Commentary: Big Tech is incapable of solving its Frankenstein problem

THE LIMITS OF COUNTING ON POLITICIANS

Many tech leaders have responded to public hostility by throwing their financial resources behind the Trump administration and other politicians they think will oppose regulation.

But history shows the limits of counting on friendly politicians. A Republican president helped create the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

American business was more popular then and employed many more people than the AI industry does now. None of that helped forestall regulation when the public demanded it.

Herbert Stein, who chaired Richard Nixon’s Council of Economic Advisers, said more regulation was imposed under Nixon than any President since Franklin Delano Roosevelt. And that approach is already failing, with politicians from socialist Senator Bernie Sanders to Donald Trump ally Governor Greg Abbott of Texas striking anti-data centre stances.

AI doesn’t have millions of employees making its case. Virginia’s Joint Legislative Audit and Review Commission found that a typical 250,000 square foot data centre employs about 50 full-time workers once open, roughly half of them contractors. Amazon.com is investing US$35 billion in the state by 2040 for at least 1,000 jobs, while Virginia’s sales-tax exemption for the industry cost an estimated US$1.6 billion in fiscal 2025.

Brookings Institution researchers do find real gains around the largest sites, with private employment up 4 per cent to 5 per cent, which is something. But it’s not “my neighbour works for OpenAI” either.

If the AI industry wants to dampen public backlash, it should start by embracing Gates’s advice. After all, he’s the only tech leader who’s been on the receiving end of a government attempt to break up his company.

An effective regulatory body, real protection for children, and communities that get more from data centres than 50 jobs in exchange for tax breaks would be a good start. Otherwise, the rebellion that’s beginning with data centres won’t end there.