A group of more than 200 experts, including 15 Nobel laureates and researchers from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google, has issued an urgent call to action. They demand governments and tech leaders immediately develop policies and institutions to manage the profound economic impact of artificial intelligence.
The jointly signed statement warns that AI could trigger an economic transformation larger than the Industrial Revolution, but over a vastly shorter time frame. This raises critical questions for workers, companies, and public institutions regarding risks like large-scale job displacement.
"Steam, electricity, and computers each gave societies decades to adapt. AI may give us only a few years," said Anton Korinek, a professor at the University of Virginia who organized the initiative. "We cannot improvise our strategy and institutions in the middle of the transformation; waiting for certainty means arriving too late."
The coalition calls for deeper research and the immediate construction of a policy framework to ensure AI benefits society. The statement's signatories include OpenAI finance chief Sarah Friar, Google DeepMind Chief Scientist Jeff Dean, and Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark, alongside Nobel laureates Michael Spence, Daron Acemoglu, and Simon Johnson.