What can federal data collection tell policymakers and researchers about artificial intelligence in the U.S. labor market?

Key takeaways

• Federal data on unemployment, wages, and the availability of jobs in the U.S. labor market exist but are fragmented, often not timely, and difficult to link across sources.
• The adoption of artificial intelligence by individual firms is challenging to measure, and existing federal surveys are often binary, asking simple yes or no or true or false questions, as well as inconsistent and not connected to data on their workers’ employment outcomes.
• Existing federal data sources cannot be used yet to conclusively show whether and how AI might be driving changes in the U.S. labor market.
• What this means for growth: Improving the infrastructure for federal data collection is essential for policymakers to understand how AI is reshaping the U.S. labor market and to design responses that are timely, comprehensive, and well-targeted. Economic growth from new technologies is not automatic; optimizing the talent in the U.S. economy requires knowing where and how the labor market is changing.

Overview

It is impossible to perfectly predict how artificial intelligence will affect the U.S. labor market. Policymakers and researchers are grappling with important questions around this topic, including what new opportunities may exist and what livelihoods might be eroded by AI? How will those countervailing forces net out, and which workers might be left behind? Will the quality of jobs be compromised in the process?