Key Points
- Google expands its AI and Economy Research Program with Nobel laureates and leading professors.
- New directors will study real-world AI adoption, productivity, and workforce changes.
- The initiative aims to shape policy and training for broadly shared prosperity.
Google recently launched the AI tools tracker ATLAS v1.0 to measure how people use artificial intelligence at work and at home. The interactive site offers open access to adoption data. However, understanding usage patterns is only the first step. The company announced a major expansion of its research efforts to help leaders navigate the economic shift driven by machine intelligence.
The expanded research program brings together academia, industry, and government to analyze this transition in real time. Core focus areas include the future of work, productivity growth, global technology spread, and AI’s role in scientific discovery. This multidisciplinary approach combines fine-grained data with rigorous economic modeling.
Nobel Laureate Philippe Aghion joins as an Academic Advisor to apply his work on innovation and growth. He will help model the long-term macroeconomic trajectory of AI alongside other prize winners. His expertise in creative destruction adds weight to the program’s theoretical foundation.
Professor Ajay Agrawal arrives as a Visiting Fellow to collaborate with MIT’s David Autor. He will advance research on the economics of AI adoption and robotics. His focus on entrepreneurship and human welfare aligns with the goal of expanding the frontier of what people can achieve with new tools.
Anu Madgavkar joins as a Director after two decades at the McKinsey Global Institute. She brings deep experience advising governments and global forums on labor markets. At Google, she will lead empirical research on global AI diffusion and small business ecosystems. Her work will track how generative AI reshapes workforces worldwide.
Daniel Rock joins from the Wharton School as a second Director. A leading voice on AI and labor, he co-authored foundational papers on technological transitions. He will bridge frontier model telemetry with econometrics to analyze enterprise productivity and labor restructuring. His technical background ensures rigorous measurement.
These leaders will work alongside Alex Imas, Director of AGI Economics at Google DeepMind, and Zanna Iscenko from the Chief Economist’s Office. This unified leadership structure connects deep technical insight with high-level economic strategy. The team serves as a scientific bridge for future ATLAS updates.
The collective goal is to identify the organizational practices and public policies needed to ensure AI upskills workers rather than just replacing them. Researchers will study training programs that democratize expertise. The aim is to drive prosperity that reaches across different sectors and skill levels.
To explore the latest publications and interact with global data, visit the program’s hub at ai.google/economy. The site offers a window into how the Google ecosystem investigates the economic forces shaping our digital future. Keeping an eye on this research helps anyone understand where technology and labor markets are heading next.
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