Owning databases that we help build: Can it end capitalism as we know it?
From interest rates to fashion, pandemics in the past — like the
Black Death in the 14th century — have left deep imprints on economic life.
This time may be no different. In the aftermath of the coronavirus, governments
can reimagine capitalism by
giving all of us a stake in the most valuable byproduct of our day-to-day
living: data. But make no mistake. It will still be a Faustian bargain.
A global data profit will be a very different GDP from gross
domestic product. The case for technology companies to share it with we, the
people who supply them the bits and bytes, is compelling. In fact, it could
even emerge as a better universal basic income — another revolutionary concept
whose time may have come — for the post-Covid world.
A state-provided allowance can improve citizens’ well-being, a
widely studied Finnish experiment has shown. Yet only a small group of
developed countries would even have a chance of sustaining a meaningful
subsidy, provided taxpayers agree. Most developing nations would balk at the
expense. Inequality between the global North and South would worsen.
This is where a share of global data profit for the 63 per cent of
the world population that’s already online could prove helpful. The FANG
quartet — Facebook Inc., Amazon.com Inc., Netflix Inc. and Google parent Alphabet Inc. —
garners $140 billion in combined operating earnings. China’s BAT trinity of
Baidu Inc., Alibaba Group Holding Ltd. and Tencent Holdings Ltd. hauls in
another $50 billion. Throw in device makers like Apple Inc., Samsung
Electronics Co. and Xiaomi Corp., payment processors like Visa Inc., Mastercard
Inc., and Paypal Holdings Inc., and the available profit pie of our data
overlords is at least $350 billion. Their combined revenue is in excess of $1.3
trillion.
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