The long-running rivalry between Elon Musk and Sam Altman has found a new point of disagreement.

Musk believes money could become almost meaningless within the next 10 years as artificial intelligence and robots make goods and services so abundant that people may no longer need money in the way they do today.

Altman, however, is not convinced.

Speaking to TMZ in a recent street interview, the OpenAI CEO was asked about Musk’s prediction that “money won’t matter by 2036.” Altman agreed that AI and robotics could bring huge prosperity and make many goods and services much cheaper. But he said he does not believe that would make money irrelevant.

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Sam Altman on Musk’s 2036 ‘money won’t matter’ prediction

“Clearly I think money will still matter in 10 years,” Altman said. He also pointed to one of the biggest risks from the AI boom: growing inequality.

Altman said that even if AI creates enormous wealth, there is no guarantee that this wealth will reach everyone. 

“I mean,  certainly one of the greatest concerns with AI that I have is around concentration of power, concentration of wealth. There are all of these ways where I think it will make a lot of things much cheaper and better, and you don’t have to buy a car, and that’ll be great, but yeah, I think that there are many reasons to think that it won’t just magically solve wealth inequality.”

Elon Musk’s bold prediction for 2036 

Musk made his infamous prediction during a long interview with The Economist editor-in-chief Zanny Minton Beddoes at Tesla’s Gigafactory in Texas. His argument is based on a future where AI systems and humanoid robots can produce goods on a scale never seen before.

Musk believes robots could eventually produce more food, housing, transportation and entertainment than people could possibly use. 

If everything becomes that abundant, Musk asks, why would people still need money?

“What do you want money for?” Musk asked. “You want money for goods and services… If that is so abundant, what do you need money for in that case?”

Musk also believes the biggest economic problem could shift from inflation to deflation.

His thinking is simple: if robots and AI keep producing more and more goods, prices could fall because there would be far more supply than people need.

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He has also suggested that governments could issue checks directly to citizens as the economy goes through this change. Musk has previously called the idea “universal high income.” 

He accepts that the transition could be turbulent. But in his view, the end result could be an economy where people do not have to work simply to afford basic needs. Work itself, he has suggested, could eventually become largely optional.

Money would then lose one of its most important roles: deciding who gets access to scarce goods and services.

Musk-Altman feud goes beyond AI and money

The tension between Musk and Altman goes well beyond their latest disagreement over money and AI. Musk, an early co-founder of OpenAI and one of its biggest early donors, sued Altman, OpenAI President Greg Brockman and the company in 2024. He accused them of “stealing a charity” by moving away from OpenAI’s original nonprofit mission and turning it into a for-profit company aimed at enriching its leaders. 

The dispute reached a major courtroom showdown in May 2026, when a three-week trial was held in federal court in Oakland. The jury unanimously rejected Musk’s claims, finding that he had waited too long to bring the case and that the statute of limitations had expired. The judge accepted the verdict, removing a major legal hurdle for OpenAI as it considers a possible IPO. 

Musk, however, has vowed to appeal the decision. He has continued to accuse Altman and Brockman of enriching themselves by effectively “looting a charity,” keeping their bitter legal and personal feud alive. 

Billionaire investor Vinod Khosla broadly agrees with Musk that money could become less important by 2036, but only if politics allows it. He said technology can create huge wealth and abundance, but cannot decide how those gains are shared. Without the right policies, AI could end up widening inequality instead of reducing it.