Look, Iāve been nursing this hangover long enough to remember when āartificial intelligenceā meant my bartender Tony knowing exactly when to pour me another shot. But here we are in 2024, and some Nobel-winning economist from MIT just confirmed what Iāve been slurring into my bourbon for months: AI aināt the messiah weāve been promised.
Daron Acemoglu - and yeah, I had to check that spelling three times - just dropped some truth bombs thatāll give the champagne-sipping tech prophets a nastier headache than my Sunday mornings. The numbers heās throwing around are soberer than my designated driver.
Hereās the real kick in the teeth: all this AI hullabaloo? Itās worth about 1.1 to 1.6 percent GDP growth over the next decade. Thatās right. After all the breathless promises about digital utopia, weāre looking at gains that wouldnāt cover the markup on a craft cocktail.
Let me break this down while I pour myself another:
The productivity boost? 0.05 percent annually. Hell, I get a bigger productivity boost from my morning coffee, and thatās saying something considering the state Iām usually in. The tech evangelists promised us flying cars, and we got a rounding error instead.
But wait, it gets better. Remember all those warnings about AI stealing our jobs faster than my ex-wife took the house? Turns out only about 20% of jobs are even on the chopping block. By 2030, most companies will still be doing the same old dance, just with fancier computers watching.
And hereās where it gets interesting, like finding an unopened bottle of Pappy Van Winkle in the back of the liquor cabinet: Acemoglu says weāre using AI all wrong. Instead of making workers better at their jobs, weāre obsessed with replacing them entirely. Itās like switching from single malt to bottom-shelf rotgut - sure, itās cheaper, but at what cost?
The real problem isnāt the technology - itās the gold rush mentality. Weāre moving faster than my credit card bill during a weekend bender. Acemoglu and his buddy Johnson (sounds like a bourbon brand Iād trust) are saying maybe we should pump the brakes a bit. Novel concept, right? Taking time to think about consequences before diving headfirst into the shallow end of the pool.
You want to know the real punchline? The same folks promising AI will lift all boats are the ones programming it to replace your average Joe faster than you can say āautomated customer service.ā Itās like that old bar trick where someone offers to buy you a drink but sticks you with the tab for the whole round.
The kicker? Even David Ricardo - the Adam Smith understudy from back in the powdered wig days - figured out that just because a machine can do something doesnāt mean itās good for everyone. And this guy was writing when the height of automation was a steam-powered loom.
Look, Iām not saying AI is useless. Thatād be like saying beer has no purpose (and trust me, Iāve conducted extensive research on that subject). But maybe - just maybe - we should slow down enough to see where weāre stumbling before we end up face-down in the technological gutter.
Until next time, Iāll be here, doing what humans still do best: questioning authority and drinking bourbon. Not necessarily in that order.
[Written through the bottom of a rocks glass, December 2024]
P.S. Send coffee. And aspirin.