Two observations:
1. Money is a human construction and is used to reflect human claims on other humans through the economy as a whole. It is therefore nonsensical to claim that any non-human entity can pay taxes. It's utterly impractical to demand tax payments from any entity that doesn't also receive payments.
2. If we evolve to a society where say 10% of the population owns 100% of the means of production of all goods and services, well, then, there has to be some resolution of what to do with the other 90%. Give them money (from taxes or just printed) is one common leftist fantasy. Let them all starve is probably closer to the grim reality of human history. But mechanisms like new taxes that are somehow understandable from our current point of view are just silly.
A few thoughts about your post....
We are not really talking about holding a non-sentient, non- reactive apparatus responsible for the payment of taxes, are we? No, what us proposed is simply taxation of capital equipment that returns value to the corporation in an amount exceeding it's cost.
In the case of robots, the corporation profits by way of dramatically increased productivity AND through the elimination of the economic burden associated with human workers who are made redundant. Yes?
If a given robot can mine more coal than seventy-five human coal miners (there is in fact a robot that will do just that), thousands of workers will be sacked with the introduction of a relative few robots. True?
If thousands are thus made redundant, what kinds of undesirable consequences are precipitated?
Firstly, taxing authorities lose revenue because those who lose their jobs are not obliged to pay taxes on non-existent earned income.
Second, the productive abilities if thousands will lie fallow.
Third, homes will be foreclosed, rents will go unpaid, children will go hungry and be forced to wear other people's shoes. Families will break-up, some will grow despondent and commit suicide.
Fourth, cars will be reposessed, new purchases will be curtailed, people will suffer greatly.
Local economies, especially in rural America will tip over.
These unfortunate events are but a few of the problems that will inevitably result when robots replace men.
What to do? The Capitalist will see no reason to do anything at all. He will celebrate the acquisition of ever greater wealth and negotiate the purchase of more robots. He will be supported in this by so-called "conservatives" and right-leaning political functionaries. He will buy politicians outright to pass laws that protect his enormous wealth.
There is a better way: Tax the robots and use the revenue to retrain workers for jobs that actually exist in the US economy.
Many displaced workers -coal miners for instance-live in very rural areas where there is little opportunity for them to obtain schooling to qualify for the kinds of new jobs that will be created in our technology driven economy. Tax revenue from robots can serve as an important revenue stream to fund job training and re-training. In this way, many of the negative consequences already noted may be avoided.
Squire
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