AI: The Great Leveller

Artificial intelligence is usually discussed in terms of what it might take away from us. Our jobs, our livelihoods, our security. But what about what it could give us?

For the first time in history, we have a technology capable of making knowledge and expertise available to almost everyone, at very little cost.

This could be the greatest opportunity for social mobility in generations.

Think about what is already possible.

With little more than an internet connection and a login, someone can have a business website built and live in twenty minutes. They can develop a brand, write a business plan, research competitors and create marketing materials. They can build software without knowing how to code.

Work that once required thousands of pounds and several different specialists can now be attempted by one person sitting at a kitchen table.

The results won't always be perfect. But the barriers to getting started have collapsed.

And it goes far beyond business.

A child whose parents cannot afford private tutoring can have access to personalised educational support. Someone without a university education can learn professional skills. People who cannot afford expensive advice can begin to understand legal, financial and technical problems for themselves.

For centuries, money has bought access to expertise. AI is beginning to break that relationship.

So why aren't we talking about this more?

Because the people leading the conversation feel most threatened.

We in the middle class have built our livelihoods around education, qualifications and specialist knowledge. Much of their value comes from their scarcity.

AI threatens that scarcity, and with it our economic security.

It is natural to protect what we have. We support opportunity for others until it threatens our own.

And we don't need to consciously oppose social mobility to prevent it. We simply invest our money, time and influence in the people and institutions that benefit us.

Britain has become a country where economic security feels increasingly difficult to achieve and even harder to maintain. We have spent decades encouraging individual competition, leaving people frightened of losing the position they have worked so hard to reach.

Perhaps the middle class hasn't deliberately pulled up the ladder. Perhaps we're simply terrified of falling off it.

Here in Camden, extraordinary wealth exists alongside significant deprivation. Children growing up a short distance apart can have entirely different opportunities.

Now imagine if every child had access to excellent personalised tutoring. If anyone with an idea could build a business without first needing money, connections or professional qualifications.

Much of this is already possible.

But AI won't automatically deliver a fairer society. Those who own the technology and have the resources to exploit it will capture most of its benefits unless we choose otherwise.

And not all of us in the middle class will survive this transformation economically.

Some of us will prosper. Others will find our skills less valuable and our livelihoods threatened. We will discover that we have more in common with the working class than with the wealthy.

That changes the calculation.

For the middle class, supporting a more equal society is no longer simply a matter of principle or generosity. It becomes a matter of self-interest.

We have a choice about how we respond.

We could use AI to bring the super-rich and a fortunate section of the middle class forward, while leaving everyone else behind.

Or we could make access to AI a public priority. The best tools cost money, and free versions are limited. So put them within reach of everyone: full access through every library card, and AI tutoring in every state school. We could use it to bring the middle and working classes forward together.

Britain has spent generations trying to improve social mobility. Now we can remove some of the barriers that have kept people in their place.

What sort of country do we want to be?

Technology doesn't decide how its benefits are shared. We do.