Will America Spend 9% of Its GDP on AI? The Industry Is Counting on It
Is there enough uncertainty about the future of AI to think that we need a parallel path for them to the public grids?
“Believers in the artificial-intelligence boom need to take a very close look at this number: 9% of GDP.
That is how much American businesses and consumers eventually have to spend per year on the services of companies like Anthropic and OpenAI to justify the staggering sums being committed to the technology right now.
Is it plausible that Americans will spend as much of their income on this one technology as they do on food? Roughly twice what the nation pays for all forms of energy or all computers and software? Seven times what consumers spend on phone, streaming, and internet services combined?
You should be skeptical. Even the most transformative inventions eventually run into the law of diminishing returns: each additional dollar a user spends yields less additional productivity (or enjoyment) than the last. That imposes a natural ceiling.”
CRE is the parallel path. Private capital, private contracts, private risk.
