AI: Economists vs. Technologists

What happened

Economists, including Daron Acemoglu, have articulated a perspective on Artificial Intelligence (AI) development, projecting a modest GDP increase over the next decade and highlighting that AI's economic benefits are not automatically distributed. This view introduces a dependency on deliberate societal choices to guide AI's application, either towards worker displacement through automation or towards new task creation and human capability enhancement, thereby influencing overall economic outcomes and worker welfare.

Why it matters

The articulated economic perspective introduces a strategic oversight burden for organisations deploying Artificial Intelligence (AI), creating a visibility gap regarding the long-term societal and workforce impacts of AI integration. This increases due diligence requirements for procurement and strategy teams in evaluating AI solutions, as the benefits are not guaranteed to be broadly distributed or to enhance worker well-being without deliberate intervention. The burden falls on leadership and workforce planning to navigate the dependency on societal choices for AI's ultimate direction.