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Core economic mechanismCore 1.0 · 19 Aug 2026

The Time+ Agreement

The bridge between “AI saved time” and “the human actually works less”: a transparent agreement that shares verified productivity gain before it can simply become more assigned work.

BaselineVerified gainShared dividendDurable Time+
Why it exists

Productivity does not automatically become freedom.

If a task falls from 45 minutes to 12, the technology has reduced human effort. But an employer can still fill the remaining 33 minutes with additional work. Without an allocation rule, the worker may create valuable automation without receiving any durable benefit.

The Time+ Agreement makes the sharing rule part of the system.
Step 1 · Baseline

Agree what “normal” means before the + improves it.

Human working time
e.g. 37.5 h/week
Responsibilities
role scope and task families
Quality
acceptable outcomes, errors and review requirements
Economic baseline
salary, throughput and relevant employer value measures

The baseline must be understandable enough that both sides can later tell whether the + created a real gain rather than merely shifting effort or risk somewhere else.

Step 2 · Verify the gain

Measure more than minutes saved.

Human Minutes Required remains the primary human metric, but economic value must be measured separately. Useful gain might appear as greater throughput, fewer errors, avoided overtime, avoided hiring, faster delivery, retained knowledge or new work that could not previously be done.

human effort reduction ≠ employer economic value
Step 3 · Share it

Three participants, three returns.

Your Time+

A defined share of verified gain reduces the person's required human working time.

Employer value

A defined share remains with the employer so participation is economically rational rather than charitable.

+ development

A defined share finances models, compute, storage, verification and continued development.

No universal split is assumed. 40/40/20 is useful as an illustrative model, not a constitutional percentage. Different roles, employers and stages may require different allocations.
Illustrative settlement

A small gain can already change the week.

Verified capacity created
5.5 h-equivalent/week
Worker Time+
2.0 h/week returned as reduced human requirement
Employer return
2.0 h-equivalent/week retained as productive value
+ development
1.5 h-equivalent/week converted into operating/development budget

This is a teaching example, not a recommended universal contract.

Step 4 · Make Time+ durable

The saved hours must change the working arrangement.

A dashboard saying “2 hours saved” is not enough. Once verified gain is converted into Time+, the person's required human working time should be updated in the employment arrangement. Material changes in role, market conditions or output can justify renegotiation, but the gain should not disappear by default.

earned Time+ → agreed human requirement → transparent renegotiation only when conditions materially change
Time+ Account · hypothesis

Use the time now, save it, or reinvest part of it.

A future platform could allow a worker to choose what to do with some earned Time+: shorten the current week, bank time toward a sabbatical or gradual retirement, or reinvest part of the productivity dividend into faster development of the +.

Open issue: banking time across employers or years could create significant employment-law, pension, accounting and financial-regulation questions. Treat this as a hypothesis until legally designed and tested.
Employer rationale

The employer participates because the employer also wins.

Human Capital .+ is not built on goodwill alone. The employer should receive a transparent share of the created value, while the worker receives Time+ and the augmentation receives continued investment. The arrangement survives only if all three returns can coexist.

What must be tested

The agreement is a hypothesis until it survives real work.

Can a baseline be measured without creating surveillance?
Can human effort reduction and employer economic value be distinguished?
Will employers accept pre-agreed sharing rather than unilateral capture of gains?
Can Time+ become durable under real employment contracts?
Can + development funding be accounted for transparently?

Your + buys back your time.

The Time+ Agreement is the mechanism intended to turn that sentence from philosophy into an economic rule.