America has always been about change. Americans are used to having the newest and best of everything. Why, then, is there so much pessimism about the impacts of AI, which is potentially a new golden goose of productivity and profit?
Part of the answer is demographic change, of course; you can hardly expect a country that is largely run by and for the elderly to embrace revolution in the economy. But that is not the whole story; Gen Z dislikes AI as much as old reactionaries do. Why is that?
Because the events of the last few decades have shown that the federal government is incapable of responding quickly and appropriately to the issues that will be created by AI. Nobody compensated the losers from globalization and technological change after 2000, and Congress is hamstrung by the Constitution, the Supreme Court, and its own rules, so why would anyone expect anything better this time around?
Change is needed to head off serious problems in the future. I will outline a number of revisions to the McConnell Project which do not require amendments to the Constitution and which, if enacted, would improve things dramatically in a series of posts over the next week.