MNI INTERVIEW: UK's ONS Finds AI Widening Productivity Gap

AI is adding to the difference in output between more and less productive workers, a senior Office for National Statistics official told MNI, as the organisation prepares to alter its surveys to better account for the effect of the technology on the economy.

"Initially there was an idea that AI would be democratising," ONS Director General, Surveys and Economic Statistics James Benford said in an interview, however the ONS's latest Business Insights and Conditions Survey suggests that it is widening existing gaps between more and less productive workers.

"Highly skilled workers are more adept at using AI," he said, adding that "you're seeing greater use of AI in those knowledge areas where the workforce is skilled, like coding is the most obvious one, but you're also seeing it in financial services, in law, legal services too." (See MNI INTERVIEW: US Labor Market 'On Pause' Amid AI Uncertainty)

The Business Insights and Conditions Survey already includes "rich questions" on Artificial Intelligence, and its latest reading found 26% of companies are using AI, including 45% of big companies, and nearly 50% of information and technology firms, said Benford.

Still, the ONS is planning to update its questions in order to better account for AI, and will publish an article in the summer.

One key question is how to measure the value of free digital goods which are now proliferating but do not show up in calculations of GDP. 

"AI isn't just enhancing existing services, it's also making available lots of free digital services," he said, and the ONS needs to "find a way to account for it beyond GDP, because if we don't we're effectively missing some of the ... economy."