By 2028, will there be a visible break in trend line on US GDP, GDP per capita, unemployment, or productivity, which most economists attribute directly to the effects of AI?
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Related to ACX five year predictions. I will resolve this based on my impression of the consensus of economists at that time. By "visible break", I mean clearly larger than ordinary year-to-year variation, and widely remarked upon.

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In my modal scenario, I see the improvements in AI until 2028 as basically a continuation of improvements in computer technologies over the last couple of decades. It seems there would have to be some sort of phase transition to cause a visible break in the trend line of one of these very major trends. As Robert Solow said, "You can see the computer age everywhere but in the productivity statistics."

bought Ṁ50 YES

Worth noting that a lot of these are lagging indicators. AI might produce unprecedented scientific discoveries in 2027, and the stock market might ~double, with little-to-no effect on GDP in 2028.

Does this resolve YES if there's a huge AI bubble that bursts and brings the whole economy down? Say on the level of .com bubble or the subprime mortgage crisis...🤔

@AIBear @ScottAlexander I am being serious, would you count AI bubble burst as "effect of AI" or something else?

opened a Ṁ5,000 YES at 36% order

If anyone wants to bet at higher volumes, I just put up 5K mana at 36%

Economists recognize this trend by 2028, or they recognize a trend before 2028 it 30 years later?

opened a Ṁ100 NO at 50% order

Going with NO because I see AI being used just enough to maintain trendline growth/productivity. As for unemployment, it has nowhere to go but up, and new technology is not going to be a popular explanation for a higher unemployment regime.

AI might somehow be scapegoated for above-trend inflation, but that wasn't in the question.

bought Ṁ500 NO

If a visible break happens, but economists attribute a smallish portion rather than the vast majority of the break to AI, how does this resolve? How small a portion does it need to be to resolve NO?

@Cactus I guess if the portion attributable to AI would itself be visible if it had happened alone, it counts; otherwise, no.

opened a Ṁ1,000 YES at 35% order

New limit orders up.

(removed duplicate)

Remember when people promised “an iPad and google and third worlders can learn anything!”

Those same people now think AI will make every student two standard deviations better or transform roles that marginally if at all leverage intelligence as is 🤔

Healthcare, education, and construction don’t exactly move quickly. Arguably have negative productivity growth over the last few decades.

Perhaps writing more words or code is possible—but this is a small slice of gdp.

Over decades: transformative enough to replace broken industries (in other countries and free regions); short-term wouldn’t expect the cartels to change much.

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If everyone dies then GDP per capita will increase significantly.

predicts YES

@MartinRandall this comment is not the most helpful

predicts YES

@ErickBall Oh, what's your theory of change for that claim?

predicts YES

@MartinRandall if everyone dies then we won't have statistics on GDP, and also we'll be dead. Tbh I googled "theory of change" and it all sounds like nonsense. The realistic scenario we're betting on makes the implicit assumption (reasonable imo) that human civilization will be continuous through 2028.

predicts YES

@ErickBall I think an AI that kills everyone in five years will be able to simulate Scott Alexander in sufficient fidelity to determine the correct resolution for this market. Killing everyone will produce a visible break in GDP, GDP per capita, unemployment, and productivity. I agree that it's unknown whether markets will resolve correctly in this scenario.

It doesn't have to be human extinction to impact GDP per capita. For example:

/JonathanRay/will-ai-kill-20-of-the-human-popula (8% at time of linking)

The impact of mass human death on GDP per capita is apparently more nuanced than I thought, from this 2020 paper laying out the impact of the Black Death.

https://www2.gwu.edu/~iiep/assets/docs/papers/2020WP/JedwabIIEP2020-14.pdf

8% is low, but in the context of a market at 28%, significant.

@MartinRandall If everyone dies, the environmentalists and socialists will finally be satisfied, because we will acheive the Kyoto Protocol targets and the Gini Coefficient will be 0.

predicts YES

@AlQuinn we're 10 years too late to meet the Kyoto Protocol targets, they were set in 1997 for 2008-2012.

Also I think genocidal AI may end up with high carbon emissions.

@MartinRandall don't be so negative; perfection is the enemy of good

@MartinRandall you made me curious. Turns out the Kyoto protocol was actually met on the aggregate, though most countries did not meet their individual targets. https://www.iedm.org/56519-have-the-kyoto-protocol-targets-been-respected/

@PatrickDelaney That is fascinating. Thanks.

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