AI will transform capitalism – but how?

Summary

The article argues that artificial intelligence could profoundly disrupt capitalism by automating not only routine labor but also knowledge work, entrepreneurship, innovation, and financial activity. It traces hopes for automation-driven emancipation to Aristotle’s account of self-operating tools and Karl Marx’s concept of “socialised knowledge” or the “general intellect.” The author contrasts US and Chinese AI strategies: American companies allegedly concentrate computing power and provide access through proprietary online services, while Chinese firms such as Kimi, Qwen, and DeepSeek emphasize open-source models that can run locally. Dean Ball of OpenAI reportedly criticized China’s approach as potentially producing “full AI communism.” The article argues that neither strategy represents a genuine end to capitalism, but rather competing forms of technologically enabled national and corporate power. It proposes a “third way” in which AI is developed for human need through universal basic services or incomes, cooperative and nonprofit ownership, lower energy use, and systems oriented toward community and altruism. The author suggests that AI may eliminate jobs without creating sufficient replacements and could weaken the connection between innovation and profit. The central conclusion is that AI does not automatically create a classless society, but may generate a crisis in existing economic arrangements and create an opportunity to reshape technological development.