Google adds leading economists to its AI & Economy research group

Program expansion and new leadership

Google announced an expansion of its AI & Economy Research Program to better track artificial intelligence’s impact on jobs and productivity.

The expansion brings on two new directors, Anu Madgavkar and Daniel Rock, to steer global AI adoption studies and labor‑market analysis.

Scott Strand, Head of StratOps and Special Projects for Technology & Society, will support the program’s strategic operations.

Zanna Iscenko, AI & Economy Lead in the Chief Economist’s Office, will coordinate research activities across the team.

The initiative also launched the AI & Economy ATLAS v1.0, an interactive open‑access platform that visualizes how people use Google’s AI tools at work and in daily life.

World‑class academic advisors join the effort

Nobel Laureate Philippe Aghion, the 2025 Nobel Prize winner in Economics and Kurt Björklund Chaired Professor at INSEAD and the Collège de France, has joined as an Academic Advisor.

Aghion will apply his pioneering work on innovation‑led growth and creative destruction to model AI’s long‑term macroeconomic trajectory.

Ajay Agrawal, Professor at the University of Toronto and Visiting Fellow, will collaborate closely with David Autor, a current Fellow and head of MIT’s Department of Economics.

Agrawal’s expertise in entrepreneurship and technology adoption will enrich the program’s understanding of AI‑driven business dynamics.

The advisory group also includes Nobel Laureate Michael Spence and Dame Diane Coyle of Cambridge, expanding the breadth of economic perspectives.

Focus areas, data access, and broader engagement

The research agenda focuses on four core areas: the future of work, productivity and growth, global technology diffusion, and AI’s impact on scientific discovery.

Google’s team will use real‑time data to measure how AI reshapes employment patterns and enterprise performance worldwide.

Findings and datasets are made publicly available at ai.google/economy, allowing policymakers, businesses, and scholars to explore the evidence.

The program emphasizes multidisciplinary collaboration, inviting input from academia, industry leaders, and government agencies.

By integrating fine‑grained usage data with rigorous economic analysis, the team aims to provide actionable insights for workforce training and policy design.

Google describes the effort as a means to ensure that AI benefits “everyone,” reflecting a commitment to inclusive economic outcomes.

The expanded team will also study AI’s role in accelerating scientific research, linking productivity gains to broader societal progress.

Through the ATLAS platform, users can interactively explore adoption trends across regions, sectors, and demographic groups.

Google expects that this transparent, data‑driven approach will help organizations anticipate and adapt to AI‑induced shifts.

Stakeholders are encouraged to review the latest publications, which detail early findings on AI‑augmented productivity.

Overall, the initiative represents a systematic effort to quantify AI’s economic influence as it unfolds.

Why This Matters: By adding top economists and open data tools, Google aims to provide concrete evidence that can guide policy and workforce decisions around AI’s growing economic role.