Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont) has made a career of mainstreaming terrible ideas, but his proposed moratorium on data center construction might be his worst yet.
“We have not a clue. We are totally unprepared for what is coming,” Sanders said Tuesday night on MS NOW. The 84-year-old socialist knows progress on artificial intelligence depends on the computational advances generated by data centers, which is why he’s determined to stop them from being built: “We’ve got to slow this thing down.”
Some oppose data centers for environmental or aesthetic reasons, but Sanders bypasses those arguments and goes straight for the old-school Marxist thesis that they’re bad because they alienate workers from their labor. He also says computers might take over the world and blames AI on “a cognitive decline among young people.”
But his real issue is that American businesses might benefit. Indeed, firms like Meta, Google and Amazon, which was founded by Post owner Jeff Bezos, are investing billions in data centers that can process mind-blowing amounts of information. Stopping that can harm big business, which is always the villain in the socialist imagination.
Investments in physical and productive capital are what corporate critics have long said they wanted. Few people have been more critical of stock buybacks than Sanders, but investment in AI is leading to a reduction in buybacks.
Sanders should also be ecstatic about how much AI can help workers. He has introduced legislation to mandate a 32-hour work week. Annual working hours have gradually declined for decades as technology improves productivity. AI’s efficiency boost someday could get workers there without the job-killing risks of a government diktat.
But Sanders doesn’t believe in letting the economy develop organically. He wants the government to manage it. Unfortunately, he’s not alone.
AI doomerism has become a bipartisan affliction. Six states, red and blue, are considering bans on new data centers. Environmental concerns have spurred fearmongering about water shortages, and straightforward NIMBYism also stands in the way of development.
So far, congressional Democrats have largely rejected Sanders’s call for a moratorium. Even if he was right that the technology is moving too fast, it’s too late to stop. If the U.S. slowed down, other countries would not. Sanders mused on MS NOW that the U.S. should negotiate an AI treaty with China. Maybe he can start with a more realistic request, like asking Xi Jinping to hold a free and fair election when his term is up.
While politicians grandstand, AI advances continue every day. It can translate phone calls in real time. AI-assisted mammography is improving breast cancer patients’ outcomes. The technology is helping facial-reconstruction surgeons 3D-print more accurate jawbones for people healing from gruesome injuries.
The ceiling for progress is not human imagination. It’s intervention from economically illiterate politicians.
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