Where's The Evidence That AI Increases Productivity?
8 71IT productivity researcher Erik Brynjolfsson writes in the Financial Times that he's finally found evidence AI is impacting America's economy. This week America's Bureau of Labor Statistics showed a 403,000 drop in 2025's payroll growth — while real GDP "remained robust, including a 3.7% growth rate in the fourth quarter." This decoupling — maintaining high output with significantly lower labour input — is the hallmark of productivity growth. My own updated analysis suggests a US productivity increase of roughly 2.7% for 2025. This is a near doubling from the sluggish 1.4% annual average that characterised the past decade... The updated 2025 US data suggests we are now transitioning out of this investment phase into a harvest phase where those earlier efforts begin to manifest as measurable output.
Micro-level evidence further supports this structural shift. In our work on the employment effects of AI last year, Bharat Chandar, Ruyu Chen and I identified a cooling in entry-level hiring within AI-exposed sectors, where recruitment for junior roles declined by roughly 16% while those who used AI to augment skills saw growing employment. This suggests companies are beginning to use AI for some codified, entry-level tasks.
Or, AI "isn't really stealing jobs yet," according to employment policy analyst Will Raderman (from the American think tank called the Niskanen Center). He argues in Barron's that "there is no clear link yet between higher AI use and worse outcomes for young workers." Recent graduates' unemployment rates have been drifting in the wrong direction since the 2010s, long before generative AI models hit the market. And many occupations with moderate to high exposure to AI disruptions are actually faring better over the past few years. According to recent data for young workers, there has been employment growth in roles typically filled by those with college degrees related to computer systems, accounting and auditing, and market research. AI-intensive sectors like finance and insurance have also seen rising employment of new graduates in recent years. Since ChatGPT's release, sectors in which more than 10% of firms report using AI and sectors in which fewer than 10% reporting using AI are hiring relatively the same number of recent grads.
Even Brynjolfsson's article in the Financial Times concedes that "While the trends are suggestive, a degree of caution is warranted. Productivity metrics are famously volatile, and it will take several more periods of sustained growth to confirm a new long-term trend." And he's not the only one wanting evidence for AI's impact. The same weekend Fortune wrote that growth from AI "has yet to manifest itself clearly in macro data, according to Apollo Chief Economist Torsten Slok." [D]ata on employment, productivity and inflation are still not showing signs of the new technology. Profit margins and earnings forecasts for S&P 500 companies outside of the "Magnificent 7" also lack evidence of AI at work... "After three years with ChatGPT and still no signs of AI in the incoming data, it looks like AI will likely be labor enhancing in some sectors rather than labor replacing in all sectors," Slok said.
8 comments
So tentative answer (Score: 5, Interesting)
by JoshuaZ ( 1134087 ) on Monday February 16, 2026 @07:50AM (#65991640)
So tentative answer is increase in productivity in some sectors but not all, and no widespread unemployment, but also not a clear massive boost in productivity. So both the largest worries about AI in terms of replacing people and the largest claims that this technology is all junk turn out to be likely not correct, but with more data still needed to be sure. So the question then becomes will this evidence impact at all the positions of either the AI-hypesters or the anti-AI groups at all, or alternatively will both groups just ignore it or try to spin it to fit their preexisting position?
Re:Perhaps too early to tell? (Score: 5, Interesting)
by noshellswill ( 598066 ) on Monday February 16, 2026 @10:23AM (#65991996)
Intense propaganda and physical abuse by data-manglers is supposed to convince every Joe-Peanut that the lower standards of service/performance/reliability provides by *.ai/LLM is the STANDARD to be maintained. Kinda like convincing ice-cream eaters to buy air-foamed store brand ice-creame instead of buying heavy creame, vanilla-beans and eggs and churning it yourself. When crap becomes the standard of excellence, excellence ceases to exist.
Re:We just started. (Score: 5, Insightful)
by Mascot ( 120795 ) on Monday February 16, 2026 @09:16AM (#65991796)
Predicting the future isn't easy.
The .com bubble was pretty much "Oh hey, computers have been around for a while and they're great, now the internet is arriving so let's make sure we don't miss out. Let's pump all of the money into any company that has a web page or might consider making one, in case they conquer the internet."
LLMs feel to me more like, "Oh hey, someone added an LCD screen to a toaster and they claim next year they'll make the airline industry irrelevant, let's put all of the money into toaster factories!"
That doesn't mean LLMs will have no place where they're useful. But, barring a new breakthrough, it's hard to see how what is in essence a "pick next word" algorithm might turn out e.g. a new Google.
But, as mentioned, predicting the future isn't easy. Perhaps I'll look like a luddite in a few years time. Then again, my track record of greeting 3D movies with "meh" every time they roll back into fashion, is pretty darn good. :p
Depends on the topic (Score: 5, Interesting)
by Drethon ( 1445051 ) on Monday February 16, 2026 @08:04AM (#65991658)
I've used LLMs for generating web interfaces and it does pretty good. Try to get it to code in assembly or have a container log traffic between other containers and the LLM will keep chasing it's tail trying to fix bugs.
Re: Call me old fashioned but (Score: 5, Interesting)
by jpellino ( 202698 ) on Monday February 16, 2026 @08:33AM (#65991700)
I have seen it work in both directions. I was a technology wrangler when desktop publishing took off. It was great that you no longer needed letraset and actual paste, but much of it turned into, if you can do this on your computer then you no longer need an assistant (then secretary). But that also took another valuable brain and set of eyes out of the process. Conversely, we worked on some multi year projects with LEGO, and watched as they automated more and more of their US plant. Adding computer control to sorting and packing lines, and automating such mundane tasks as making sure a minifig heads were on straight. They prided themselves for never losing a person from this, they would assign them to a new project or product. This was about the time they were turning the corner on adding outside IP to their lines. It allowed them to use experienced people to staff these new initiatives, and from all indications, it kinda worked.
I don't think they care if it does (Score: 5, Insightful)
by rsilvergun ( 571051 ) on Monday February 16, 2026 @08:44AM (#65991722)
The possibility of replacing every white collar worker is just too tantalizing. Even if it costs more replacing those workers moves more power to the top.
We are past the point where billionaires are just trying to make more money. We are at the point where they want more power. More power means being able to decide who gets the function in society and that means controlling who gets to work. The best way to do that is to limit the amount of available work.
It breaks a dependency the billionaires have on us working stiffs. Over and over again when we catch billionaires candidly they show complete disgust for us. So if they have to spend an extra 20 or 30% of their already limitless wealth to no longer have to interact with or depend on us that would be a small price to pay
Basically it's the end of capitalism just not the way that the blue haired girls keep telling you we should do it
Productivity (Score: 5, Informative)
by Iamthecheese ( 1264298 ) on Monday February 16, 2026 @09:02AM (#65991764)
Productivity always rises in a recession. https://www.bls.gov/opub/mlr/2... [bls.gov]
"It productivity researcher" (Score: 5, Interesting)
by WaffleMonster ( 969671 ) on Monday February 16, 2026 @10:24AM (#65992000)
Who works at Stanford's HAI and only seems to write about AI. "Advancing AI research, education, and policy to improve the human condition."
"This week America's Bureau of Labor Statistics showed a 403,000 drop in 2025's payroll growth - while real GDP "remained robust, including a 3.7% growth rate in the fourth quarter.""
This gibberish doesn't even warrant the customary correlation != causation.
https://fred.stlouisfed.org/gr... [stlouisfed.org]
"This decoupling - maintaining high output with significantly lower labour input - is the hallmark of productivity growth."
Wait.. what? Significantly lower labor input? "Drop in payroll GROWTH" != "significantly lower labor input"
From page 4.
"
Jan 2025 158,268
Dec 2025 158,497
"
https://www.bls.gov/news.relea... [bls.gov]
"This is a near doubling from the sluggish 1.4% annual average that characterised the past decade... "
Just look at the chart, the numbers are all over the place and we have genius's comparing averages with a snapshot to advance a narrative. The weasel words and manipulation of both the data and the reader are absurd.