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Neither agree nor disagree Who knows? On the one hand, there are clear examples where it has. On the other, there are clear examples where it facilitated crime, warfare, fraud, online scams, etc and created other challenges, e.g., in education setup. There's also the global AI arms race.
Professor Ori Heffetz
Associate Professor of Economics, Cornell University and Hebrew University -
Neither agree nor disagree I think it's too hard to tell. A lot of people use machine learnings products and benefit from them in myriad ways. However, these technologies are also an enormous draw on environmental resources, seem impossible to train without engaging in intellectual property theft, have enshitified the internet in many ways (one has to type -ai into every Google search now to avoid getting giving misleading information at the top of the search results), and have enabled and accelerated a wide range of nefarious practices like malware and deep fake pornography.
Professor Mark Fabian
Associate Professor of Public Policy, University of Warwick -
Neither agree nor disagree Overall, I have a positive view of the impact of AI, as I do of other technological advances. However, its impact on public well-being is complex and difficult to assess in isolation, given its complex entanglement with broader technological, economic, and societal changes since 2000. I see AI much like social media: it is neither universally beneficial nor detrimental to well-being, but its impact depends on how it is used and by whom. For example, while AI has increased productivity and improved certain jobs, it has also led to revenue losses in other jobs.
Professor Mohsen Joshanloo
Associate Professor (Psychology), Keimyung University, South Korea -
Neither agree nor disagree I am afraid I don’t know there is little evidence either way
Professor David Blanchflower
Professor of Economics at Dartmouth -
Neither agree nor disagree I'm not aware of research that can help answer this question. Each time I converse with some bot now at "customer service", I would scream that AI does us no good, but that is just reflective of the fact that most of my interactions with AI (student theses written by AI, refereeing being done by AI) have been negative.
Professor Martin Binder
Professor of Socio-Economics at Bundeswehr University Munich -
Disagree As is the case with most new technologies, as well as with older tools, the problem does not lie in the tool itself, but rather in its use and, above all, the motivation driving its creation and influencing its design. It becomes necessary to identify the force that guides both the development of AI and its design and application, which is basically the generation of profits for the corporations developing it. Motivation is not interested in solving the underlying factors threatening well-being, but rather in taking advantage of problems for profit. For instance, we could have a companionship chatbot that collects all sorts of information about a person. The companionship provided is clearly not genuine or selfless; instead, it will serve the purpose of commercializing the underlying problem -loneliness- and extracting the greatest possible profits, even if this results in dependency or, in extreme cases, addiction. The chatbot would be marketed as a solution to the growing problem of loneliness, but in reality, it would merely serve as a palliative that takes advantage of deeper social problems which are neither recognized nor addressed. The incorporation of AI into productive activities may be economically efficient, but it may end up reducing humans’ access to their sources of income. Furthermore, the incorporation of AI into the military industry could lead to increasingly complex and costly arms races, in what is evidently a negative-sum race, diverting resources away from areas that genuinely promote well-being. Of course, one can imagine positive uses for new technologies, such as the development of new vaccines, personalized educational support, and traffic coordination in cities, among others.
Professor Mariano Rojas
Professor of Economics, Universidad Popular Autónoma del Estado de Puebla -
Disagree Human wellbeing is produced most from local inputs that in general cannot be delivered by AI as they are human-provided: the quality of our human relationships and our social status (we care where we sit in the hierarchy of humans, not the hierarchy of machines plus humans). Our physical health is an area where some AI-delivered improvements are possible, such as via products and services that support people developing or sticking with healthy exercise, diet, or sleep regimens, but i think the causal impact of AI on wellbeing through these channels is marginal and there are also costs to using technology in these areas rather than just getting on with it oneself: in particular, reliance on such crutches misses an opportunity to develop one's own determination, stamina, and sense of being capable of surmounting obstacles. The same is true for the use of AI in generating text or other academic work: it is a crutch that in the long run will not make anyone happier. AI-mediated medical diagnosis holds significant promise to make people better off, but what we have seen in this area to date is not accessible to most people. The introduction of AI into production processes and potential impacts on the labour market ("the robots will take our jobs") hasn't improved production efficiency enough to measurably increase wellbeing through that channel, and all the talk about how everyone is going to be replaced by machines stresses people out, which is a direct negative for wellbeing. On the whole then i don't see a convincing argument that AI has improved wellbeing and i see a few arguments that would point to a reduction in wellbeing due to the introduction of AI - so far at least.
Professor Gigi Foster
Associate Professor and Undergraduate Coordinator, School of Economics, UNSW Business School -
Neither agree nor disagree Most artificial advances to date appear to be in technical areas, e.g. medical AI technologies detecting cancers etc. It is too early to determine the extent to which AI will disrupt or benefit the labour market, and therefore the wellbeing of the people.
Doctor Tony Beatton
Visiting Fellow, Queensland University of Technology (QUT) -
Completely agree Advances in artificial intelligence since 2000 have increased productivity, which generally increases economic output and improves human wellbeing.
Professor Daniel Benjamin
Associate Professor of Economics, University of Southern California -
Disagree Tough question on which we can only guess an answer. Since the macro-picture on wellbeing is a decline since 2010 whilst AI is only reaching fruition after that, an initial guess is that AI has not helped. The applications of AI sofar have been towards greater consumer convenience, which is rather unimportant for overall wellbeing: we are more quickly given what we want, leaving more time to want more. The military, marketing, surveillance, and propaganda applications have made us less safe, more caged, and more dependent on the thinking of AI than our own.
Professor Paul Frijters
Professorial Research Fellow, CEP Wellbeing Programme, London School of Economics -
Disagree Artificial intelligence is undoubtedly transforming lives. However, its net impact on well-being appears relatively minor, as its current benefits and drawbacks seem to balance out. Among AI’s key advantages is its role in driving innovation, such as in drug discovery and medical diagnosis, improving health outcomes. AI also enhances productivity, supporting economic growth while automating tedious tasks, freeing individuals to engage in more meaningful and happiness-inducing work activities. Additionally, AI helps address labor shortages in aging societies, particularly in developed countries. Other benefits include increased convenience and easier access to knowledge. On the downside, AI fuels the rise of online social media, which relies on AI to maximize engagement through highly personalized and often addictive content. This significantly impacts time consumption, especially among younger generations, who spend hours daily on mobile devices and social platforms. The constant exposure to addictive content deprives the brain of necessary moments of rest while the constant exposure to curated, idealized lifestyles fosters social comparison. These issues contribute to rising mental health issues such as anxiety, depression, burnout, sleep disturbances, reduced attention spans, social isolation, and low self-esteem. Moreover, excessive screen time promotes sedentary behavior, increasing the risk of obesity-related diseases.
Professor Martijn Hendriks
Associate Professor, Erasmus University Rotterdam & University of Johannesburg -
Agree Before Chat GPT the influence has been less visible, but I think that in general the effect gas been positive, especially in medical diagnosis
Professor Eugenio Proto
Alec Cairncross Professor of Applied Economics and Econometrics, University of Glasgow, Adam Smith Business School -
Neither agree nor disagree To date, advances in AI appear to have had only trivial effects of subjective wellbeing (SWB) which is mostly determined by relationships with family and friends, health, material living standards, and societal freedoms. None of these has been materially affected by AI since 2000.
Professor Arthur Grimes
Chair of Wellbeing and Public Policy, School of Government, Victoria University of Wellington -
Neither agree nor disagree The most important impact is in fact unknown: we will probably experience some social disruption that we cannot predict. For example, in the long term it might generate dependence, human intelligence reduction, increase inequalities and concentrate further the political and social power in fewer hands (of those who control the expensive AI). On more short-term effects, AI has positive as well as negative things. On the positive side, AI has helped (some) individuals to be more productive (increase efficiency) as well as it has allowed humans to do things we could not do before (for example, image or tele-detection). Some of these improvements however may have also negative effects. For example, improved social media algorithms might increase addiction to social media and political polarization. On the short-term negative effects, AI might destroy human creativity and intelligence (one can already see this when evaluating project grants, which all look written by the same person). It is however still to see whether cognitive ability is complementary or substitute of AI and whether in the long term, AI has a positive or a negative impact on human intelligence.
Professor Ada Ferrer-i-Carbonell
Professor of Economics, IAE-CSIC -
Neither agree nor disagree The answers to whether artificial intelligence (AI) improved well-being depend on the definitions and unfortunately on ideological predispositions, I believe. We need to work with a common precise definition and to conduct more research. Speculating, AI includes labor augmenting and replacing technology, which has often been used to improve human lives. However, without oversight this technological development concentrates power, both economic and informational, in the hands of very few actors - in which case human well-being would decline. With oversight the development could be used improve lives. Anyone with access to a smart phone has unprecedented computing and information power compared to the year 2000, which has been facilitated in part by machine learning and AI (e.g., Google search). Even with more complete research, the answer will be nuanced. AI likely helps some populations and harms others, and even within a population, the impacts likely vary across life domains.
Doctor Kelsey J O'Connor
Researcher in the Economics of Well-being -
Neither agree nor disagree Theoretically, one can expect improved productivity and more time free time available, but mainly to those who stay in employment. The application of AI is fairly new. Already empirical research indicates that new technology and robotics are seen to have positive effects on efficiency or productivity in certain industries, but also adverse in others (Aghion et al, 2016; Dekker et al, 2017; Hinks, 2024). While AI can have certain positive effects in areas, such as education, academic research and health care, the negative effects of stress, job loss and fear of misfit to new technology have to be factored in. The overall effects on human wellbeing can be established by further empirical research in each industrial, geographical and locational (country) context. If AI overtakes human capability to make independent decisions, this would impair our ability to think deeply and connect to others. The loss of human contact may cause loneliness, alienation and engender stress, as we spend more time connecting via technology, smart phones and social media rather than interacting physically. Maintaining good physical relationships in the family, among friends, colleagues and the community are critical for improved human wellbeing. Advances in human and social capital are as important to wellbeing as AI.
Professor Darma Mahadea
Associate Professor and Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Kwazulu-Natal, South Africa -
Neither agree nor disagree I am certainly not an expert in this field, but the literature shows that AI can have both positive and negative effects on well-being (e.g. Pataranutaporn, Pat, et al. "AI-generated characters for supporting personalized learning and well-being." Nature Machine Intelligence 3.12 (2021): 1013-1022.; Li, Han, et al. "Systematic review and meta-analysis of AI-based conversational agents for promoting mental health and well-being." NPJ Digital Medicine 6.1 (2023): 236.) To answer this question comprehensively and generate empirical knowledge, it would be necessary first to systematize the different applications of AI. I am thinking, for example, of its use in the workplace, in education as well as in medical diagnostics, but there are many more areas where AI is applied. The next step would be to identify the potential positive effects of AI use while simultaneously assessing its risks. Only then would it be possible to quantify these effects in any meaningful way. A general answer is difficult because potential negative effects could outweigh or even cancel out the positive ones. Moreover, to gain a clearer understanding of whether AI influences well-being positively or negatively, it would also be necessary, in my view, to consider different dimensions of well-being.
Doctor Antje Jantsch
Researcher, Leibniz Institute of Agricultural Development in Transition (IAMO) -
Neither agree nor disagree AI has clearly brought important benefits to human wellbeing through better healthcare - improving diagnosis accuracy, helping discover new medicines, and creating personalized treatment plans. These advances have saved lives and improved health for many people. In everyday life, AI assistants and automation tools have made information more accessible while AI in education has made learning more available to different types of students. But these benefits haven't reached everyone equally. Many workers face career uncertainty as AI changed the job market. The "digital divide" means that technology benefits mostly go to people who already have resources and education. AI used for surveillance and in social media has created serious privacy problems and potential mental health issues. Unsurprisingly, research from the Oxford Internet Institute shows that how technology affects life satisfaction depends greatly on how people use it and their personal circumstances. When AI systems are created with clear wellbeing goals and input from affected groups, they tend to have positive effects. This matches what Calvo and Peters suggested in their "Positive Computing" approach (2014), which recommends designing technology specifically to support psychological wellbeing. When AI is created mainly for profit or efficiency without considering human impacts, problems often result.
Doctor Anthony Lepinteur
Research Scientist, University of Luxembourg -
Neither agree nor disagree Advances in artificial intelligence have made people more productive and many things easier - which is good for well-being. However, these benefits are unevenly distributed and tend to benefit knowledge workers. A negative effect: those who do not work with AI tools are probably afraid of being left behind.
Professor Jan Delhey
Professor of Sociology, University of Magdeburg -
Neither agree nor disagree AI has offered growing opportunities since the year 2000, but it has also created unprecedented problems. Since most readers are familiar with the opportunities, I focus on some of the downsides. AI allows to monitor every aspect of the life of millions of individuals at a very low cost: by keeping track of their interactions on online social media, their use of mobile devices, their movements, their physical activity, AI enables a minority to accumulate huge power and control over others. AI has also been used to improve algorithms of online social networks to maximize users' engagement. This, however, favored the spread of hate speech, violent contents, plot theories, and fake news because AI figured out that engagement is higher the more a post is controversial. In some cases, this has had dramatic consequences. For instance, a report by Amnesty International found that Facebook amplified hate ahead of the Rohingya massacre in Myanmar. By manipulating the messages that attract more traffic, the results of searches on search engines, and by tracking and matching individual information at very low marginal cost, AI represents a huge threat for human well-being. The net effect of the costs and benefits of AI for human well-being is therefore not clear.
Doctor Francesco Sarracino
Economist, Research Division of the Statistical Office of Luxembourg -STATEC -
Agree I mostly agree that artificial intelligence (AI) has significantly enhanced human well-being and increased efficiency across various domains. However, AI developments also pose challenges to human well-being, such as privacy and ethical considerations; I am also concerned that AI bots such as ChatGPT may foster complacency. We are all familiar with AI's advancements in various dimensions of wellbeing, for example, in the health profession and its educational benefits through search engines, online tutorials, and websites such as GitHub, Coursera, and YouTube. AI-driven applications also assist in selecting leisure activities on platforms like Netflix and YouTube. Large Language Models (LLM) also cater to academic needs. Tools such as Grammarly, Research Rabbit, Scite AI, and R Discovery have vastly increased our access to relevant and new research and assist with writing. Beyond these apparent ways in which AI has benefited human well-being, there are also indirect benefits through the accessibility to data to inform decision-making. The combination of big data extracted from social media and various internet sources, as well as AI-driven methodologies, has filled a void in well-being data. This data is real-time, easily accessible, and less expensive than traditional survey methods. See, for example, Martin & Salomon-Ermel (2024) and Greyling & Rossouw (2025) for well-being data constructed using Google Trends data.
Professor Talita Greyling
Professor, School of Economics, University of Johannesburg -
Agree For me, two of the best examples of how advances in AI since 2000 have, overall, improved human wellbeing are in the areas of healthcare and economic growth and productivity. AI is transforming diagnostics by rapidly analysing medical data, identifying diseases early, and reducing human error. For example, Qure.ai (the world's most adopted healthcare AI company) uses deep learning to interpret radiology images and detect conditions like Tuberculosis, lung diseases, and strokes. For the years 2023-2024, they positively impacted over "20 million lives through their advanced AI-driven screening solutions in X-rays and CTs and screened over 1 million patients for Tuberculosis in 24 African countries". In terms of economic growth and productivity (and sustainability), you need only look at the agricultural sector. Blue River Technology (that partnered with John Deere) developed, with the help of AI, smart tractors that take images, identify which plants to remove, spray them, and verify the accuracy and performance of the system, all in real-time. This kind of technology reduces chemical use, optimises farming techniques and promotes sustainability. In saying the above, I am cognizant of the areas where AI has negatively impacted sectors through job displacement. For example, lawyers (I have few in the family) can't compete with the likes of ChatGPT when it comes to analysing legal cases and precedents in 30 seconds or less. Or in the manufacturing industry, where humanoid robots and AI have transformed automotive manufacturing and production processes, making it more profitable, but has seen mass lay-offs and has an estimated "Potential reduction on wages around $3 trillion by 2050".
Professor Stephanié Rossouw
Associate Professor, School for Social Science and Public Policy, Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand -
Neither agree nor disagree I'm not aware of any strong evidence on the impact of artificial intelligence on human wellbeing. The term artificial intelligence is, itself, somewhat unclear. I take it here to refer to the use of large language learning models which is the sense in which the term is often used in the media. Extending the term to the impact of machine learning and algorithmic-driven business models in social media I tend towards pessimism as I think there is fairly robust evidence that the combination of social media plus ubiquitous smartphone availability is bad for youth mental health (e.g. Ebi-Jaoude et al, 2020).
Doctor Conal Smith
Principal, Kōtātā Insight -
Neither agree nor disagree Like many past cases of rapid technical change, there have been better and worse uses, by people and institutions with better and worse motivations and methods. There are signs, especially from the United States, that the scientific gains are being overshadowed by the societal losses.
Professor John Helliwell
Professor Emeritus of Economics, University of British Columbia -
Neither agree nor disagree Empirical evidence demonstrates several positive impacts of AI implementation. In healthcare, AI technologies have achieved measurable improvements through enhanced diagnostic accuracy (McKinney et al., 2020) and shown positive effects on educational outcomes when thoughtfully integrated with human instruction (Reich, 2020). Professional productivity has increased in specific contexts, though these gains often require substantial organizational adjustments (Brynjolfsson et al., 2022). AI has also contributed to improved outcomes in transportation and healthcare, such as enhanced diagnostic imaging and intelligent traffic management. Mental health support through AI chatbots shows promise in controlled settings, though it still lacks robust evidence of sustained long-term benefits, and the anticipated productivity gains from AI implementation have shown uneven distribution patterns across different population segments (Acemoglu et al., 2023). However, significant negative impacts warrant serious consideration. Research has identified troubling patterns in social media algorithms that amplify harmful content related to eating disorders, significantly impacting vulnerable teenagers. Content recommendation systems intensify body image issues among adolescents through continuous exposure to idealized and manipulated images. Algorithmic biases and the digital divide exacerbate inequities, limiting access to AI benefits and reinforcing social and economic disparities (Eubanks, 2018). Of particular concern are instances where algorithmic acceleration of harmful content has been linked to increased rates of self-harm among young users (Murray et al., 2023), and the first case where AI chatbots failed to recognize and appropriately respond to explicit suicidal ideation. Implementation of AI technologies has also raised significant privacy and autonomy concerns. References Acemoglu, D., Autor, D., Hazell, J., & Restrepo, P. (2023). Automation and the Workforce: A Firm-Level View from the 2019 Annual Business Survey. AEA Papers and Proceedings, 113, 12-16. Brynjolfsson, E., Rock, D., & Syverson, C. (2022). The productivity J-curve: How intangibles complement general purpose technologies. American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, 14(1), 333-372. Eubanks, V. (2018). Automating inequality: How high-tech tools profile, police, and punish the poor. St. Martin's Press. McKinney, S. M., Sieniek, M., Godbole, V., Godwin, J., Antropova, N., Ashrafian, H., ... & Shetty, S. (2020). International evaluation of an AI system for breast cancer screening. Nature, 577(7788), 89-94. Murray, S. B., Anderson, L. K., & Cusack, A. (2023). Digital self-harm among adolescents: The role of algorithmic amplification. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, 52(1), 143-156. Reich, J. (2020). Failure to disrupt: Why technology alone can't transform education. Harvard University Press.
Professor Daniela Andrén
Senior Lecturer, Örebro University School of Business -
Disagree It's tough to take a stand on this beyond admitting insufficient knowledge to tally an overall causal impact. However, my suspicion is that if we don't know the answer, it might be that the negatives dominate. AI can surely be given some credit for widespread productivity increases, which must have had broad benefits. However, AI equally strengthens the "dark side of capitalism": just like our capitalist system is remarkably successful at filling niches when and where a need arises, it is equally able to create fake needs whenever there exist human weaknesses that can be exploited. The market is certain to be just as good at that task, which hurts people but makes profit, as it is at the task of helping people while making a profit. There are now numerous enhanced algorithms in social media tuned to hijack primitive reward circuitry in our brains to seek increasingly simplistic, shallow, and polarizing messages. In fact, the 200-year-long but accelerating increase in the rate of information we are bombarded with is likely responsible for steadily decreasing attention spans, which means we are losing the collective ability to manage debate and democratic deliberation (so says Johann Hari in "Stolen Focus").
Professor Chris Barrington-Leigh
Associate Professor, McGill University