I was funemployed for a 9 month stretch last year (layoff severance package, followed by waiting for a visa and traveling), and when I wasn't traveling, I found my life kind of falling apart with a lack of structure. I tried to schedule workout classes and hobbies, as well as involvement in my church, but it just didn't fill my time, and none of my friends were free during the day. I spent a lot of time with my retired parents, but the time we spent together became very low quality, and it was tinged with the knowledge that I ought to be doing something else with a lot of my time. I also spent a lot of time scrolling.

I started work again 3 weeks ago, and I find myself using the time outside of work much better because there is less of it.

I would still love a 30 hour work week, and if I had young children, I am certain that I would cherish time off much more.

Working to keep a roof over the head of yourself and those you love is a necessity. It can become an identity if you enjoy what you do, sure, but that is not a given for, I'd say, a big majority of the workforce, globally.

You have value just by virtue of being a living being. No one needs work to have or portray value, that's just capitalist propaganda.

My own identity certainly isn't "IT manager," nor do I derive life meaning or self actualization from what do to collect a salary to feed myself and have shelter. In fact, my career/job is by far the least important thing in my life, I have it purely out of necessity.

For one thing, the financial barrier may not necessarily stay that high forever.

For another, such regulations could prevent a competitor from making the weights open for their model to try and disrupt the competition.

And finally, Amodei would no doubt want to be involved in designing the tests the AI needs to pass, and could (and likely would) design it in a way that Anthropic models would be able to pass easier than competing models.

Well he explicitly calls for regulations that ban open weight models, which of course hugely threaten Anthropic's API business model. If we got a open weight model actually around as good as Opus 4.6 that would be extremely bad for them.

Regulating competitors out of existence like that is textbook regulatory capture.

Dario is also huge on regulations banning Chip exports to China, who are the only other real competitors to US Labs, open weight or not.

Also invariably, such corporations always create regulations that are easier for them and harder for competitors.

You'd need a ton of money if you followed the unoptimized, cash burning mindset of existing AI labs. There's probably a ton of optimization that is just sitting on the table. Chinese labs have proven it can be done for way less money.

Then there's running inference service of open weights, which doesn't necessarily require opening a lab. You can grab Chinese model weights and sell inference.

Anthropic wants to make sure nobody can open a new domestic lab, or provide inference services of unauthorized open weight models, or release open weights if model is good. It is regulatory capture - it covers all areas that are dangers to Anthropic's bottom line.