AI is increasingly presented as an economic opportunity: a route to higher productivity, greater competitiveness, a way to unlock innovation and create new industries and new sources of growth. But this presents a challenge: if AI succeeds in creating significant economic value, what kind of economy and society do we want that value to create?

Who benefits? Who participates? Who has a stake in the future that emerges?

And what role should business play in shaping this?

The UK Government is beginning to ask these questions explicitly. Its new AI Economics Institute, established by HM Treasury and the Department for Science, Innovation and Technology, will examine the impact of AI on productivity, labour markets and growth. Crucially, part of its remit is to understand whether the gains from AI are broadly shared across regions, income groups, sectors and generations.

Productivity is only part of the story

There are good reasons to be optimistic about AI’s economic potential. The Learning and Work Institute and Rigby Foundation report, Building an AI-ready workforce, estimates that comprehensive AI upskilling could generate a 2.3% productivity boost by 2035, creating economic value worth around £80 billion. Yet the report also argues that capturing those gains depends as much on leadership, workforce development and organisational choices as it does on the technology itself.

But productivity growth, important though it is, does not necessarily determine who benefits.

This distinction is highlighted in Anthropic’s report, Scenarios for our Economic Future, which explores different possible outcomes as AI capabilities advance. In some scenarios, economic growth accelerates dramatically while the labour share of income declines and unemployment rises among certain groups of workers. These are potential scenarios, not predictions, but they demonstrate an important point: an economy can become significantly more productive without the gains being widely shared.

Predictions about the economic impact of AI are frequently framed in terms of growth and efficiency. Businesses are being encouraged to adopt AI to improve performance, reduce costs and unlock new sources of value.

But the benefits of innovation are shaped by choices: how organisations deploy technology, how skills are developed, how labour markets adapt, what incentives policymakers create, and how value is distributed across society.

The arrival of AI therefore presents a challenge that is not simply technological or economic. It is a social one.

A solidarity perspective

One of the pillars in our Framework for AI is solidarity. At its heart, solidarity begins with a simple idea: that other people matter.

It asks us to look beyond our immediate interests and recognise that we are part of a wider web of relationships and mutual dependence. Our prosperity is connected to the prosperity of others. The long-term success of businesses is inseparable from the health of the societies in which they operate.

Viewed through this lens, AI is not simply a tool that helps organisations become more productive. It is a force that could reshape work, opportunity and economic participation across society.

That shifts the question.

Instead of asking how businesses can maximise the value they extract from AI, we might ask how businesses can help ensure that the value AI creates strengthens society as a whole.

This is not a matter of charity or corporate responsibility sitting alongside commercial objectives – it is about recognising that businesses have a direct stake in the kind of economy that emerges.

Economies work best when people feel they have opportunities to contribute, participate and benefit. They are more resilient when prosperity is broadly shared and when technological change strengthens rather than weakens social cohesion.

Business has more agency than it realises

Much of the public discussion about AI focuses on governments and technology developers. Yet businesses themselves are among the most important actors shaping how AI affects society.

Business leaders are not passive recipients of whatever AI future emerges. Through the technologies they buy, the standards they demand, the suppliers they choose, the jobs they redesign and the investments they make in people, they help determine how the benefits and costs of AI are experienced.

The influence extends even further.

In the absence of comprehensive global regulation, organisations can have significant influence over how AI is developed and deployed through what they choose to buy and the expectations they place on technology providers.

They can shape the market signals received by AI developers. They can use their purchasing power to encourage transparency, accountability and human-centred design. They can advocate for investment in skills and workforce transition. They can support standards and governance approaches that encourage innovation while protecting human dignity and social trust.

A broader conversation is needed

Many organisations are already asking how AI can improve productivity, enhance customer experience or reduce costs. Far fewer are asking what kind of future they want AI to help create.

  • What should businesses expect from those developing increasingly powerful AI systems?
  • What policies and regulatory frameworks are needed to support innovation while ensuring the benefits are widely distributed?
  • What investments in education, skills and infrastructure will help more people participate in the opportunities AI creates?
  • How do we ensure that AI strengthens, rather than weakens, trust, social cohesion and economic participation?

These questions sit beyond the remit of any single organisation. Yet they are too important to leave solely to governments or technology companies.

Business has both the legitimacy and the responsibility to contribute to these debates.

A moment of choice

There remains considerable uncertainty about AI’s long-term effects on work, productivity and growth. The Government’s own assessment highlights the importance of factors such as adoption rates, workforce adaptation and policy choices in determining future outcomes.

That uncertainty should not lead to passivity.

The future economic impact of AI will be shaped not only by technological breakthroughs but by the decisions organisations make today and the voices they choose to bring into the conversation.

The principle of solidarity invites leaders to recognise that wider responsibility.

The challenge is not simply to deploy AI successfully within individual organisations. It is to help shape the conditions in which AI can contribute to the common good, enabling more people to participate in, contribute to and benefit from the value it creates.

Ultimately, the question is not whether AI will transform our economy – it is whether businesses are willing to use their influence to help ensure that transformation serves the broadest community.

Because the future of AI is not something that happens to us. It is something we are collectively shaping.