ABSTRACT
This paper examines the potential impact of artificial intelligence (A.I.) on economic growth. We
model A.I. as the latest form of automation, a broader process dating back more than 200 years.
Electricity, internal combustion engines, and semiconductors facilitated automation in the last
century, but A.I. now seems poised to automate many tasks once thought to be out of reach, from
driving cars to making medical recommendations and beyond. How will this affect economic
growth and the division of income between labor and capital? What about the potential
emergence of “singularities” and “superintelligence,” concepts that animate many discussions in
the machine intelligence community? How will the linkages between A.I. and growth be
mediated by firm-level considerations, including organization and market structure? The goal
throughout is to refine a set of critical questions about A.I. and economic growth and to
contribute to shaping an agenda for the field. One theme that emerges is based on Baumol’s “cost
disease” insight: growth may be constrained not by what we are good at but rather by what is
essential and yet hard to improve.