake to the federal authorities, and whereas CEO Sam Altman envisions sharing the optimistic features of AI with the general public, critics see this as extra of a manner to purchase political cowl in Washington. In both case, Silicon Valley was by no means eager on placing Uncle Sam on the cap desk. “Among the most harmful phrases on the earth are: ‘I am a authorities worker and I am right here to assist,'” veteran investor Roelof Botha joked in one other roundtable with this editor final yr.

It is price contemplating how a lot wealth lies outdoors these programs. After SpaceX’s IPO final month, Musk turned the primary particular person to be price greater than $1 trillion. Forbes journal counted 45 new AI billionaires in its 2026 rating alone, price a mixed $2.9 trillion, and this was earlier than Anthropic and OpenAI went public. In the identical BI article about Anthropic’s staff, BI says that after Anthropic and OpenAI full their IPOs, the mixed staff of each firms could have sufficient wealth to purchase almost a 3rd of all properties within the San Francisco metropolitan space.

that really feel Though unprecedented, it’s debatable whether or not that is an excessive historic instance. The share of wealth held by the highest 1% of U.S. households reached 31.7% within the third quarter of final yr, a file for the reason that Federal Reserve started monitoring the information in 1989, and about the identical share of wealth held by the remaining 90% of households outdoors the highest 10 mixed.

That is nonetheless under the 45% recorded by the highest 1% on the peak of the Gilded Age in 1916. Nonetheless, whenever you cease the lens right down to the tippy prime, the photograph is reversed. Famend economist Gabriel Zucman calculated that round 1910, on the peak of the Gilded Age, America’s 4 nice wealth teams collectively accounted for 4% of America’s GDP. Right now, that very same fraction of the inhabitants (now 19 households as a substitute of 4) is price 14%.

Whether or not voluntary or compelled, Reimer’s two paths have precedent from the final time American wealth focus reached this degree. In 1889, on the peak of the First Gilded Age, Andrew Carnegie revealed a paper arguing that wealthy folks ought to deal with their wealth as a belief to be distributed for the general public good throughout their lifetime, and that it was shameful to die wealthy. That essay, “The Gospel of Wealth,” turned a founding doc of contemporary philanthropy and the mental ancestor of the Giving Pledge.

Nonetheless, I couldn’t proceed down one other path for lengthy. By the mid-Nineteen Thirties, Louisiana Sen. Huey Lengthy had constructed up a nationwide following for a program referred to as “Share Our Wealth,” which referred to as for top taxes on the rich to offer funds for a assured earnings for all Individuals. Involved about dropping working-class help for Lengthy, Franklin Roosevelt pushed by what the press referred to as a “rich infiltration tax,” elevating the highest marginal earnings tax charge to 79 p.c. Though it didn’t lead to as a lot redistribution as Lengthy had hoped, it stays the clearest instance in American historical past of politically compelled redistribution after voluntary contributions didn’t adequately deal with the mounting pressures below it.

None of that is new to Reimer, who has spent his profession within the expertise trade. Much more fascinating to him was the “ethical middle of a expertise firm,” a fascination he found as an undergraduate at Stanford College in 1984 when he realized that Apple discounted the primary Macintosh to college students and that Steve Jobs and Apple’s different founders had been, in his phrases, “heroes” who constructed one thing they felt was really good for the world.

What bothers him now, he mentioned, is listening to his kids speak about sure tech firms the way in which earlier generations talked about protection contractors and tobacco producers.

Critics could be aware that Mr. Reimer, as an investor in Anthropic and different tech firms, is a direct beneficiary of the windfall that he says he’ll finally must share. However he hopes different beneficiaries will select to present some again moderately than have their cash taken away. There’s a straightforward manner and a tough manner to do that, and Reimer is betting that folks will select the simple manner earlier than historical past chooses it.