Wealth inequality will be massively expanded
The gains from advanced AI are positioned to flow to a small group of companies and investors, while everyone else bears the disruption and risk.
AI’s gains are flowing to those who already own the most. The IMF concluded that “in most scenarios, AI will likely worsen overall inequality”.1 Experts already warn the gap between capital and labor will grow.
- Daron Acemoglu, MIT, predicted AI will widen the gap between capital and labor income.2
- The IMF warned that productivity gains at AI-adopting firms will likely boost returns to capital, favoring high earners.1
The divide is already visible.
- In 2025, the “Magnificent Seven” tech stocks drove about 40% of the S&P 500’s gains.3
- The top 1% already hold 31.7% of U.S. wealth, about as much as the bottom 90%.4
- In 2026, the world got its first trillionare.
It has been argued by AI corporate leaders that superintelligence will usher in a new era of wealth creation. They state that AI will democratize productivity, create a world where anyone can realize their ideas, and profit off the returns. Maybe the wealth generated by AI will even be distributed fairly amongst people, they say, and free us from the tyranny of having to work jobs that make us miserable.
This narrative could not be more misleading. What they leave out of this discussion is that compute is not free, not even close. These companies want to make money off their products, and they do this by selling compute to users as they need it. And the individuals bankrolling these labs certainly show no signs of wanting to give up their profits to help the public.
The problem is clear: those with more money to spend on compute will be able to better realize their ideas, and outcompete those with less resources. In such a world, income inequality is certain to spiral out of control even further than it already has.