These days, you don’t have to be a Rockefeller financier to know that the US economy is on shaky ground. Utility bills are going through the roof, imported goods are skyrocketing in cost, and job growth is nonexistent. Of course, it doesn’t bode too well that the Rockefeller fellas are trembling too.
Writing in the Financial Times, noted fund manager and former Morgan Stanley investor Ruchir Sharma argued that the US economy has more or less become “one big bet on AI.”
It’s a bold claim, but it’s not hard to see his case. As many economists have been shouting to the heavens, the numbers are looking increasingly grim as wild tech investments keep an otherwise horrendous economy aloft.
As Sharma notes, the billions of dollars being dumped into AI now account for 40 percent of US GDP growth in 2025, with no signs of slowing down. Meanwhile, AI companies have accounted for 80 percent of growth in American stocks.
Even though the stock market isn’t synonymous with the broader economy, Sharma writes that its remarkable growth is drawing in the green stuff from all corners of the globe. In effect, this is stimulating the economy for the ultra-wealthy — with help from Donald Trump’s “Big Beautiful Bill,” which syphons money to the rich — as we’re seeing now in the consumer economy.
Though consumption has historically made up the largest section of the total US economy, it’s now dwarfed by AI investments. As the FT notes, what remains of consumption is likewise driven by the top ten percent of American earners — an already wealthy group compared to the rest of the world — who now account for a record-breaking 50 percent of all US consumer spending.
There are also crises developing in immigration for obvious reasons, which has a major impact on productivity, as well as a surge in home foreclosures and a huge rise in US government debt. Yet despite it all, the headlines remain rosy, thanks entirely to AI.
“The main reason AI is regarded as a magic fix for so many different threats is that it is expected to deliver a significant boost to productivity growth, especially in the US,” Sharma writes. “[Investors] appear convinced America is building leads in AI innovation, infrastructure and adoption that cannot be matched.”
Yet without AI spending, the US would lose one of the last industries actually bringing in any coin. In other words, “AI better deliver,” as Sharma warns — or the whole house of cards will soon come crashing down.
More on AI hype: Cory Doctorow Says the AI Industry Is About to Collapse