--- title: "Automation and Polarization · AI Fault Line" url: https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-1086-739330/ description: "AI Fault Line is a neutral, evidence-cited field guide to why experts looking at the same developments disagree about AI's effect on productivity, jobs, inequality, regulation and the pace of change." --- [Research](https://aifaultline.com/research/) # Automation and Polarization [Daron Acemoğlu](https://aifaultline.com/authors/daron-acemoglu/), Jonas Loebbing · Journal of Political Economy · 28 Oct 2025 [Read original source](https://doi.org/10.1086/739330) Where this sits in the debate - [Will AI destroy more jobs than it creates?](https://aifaultline.com/debate/jobs/) - [Will AI widen inequality?](https://aifaultline.com/debate/inequality/) · its finding supports the claim ([why studies differ](https://aifaultline.com/debate/inequality/#why)) Direction of the finding as read from the abstract by an AI model ([AI-written](https://aifaultline.com/about/)). ## Abstract We develop an assignment model of automation. Each of a continuum of tasks of variable complexity is assigned to either capital or one of a continuum of labor skills. We characterize conditions for interior automation, whereby tasks of intermediate complexity are performed by capital. Interior automation arises when low-skill wages are low and effective cost of capital in low-complexity tasks is high. Minimum wages make interior automation less likely. Higher capital productivity causes employment and wage polarization, changes the skill premium nonmonotonically, and reduces the real wage of workers with comparative advantage profiles close to that of capital. ## About this publication **Top journal.** One of the journals economics departments rank highest: the “top five” economics journals, and the general-science journals Science and Nature. Placed by: Top five economics journals. [How sources are ranked](https://aifaultline.com/about/#source-ranking). Published 2025 (12 months ago) Citations 10 (OpenAlex) ## Citations in context [Chart: 10 citations, cohort median 10] 10 citations — 58th percentile among the 33 indexed papers from 2025 in this collection. Citation counts favor older papers; this compares only same-year papers here, not the whole literature. [Chart: published 2025] □ added to this collection in 2026. Daron Acemoglu signed the wemustactnow.ai letter · author affiliation matches seed institution massachusetts institute of technology — part of why this paper is in the collection. ## More on this topic Related by theme, not necessarily by method or conclusion. - [The Effects of Generative AI on High Skilled Work: Evidence from Three Field Experiments with Software Developers](https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-2139-ssrn-4945566/) SSRN · 2024 - [GPTs are GPTs: An Early Look at the Labor Market Impact Potential of Large Language Models](https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-48550-arxiv-2303-10130/) arXiv · 2023 - [Extending “GPTs Are GPTs” to Firms](https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-1257-pandp-20251045/) AEA Papers and Proceedings · 2025 - [New Frontiers: The Origins and Content of New Work, 1940–2018](https://aifaultline.com/research/p/doi-10-1093-qje-qjae008/) The Quarterly Journal of Economics · 2024 Overview assembled automatically from collected metadata. [How this site is built](https://aifaultline.com/about/).