More than 200 economists and artificial intelligence researchers have urged governments and technology leaders to begin preparing for AI’s economic effects before the technology causes widespread disruption.

The signatories include 15 Nobel laureates and researchers or executives associated with OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google. Their joint statement warns that AI could produce an economic transformation larger than the Industrial Revolution, but within a “vastly shorter” period.

The group is calling for deeper research into AI’s economic consequences and the development of policies and institutions capable of managing the transition. Its concerns include large-scale job displacement and the effect of rapidly advancing AI systems on workers, companies, and public institutions.

AI’s Compressed Economic Timeline

Previous technological shifts gave governments, businesses, and labor markets decades to adjust. The statement argues that AI could compress a similarly consequential transformation into only a few years, leaving institutions with limited time to respond.

“Steam, electricity, and computers each gave societies decades to adapt. AI may give us only a few years,” said Anton Korinek, professor at the University of Virginia.

“We cannot improvise our strategy and institutions in the middle of the transformation; waiting for certainty means arriving too late.”

Korinek organized the initiative with economists Erik Brynjolfsson, Ajay Agrawal, and Tom Cunningham. Korinek joined Anthropic’s economic research team in March.

The statement does not frame AI solely as a labor-market risk. It calls for institutions and policies that can help ensure the technology produces broad societal benefits while governments and businesses navigate potential disruption.

AI Industry Leaders Join the Call

The signatories include executives and researchers from organizations developing some of the world’s most advanced AI models.

OpenAI Chief Financial Officer Sarah Friar, Google DeepMind Chief Scientist Jeff Dean, and Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark signed the statement. Members of Anthropic’s economic research team are also among the participants.

Nobel laureates Michael Spence, Daron Acemoglu, and Simon Johnson are among the economists supporting the initiative. Their participation brings together academic economists and leaders from companies directly involved in developing advanced AI.

The combination is notable because the economic consequences of AI will depend partly on how quickly businesses deploy the technology and how governments respond to changes in employment, productivity, and market structures.

Why It Matters

The statement shifts the AI governance debate beyond model safety, privacy, and technical regulation to the institutions that shape employment and economic participation.

For enterprise leaders, rapidly expanding AI capabilities could affect workforce planning, job design, and investment decisions. Companies may need to determine which tasks should be automated, where employees require new skills, and how AI-generated productivity gains are distributed across their organizations.

Governments face a related challenge. Waiting for definitive evidence of labor-market disruption could leave policymakers responding after economic changes are already underway. The signatories argue that research, institutional planning, and policy development should begin before the full extent of the transformation becomes clear.

The initiative does not claim certainty about the precise scale or timing of AI’s economic effects. Instead, it argues that the potential speed of change makes preparation necessary despite that uncertainty.

The key question is now whether governments, technology companies, and economic institutions translate the statement’s warning into research programs, workforce policies, and formal mechanisms for managing AI-driven economic change.