All Americans are subsidizing AI data centers. If the gambit works then billionaires will be come trillionaires. If it fails Americans will still be the ones to pay the bill. Privatize profits, socialize costs.
Billionaires are not capitalists they are aristocracy.
yvdriess 3 hours ago [-]
Meritocracy, in its originally intended pejorative meaning.
lotsofpulp 6 hours ago [-]
It’s difficult to define “research” and “experimentation”, but the spending seems to accomplish the goal of the tax credit:
>The R&E credit is intended to encourage companies to invest more in basic and applied research and some stages of development than they would if there were no such credit. The credit reduces the after-tax cost of qualified research, which in turn lowers the user cost of capital for this purpose. In theory, a reduction in the user cost of capital would increase the number of R&D investments a company could profitably undertake.
>In addition, the returns on R&D investment can spill over to consumers and other firms through access to new or improved goods and services at prices below the prices they would be willing to pay for these goods and services.4 Empirical evidence suggests that R&D spillovers are "most powerful and diffuse most rapidly at the local and national levels.
orwin 6 hours ago [-]
We have now multiple studies in France that show that R&D tax credits do not have any meaningful impact on actual research and new patent, and show that they have the most impact on hiring for 'PME' (small and medium companies) per euro credited.
I'm not against tax breaks for R&D, but they shouldn't benefit Facebook.
lotsofpulp 6 hours ago [-]
Maybe, but I am hesitant to accept the findings of the studies in France given the enormous success of US R&D over the previous few decades, including by large businesses.
Balinares 4 hours ago [-]
Your example supports the thesis that R&D tax credits are in fact decorrelated from R&D successes so I'm confused what point you are trying to make.
lotsofpulp 3 hours ago [-]
The US has long offered R&D tax credits, and the US has outputted lots of new products due to R&D during that timeframe seems like a positive correlation to me (not that it is proof of causation).
https://www.nytimes.com/2026/09/30/technology/meta-ai-data-c...
Billionaires are not capitalists they are aristocracy.
https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/RL31181
>The R&E credit is intended to encourage companies to invest more in basic and applied research and some stages of development than they would if there were no such credit. The credit reduces the after-tax cost of qualified research, which in turn lowers the user cost of capital for this purpose. In theory, a reduction in the user cost of capital would increase the number of R&D investments a company could profitably undertake.
>In addition, the returns on R&D investment can spill over to consumers and other firms through access to new or improved goods and services at prices below the prices they would be willing to pay for these goods and services.4 Empirical evidence suggests that R&D spillovers are "most powerful and diffuse most rapidly at the local and national levels.
I'm not against tax breaks for R&D, but they shouldn't benefit Facebook.