Virtue or Self-Preservation? A Skeptical Look at AI Makers' Safety Alarms

This is a random thought, but it's been on my mind all week, so I feel the need to put it in writing to get it out of my head. I have been troubled by the news cycle concerning how the top AI maker companies are "sounding the alarm" over AI and are practically begging the US government to step in and regulate the industry. 

Okay... since when do for-profit companies in a capitalistic economy request government intervention? Government intervention in markets and companies is often seen as government overreach, and it is rarely welcomed. In this article, I reflect on a few possible reasons these AI makers are asking for the government to meddle in their own industry. There may be more reasons than I share, and I am open to correction.

(1) The companies have created a technological monster that they can no longer control.

Perhaps these AI makers have been shady about it, but now they realize they can no longer hide the dark reality AI will bring to society. Therefore, they want the government to step in so that later, when things might get grim, these AI companies can save themselves by placing "blame" on the government. If AI models go rogue and act nefariously, or if enemy actors get their hands on unchecked AI capabilities, these companies can say, “We warned the government back then... why didn't they do anything about it?"

But this ignores the fact that these companies will have created the AI monster in the first place. 

(2) The companies want to block out competition and secure an exclusive domain in the AI industry

Perhaps there is no AI rogue monster, but these AI companies fear that foreign companies will take their market share. So they exaggerate the AI scare, forcing the government to act and regulate the industry. But from a business perspective, this secures market share for companies like Anthropic, OpenAI, xAI (SpaceX), Meta, and Google. They create a problem, force the government's hand, then secure a seat at the government table to steer AI regulation. 

This would be no different from a chocolate candy company making a super-addictive chocolate that no one could resist, then fabricating mass hysteria about how bad it would be if other chocolate companies began producing similar chocolate. Then the chocolate company “sounds the alarm” that the government must regulate the chocolate candy industry because it could get dangerous. Finally, the chocolate company stands ready to "advise" the government on how to regulate the chocolate candy industry. Calling this a conflict of interest would be an understatement. 

Kind of like how the Food Pyramid for healthy foods “recommended” by the FDA was developed largely by executives from the manufactured food industry... I'm sure there are no biases towards corporate profits in that system. 

(3) The companies fear an AI tech bubble and are positioning themselves to be bailed out by the government.

Just like the Dot-Com bubble of the late 90s/early 2000s, I have a sneaky suspicion an AI bubble is looming. I'm not a market prophet nor the son of a market prophet. I just have a BS in Economics and was taught Austrian economics by Libertarian economists, so what do I know about markets? Maybe not much, but I do know a bit about market history. 

The Dot-Com bubble was a massive overpricing of future expectations for key companies (most of them start-ups) that were all the rage for the new iteration of internet-based tech companies. Once these companies could no longer consistently produce results that met investor expectations, investors bailed out... many companies evaporated, and the market crashed into correction territory (maybe overcorrection).

I was an undergraduate studying economics during the 2007-2008 Great Recession. I am not sure what was so great about it. But nonetheless, it was truly a time to be alive, that is, if you were a young economics student planning to be an economics professor who would later crash and burn that career path because of something called advanced math. We watched the news of financial markets collapsing and economies receding, then went to class and had professors teach us economics through these live (and often tragic) events. Of all the lessons I learned in that four-year degree (which I magically turned into five years), one stands out and reminds me of what is happening in the current AI industry. The US government will absolutely refuse to let some companies fail. 

Which companies receive the bailout blessing from the US government? In my humble opinion, it is companies in a sector of the US economy that has consolidated a significant share of US market growth. Second place criterion might be companies in a sector that accounts for a significant portion of GDP growth. Sometimes these two criteria align. But often, the government bails out companies most likely to crash markets. I know it can be more complicated than this, but just go along and let me have my moment. 

This is where the “too big to fail” phrase comes from. The company has a high valuation, makes up a significant portion of a sector’s value, and that sector has consolidated much of the total US market value. Thus, the government may deem a company like that too influential to crash and burn, or else the ripple effects of that crash may crash the entire US economic system (at least for a time). I believe some of these AI companies fit, or nearly fit, this definition.  

Currently (as of mid 2026), the Technology sector of the US stock market makes up as much as 37% of the S&P 500 index. I’ll use the S&P 500 because it makes up about 80% of total US public company value. These percentages get tricky because the numbers change depending on the measuring standard used. Some indexes categorize companies oddly. For instance, I consider Alphabet (Google) and Meta (Facebook) technology companies, but many official standards categorize them in the “Communication Services” sector, which removes them from the Technology sector.

Therefore, if we categorize Technology companies along with Communication Services companies (including Google, Facebook, etc.), then these sectors make up nearly 50% of the S&P 500! Oh, and by the way, Amazon and Tesla are classified in a different sector called “Consumer Discretionary.” So the 50% does not include these two behemoth tech companies. A Yahoo Finance analyst reported back in the summer that the Technology, Media, and Telecommunications sectors are around nine percentage points higher than the Dot-Com bubble’s peak consolidation before the bubble popped. The core ingredients for a bubble in the AI industry are already baked in, at least in my mind.

Apple, Microsoft, Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Meta (Facebook), Nvidia, and Tesla make up what analysts refer to as the Magnificent Seven. As of September 2026, the Magnificent Seven made up over 30% of the S&P 500’s total value. Nvidia alone makes up roughly just over 7% of the S&P 500. All of this to say that out of the largest 500 publicly traded companies in America, seven of them make up around 30% of that entire value! Those seven companies are also heavily involved in the AI industry.

It’s also ironic that I used AI to help me research this data (thanks, Claude)... but anyway. 

Mind you, Anthropic and OpenAI are not publicly traded yet. But they soon will be. Thus, we return to the original question. Why would the creators and most significant producers and users of AI cry out for government intervention? Why would some of the largest companies in the US that have thrived mightily on a capitalistic system cry out for the government to regulate their beloved AI? 

Since when does the toy maker ask the government to regulate toy makers when he is making profits of biblical proportions without the government’s involvement so far? I suggest the toy maker may have caught a glimpse of the future. The future might reflect an era when his investors get mad and bail on him because they realize his toys are not producing the financial rewards the hype demanded. His toys may not produce the results needed to justify the high-value investments his investors made. What can the toy maker do? He can make himself too valuable. He could make the success of the US market tied to his own company’s success. He could become too entrenched with politicians’ own coffers. Then, he can cry for the government to regulate his toy industry so he has a sure pathway to a bailout.  

I cannot be convinced that these AI companies sounding the alarm are motivated by altruism. Another lesson from my Economics degree is that companies operate for profit and will fight to survive and preserve it. For-profit companies do not operate on conscience; they operate on revenue and margin. 

What’s the point of all of this?  My mind snaps back to what I studied about the run-up to the Dot-Com crash and what I saw live during the Great Recession. I think Americans should pay attention to what materializes from the recent push by AI companies calling for government intervention. I think we can be certain they are not asking the government to step in out of the kindness of their hearts. 

They may be scared of the monster they created and are hedging their bets so they can shift responsibility and blame onto the government. Or they could be selfishly trying to shut out further competition in the industry by fabricating a scare to bait the government into stepping in and regulating who wins and loses in the AI space. Or, in my opinion, the more likely case, a growing bubble in the AI industry is closer to popping, and these companies want to hedge their bets with Uncle Sam so that when the time comes, they can survive. I have no idea how long it might be until this theorized bubble pops. It could still take years. But all the signs leading up to the Dot-Com bubble are there, at least in my mind. Several signs leading up to the Great Recession are also in the mix. For instance, overvaluations and reckless spending, but in a new industry this time: AI. Adding to these concerns is the amount of US government debt. 

 Charles Darwin was wrong. The strongest and fittest do not survive because nature selects them too. The survivors (in this case, companies) are those who are inseparably bound up in the dominant institutions and markets. Institutions can be counted on to do one thing without fail. They will always act to protect their own interests and survival. Just like these AI companies can be counted on to do what is best for their own interests, not the interests of the populace. If someone can prove me wrong, I would be excited by that refutation.  

I like to write about ethics and cultural issues, so I wondered what my out-loud ramblings about this topic might have to do with ethics. Well, it does. Can we trust companies, immensely large companies, to do what is ethical concerning their own products and regulate themselves? I think not. People are moral agents; companies are not. Companies are a thing; they are not a who. But companies are made up of people. Thus, companies are only as ethical and virtuous as their people. However, in these massive companies, power and influence are often consolidated in the hands of a select few at the top. Everyone else below them are soldiers who follows orders; I mean, they do have mortgages to pay off, after all. And the select few in power can always be counted on to protect their profits and interests. That is why I find it fascinating (not a good fascination) that these influential AI companies are calling for a slowdown in AI development and government regulation. 

AI companies like Anthropic, OpenAI, xAI, and Alphabet are sounding the alarm about AI, citing public safety. Ironically, they now want to warn everyone about the very AI they created. Can we trust companies like these to act ethically? Can we trust companies like these to operate on moral principles that act for the good of society and people? I am not convinced we can. Should we hold them to high ethical standards? Of course! But how can we? We should be able to count on our institutions and government. Only time will tell what they do with the AI industry.

These are strange times indeed, and it will be interesting to see where this situation ends. But for now, I am very suspicious of the motives of these AI companies asking for government regulation because of safety concerns. In my mind, there must be a self-preserving motive behind their push. And the fact that the key AI players are all in it together makes me think it’s an AI industry issue, not just one company’s problem. 

If there is any personal application to my long rant, I suppose it is this. If you are an employee, regardless of your industry, do everything you can to be more than just a soldier who follows orders. Do everything you can to help your company be virtuous and ethical by living out good morality inside your company. Be the employee others in your company can trust to do the right thing no matter what. That type of behavior can be infectious.

A final word of application is to be a person who is motivated by doing good to others and your society, rather than motivated out of self-interest and self-preservation. So amid all the current AI hype, craze, and even fears, take heart, press on, and be a virtuous person.