'Mancur Olson': on the UK's AI future

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The Robot Reckoning: An Olsonian Autopsy of Britain’s Future

Mancur Olson died on February 19, 1998, at the age of 66. He was a professor of economics at the University of Maryland at the time of his death and a key figure in the development of public choice theory and institutional economics.

But imagine Mancur Olson returns from the grave in 2040, tweed rustling, spectacles glinting, to inspect a Britain where every household can afford an omniskilled humanoid and a chat-bot cleverer than a barrister. Would he preach a new dawn of growth?

Hardly. He would reach for his usual instruments—coalitions, incentives, institutional sclerosis—and start dissecting.

How to Think about the Problem

Olson never stared at the gadget; he stared at the interests swirling around it. Three questions organise his diagnosis:

• Who owns the robots and the models? Outright ownership diffuses power; subscription models funnel rents up the chain. Follow the deeds and the IP licences.
• Can institutions bend before they break? Parliament, courts, regulators and councils must rewrite the rules at speed. If they dither, yesterday’s cartels will colonise tomorrow’s platforms.
• Which coalitions organise best? Winners are concentrated—platform firms, data landlords, property holders. Losers—the displaced and the diffuse—rarely coordinate. That asymmetry decides the spoils.

What Household Robots Actually Do

First, a labour shock. When every family commands cheap, tireless digital servants, human labour loses leverage in routine tasks. Wages fall where code competes. The remaining human niches cluster round status, intimacy and regulation: think bespoke cabinetry, personalised therapy, safeguarding-intensive caring.

Second, mass capital without capitalists—maybe. If the robots are truly owned (no hidden cloud leash), Britain experiences an unprecedented spread of productive assets. But if usage is gated by subscriptions, data tolls and perpetual updates, we are merely tenants on silicon estates.

Third, the public sector convulses. Triage bots slash NHS wait-lists, AI tutors threaten classrooms, council payrolls shrink under algorithmic case-work. Each advance delights the Treasury and terrifies the unions. Expect pitched battles couched in the language of ethics and safeguarding.

Fourth, regulation turns into trench warfare. Incumbent professions will demand “safety” rules designed to delay rivals. Ethical white papers multiply; their subtext is market-share protection.

Will Robots Break Britain’s Cartels?

Olson would walk borough by borough and conclude: not automatically.

The property lobby will scarcely notice; robots do not create land. Finance will sack half its back-office, pocket the gains and double its lobbying budget. Professional guilds will fracture—conveyancers may vanish, but surgeons will wrap themselves in ever-thicker credentialing. Public-sector unions will fight, fragment, then pivot to co-manage the very AI they decry.

Old coalitions thin, new ones fatten. What emerges is churn, not emancipation.

Two Futures

Creative destruction works. Open hardware, portable models, muscular antitrust and—crucially—land-use reform let robot productivity flow into cheaper goods and higher living standards. GDP per head lifts decisively, inequality narrows, politics grows turbulent but vital.

Cartel perpetuation. Robots are cloud-tethered, IP is ironclad, planning remains frozen, regulators tiptoe. Output potential rises but the dividend concentrates in platform equity and land rents. Median wages stagnate, discontent ferments, Britain’s productivity puzzle deepens to a lament.

On recent form—housing gridlock, regulatory drift, Whitehall capture—Olson would wager on the second path unless a genuine crisis forces reform.

What Would Olson Do?

1. Crack model monopolies. Mandate portability and open-weights once a system crosses a market-share threshold.
2. Shift taxes from robots to land. Let automation run free while recapturing gains embedded in property.
3. Sunset every professional monopoly. Licences expire unless periodically re-justified in open hearings.
4. Liberalise planning. Robot labour is useless if walls, roads and houses remain rationed.
5. Seed universal capital stakes. A sovereign AI fund can grant each citizen equity, so the silicon surplus arrives in wallets, not trickles.

The Verdict

Household androids and genius chat-bots will not, by themselves, drag Britain from its doldrums. Potential output will soar, but without radical institutional renovation the surplus will be skimmed by the very coalitions that jam the gears today—augmented by a new layer of platform barons. In short, the robot revolution will either pry open Britain’s cartel state or varnish it with chrome.

Unless Parliament finds the nerve to tax rents, break monopolies and liberate land, we may soon queue at food-banks under the watchful eye of cheerful, cloud-leased butlers supervised by very advanced police drones—proof that even universal automation cannot compensate for human political inertia.