200-plus economists and 16 Nobel laureates warn AI could outpace Industrial Revolution job losses

More than 200 economists and AI researchers, including 16 Nobel laureates, signed a statement warning that AI could displace workers faster than the Industrial Revolution, the Stanford Digital Economy Lab said on July 13.

Titled ‘We Must Act Now,’ the statement is one of the largest coordinated economist warnings yet on AI’s labor-market risks. It frames the threat as one of pace: a transformation potentially larger than the 19th-century shift to factory work, but compressed into far less time.

The signatories include Michael Spence, an NYU professor emeritus and Nobel laureate, and Daron Acemoglu, an MIT Institute Professor. It was organized by Erik Brynjolfsson, who directs the Stanford Digital Economy Lab, with Ajay Agrawal of the University of Toronto’s Rotman School of Management, Anton Korinek of the University of Virginia, and Tom Cunningham of METR.

The statement calls on leaders to ‘build the incentives, guardrails, and institutions needed to steer AI in a direction that complements humans and benefits society,’ while acknowledging that AI could also raise living standards.

The letter is a warning, not a forecast. It cites the risk of large-scale job displacement without projecting specific job-loss numbers or a timeline.