Artificial intelligence is driving once-in-a-generation advances in medicine, math and disaster prevention. It’s not just a scientific breakthrough — it’s a breakthrough in how we make breakthroughs.
As a general-purpose technology, AI has the power to accelerate overall economic growth and transform economies. The nations that deploy it at scale will be the nations that come out on top. July’s AI Action Plan rightly made AI leadership a “national security imperative.”
But to lead in AI, we not only have to create the best models, we also have to put them to work. And while America is excelling at the first, we are lagging at the second.
What’s holding back U.S. AI deployment?
America’s tech companies are investing over a trillion dollars a year in data centers and research and development. And today, the U.S. boasts models 300 times more efficient than the state of the art just two years ago.
But the proof of the pudding is in the eating. The true measure of these models’ value is whether Americans are actually using them. There, other countries are leaving us behind.
From TVs to color printers, America often wins at innovation but loses at deployment and adoption. If we want to win the AI deployment race and lead the world in critical technologies, we need to get these tools into peoples’ hands and let them discover the possibilities they unlock.
Other countries are taking this approach. That includes America’s main rival in the AI race, China, which is laser-focused on both AI development and AI adoption. In the words of a Chinese tech executive: “America focuses on the model, but Chinese players emphasize practically applying AI.”
The results should make us sit bolt upright: Over 600 million Chinese are already working with large language models, 83 percent of businesses are using it and China now has more than 200,000 new AI companies.
Bottom line: The country is leading globally in business and consumer AI adoption. Americans are known for our ingenuity and “can-do” spirit. So what’s holding us back in this global competition?
Poll after poll shows that while Americans are curious about AI’s potential for society, they are less excited about its potential than people elsewhere.
Dystopian films like “Terminator” and “Blade Runner”and a tendency to think of AI as social media 2.0 have created challenging framings. And there are valid and important concerns about the potential for how jobs might evolve and change.
These are of course very real issues, and the advent of every important new technology creates new challenges. But valid concerns shouldn’t lead to a vicious cycle in which skepticism slows adoption, which slows down the very improvements that would build trust.
It’s time to break that cycle by tapping into another insight from recent polling: The more people use AI, the more they look forward to the possibilities it can unlock.
Nurses in Tennessee used AI to streamline hand-off reports and freed up more time for them to spend with their patients. Firefighters in Florida started using AI and gained real-time insights about how fires might spread.
As people learn first-hand what they can do with AI, they appreciate how it can solve problems, speed up mundane tasks and uncover insights that were once out of reach.
Optimism is a strategic advantage in the AI deployment race, but optimism comes from positive experience.
It’s less about talking up AI’s benefits, and more about giving people access to AI tools — Deep Research, Deep Search and more — so they discover those benefits for themselves. That will take a coordinated strategy from both the private and public sectors across areas like education, responsibility, and energy.
Connecting people to AI skills will be key. By encouraging students and educators to work with AI to solve community challenges, initiatives like the Presidential AI Challenge can demystify AI and show people how they can use it in their daily jobs.
The government can lead by example, using AI to boost civic engagement, protect critical infrastructure and make agencies more efficient. Streamlined regulation, building on existing laws, can help remove barriers to getting AI in people’s hands. That’s what countries across Asia are doing — and it’s paying off.
At the same time, industry has a responsibility to implement safety frameworks, build guardrails against AI-specific risks and support cross-company standards, similar to labels from Underwriters Laboratories or the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval.
Finally, we’ll need abundant and reliable energy to power this new era of innovation. That will take permitting reform, advanced nuclear fission and fusion, cutting-edge storage, sophisticated grid management and an “all-of-the-above” energy strategy.
American ingenuity gave rise to many of today’s AI breakthroughs — and there’s more to come as people start using AI in their day-to-day lives.
With AI poised to shape global leadership for the 21st century, it’s time for Americans to do what we do best: Put optimism to work.
Kent Walker is Google’s president of Global Affairs.
