Shundo David Haye – Zen Priest

‘Powerful A.I. may look alien, but the political dilemmas it raises are not. Some economic policy experts predict that A.I. will look like an accelerated and expanded version of deindustrialization. But rather than companies outsourcing jobs to overseas workers, they will be outsourcing them to A.I. agents. “The China shock unfolded over several years, whereas this could happen over two years,” said Bharat Ramamurti, a former deputy director of the National Economic Council in the Biden White House. “These companies have spent so much money developing models that there’s going to be immense pressure on them to generate revenue through quick adoption.”

“I’ve interviewed so many college students who are super fearful about what the future means, and their narrative is exactly the same as those blue-collar guys in the heartland,” said Molly Kinder, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who studies work and automation. In Ms. Kinder’s view, A.I. companies’ narratives about abundance repeat the same flawed promises of globalization. “Our economy grew extraordinarily and prices went down, but there were clear losers.”

In this sense, A.I.’s broad capabilities foster a rare class solidarity between white-collar and blue-collar workers. When 20-something software engineers in San Francisco talk about escaping the permanent underclass, I hear them projecting concerns about their own precarity: What happens if the invisible hand of the market decides that my skills are no longer valuable? Who will catch me if I fall? For once, a rarefied class of employees — those used to being the automaters, not the automated — is reckoning with their potential obsolescence.

It is not as if the U.S. has never before seen problems of wealth inequality, a declining labor share of the economy or technological shocks to jobs. But this time we might finally do something about it, now that some of the most privileged are vulnerable.

“I think you’re going to see a battle of ideas in the next presidential election,” said Ms. Kinder. A.I. has risen in importance to voters faster than any other issue in the past year, per Mr. Shor’s polling data. And Democrats ought to be especially alert: Their younger and more college-educated voters are more exposed to A.I. than Republicans are. Senator Mark Kelly and Representative Ro Khanna have announced sweeping A.I. agendas. The technology is an opportunity for gutsy politicians — especially populist candidates vying in a crowded 2028 presidential primary — to push ideas that are usually too radical for moderate voters to swallow.’ (from the New York Times)