How the AI ​​boom was made possible by a 1970s economic revolution

Artificial intelligence is accelerating a global economic revolution that began in the 1970s. Exploring the impact of AI on various areas of society highlights an important parallel moment in history: the emergence of the “service economy” in the United States.

In 1972, amid a time of global unrest, a group of OECD (Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development) economists sought to reinvent the way nations thought not only about prosperity but also about the very purpose of society. They did this by proposing a broad new category of commerce: services.

It’s hard to imagine today, but until then economists had largely perceived and measured trade solely in terms of goods. Money was made through the exchange of material, physical products (wheat, weapons, butter). To become a rich nation, the wisdom went, one had to add unique value to one’s raw materials (crops, iron) by transforming them into more complex products (processed foods, steel) that gave one a competitive advantage over others…