Whether artificial intelligence will create or destroy work is contested among economists, but the public has largely made up its mind. Analysing survey data from 38 European countries with more than 37,000 respondents, a team including Armin Granulo of the LMU Munich School of Management found that in most countries people believe AI eliminates more jobs than it creates, a view that is strikingly stable and most common in economically developed states.
The consequential finding, published in PNAS with co-authors at the University of Vienna, is what that belief does. People who see AI as labour-replacing report lower satisfaction with democracy and less political engagement, from discussion to civic participation. Representative experiments in the United Kingdom and United States suggest the link is causal: participants shown scenarios framing AI as replacing human labour subsequently expressed less trust in democratic institutions than those shown AI creating new kinds of work.
The effects arise even though AI's measurable impact on labour markets has so far been limited, meaning expectations alone are shifting democratic attitudes. The authors argue that public debate fixated on job losses may carry unintended political side effects, and that communicating the genuine openness of technological futures, as something societies can shape through democratic choices, could help counter the corrosion.