AI's Real Economic Impact Is on Decision-Making, Not Automation

The Microeconomics of Artificial Intelligence (Open Access)

In this open-access MIT Press book, economist Joshua Gans argues that AI's primary economic effect is not automation but the enhancement of decision-making. He examines the supply and demand for AI predictions, how market structure shapes their price, and the policy trade-offs in antitrust, privacy, and regulation.

While this may facilitate automation, this result is secondary to AI's impact on decision-making.
  1. nadetastic

    > Applied statistics is a

    far more precise descriptor, “but no one wants to use that term, because

    it’s not as sexy.”

    This really hit me some time back when I was explaining AI to a friend. After about 10 mins of rambling about LLMs and mentioning the attention paper like I knew what I was talking about, it ended with “oh so it’s just a really advanced auto correct”

  2. amelius

    Speaking how which, how are economists using AI? Are they getting better at making predictions?

More from this day

2026-09-08