IWB Blog
A collection of observations, news and resources on the changing nature of innovation, technology, leadership, and other subjects.
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Category: Political Issues
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On August 11, MIT Nobel laureate economist Daron Acemoglu published his latest book, What Happened to Liberal Democracy?: Remaking a Politics of Shared Prosperity. For much of the second half of the 20th century, liberal democracy appeared to be remarkably successful. Economic growth raised living standards across broad segments of society, technological advances created new…
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Artificial intelligence is often discussed in terms of faster economic growth, higher productivity, and greater corporate profits. But those are not the only outcomes that matter. Another very important question is whether AI will actually improve human welfare by broadening opportunity, strengthening institutions, and raising living standards across society. That question is at the heart…
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“The launch of ChatGPT in 2022 ignited the artificial-intelligence boom — and elicited a chorus of warnings from AI bosses of an impending jobs apocalypse,” said The Economist in “Prepare for an AI jobs apocalypse,” the lead article in its May 16 issue. “Never mind that they have reason to talk up the disruptiveness of…
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Earlier this year I wrote a blog about the continuing debate across higher education on whether — and how — university students should be taught to properly use generative AI, “How Should University Students Be Taught the Proper Use of AI.” I mentioned in the blog that the debate about AI reminds me of my…
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“Artificial intelligence is shaping how many college students think about their academic paths,” said a recently published Gallup article, “College Students Weigh AI’s Impact on Majors and Careers.” Forty-two percent of bachelor’s degree students say AI has caused them to give serious thought to changing their major, including 13% who say they have thought about…
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“AI agents — autonomous systems that perceive, reason, and act on behalf of human principals — are poised to transform digital markets by dramatically reducing transaction costs,” wrote Peyman Shahidi, Gili Rusak, Benjamin Manning, Andrey Fradkin, and John Horton in their recent NBER working paper, “The Coasean Singularity? Demand, Supply, and Market Design with AI…
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“Transformative AI has revolutionary potential,” wrote Stanford University postdoctoral fellow Gabriel Unger in “Economic Possibilities for Artificial Intelligence,” one of the 21 essays in Volume 2 of The Digitalist Papers — a roadmap of the relentlessly advancing capabilities of the AI revolution. Unger adds that the AI revolution has arrived at a particularly significant moment. “America…
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Over the past few years, I’ve written a number of posts on the potential economic impact of artificial intelligence. One theme that has consistently stood out is the wide divergence of views on how transformative that impact will be. While there is broad agreement that AI capabilities are advancing rapidly, there is far less agreement…
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Earlier this year, the National Academies of Sciences (NAS) released “How Is AI Shaping the Future of Work,” a video podcast and accompanying transcript of a conversation between MIT economist David Autor and writer Sara Freuh in Issues in Science and Technology, a quarterly journal jointly published by the NAS and the University of Arizona.…
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“Agents will be embedded in business processes with direct impact on operations, data, and compliance,” wrote Eric Broda and John Y Miller in “KYA — Know Your Agent,” a recent article in their Agentic Mesh Substack. Broda is the founder of Broda Group Software, co-founder of The Agentic Mesh Company, and co-author of Agentic Mesh,…