The Productivity Commission has said that productivity in Australia has slumped for the last decade, and that AI could be key in fixing it.
Speaking with Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) Chief Economist Luke Yeaman, Productivity Commission Chair Danielle Wood attributed the flat-line to structural economic changes, weak business investment, poor technological adoption rates and a shift to labour-intensive services.
“Investment just hasn’t really recovered anywhere post GFC… that means less technology, less capital per worker,” Wood said, adding that lower business enthusiasm had also impacted productivity.
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“If you’ve got fewer people switching jobs, fewer new businesses… fewer disruptions in markets… [productivity] tends to be lower,” she said.
However, Wood said that the low levels of productivity could be alleviated, in a large part thanks to AI. The technology could provide a notable boost, depending on how well it is adopted and implemented within the Australian economy.
Wood says that Australia is behind on adoption compared to the US, UK and Canada, and the productivity gains that the technology delivers depend entirely on how businesses adopt AI within their operations.
“Our estimate… was that AI could add 4% to labour productivity over the decade,” Wood said. “It is meaningful and… not much else is going to give you something of that magnitude,” she said.
“The benefits obviously only come once you adopt it… but it’s also about moving past the shallow adoption of AI, from using it to write better emails, take meeting minutes, to using it for the fundamental reconfiguration of businesses, processes and products.”
The banking industry is one in Australia that has already invested heavily and adopted AI technology, with CBA planning to or having already used it for financial advice, customer service and more, to varying degrees of success.
However, the bank’s CEO Matt Comyn said businesses worldwide might begin tightening their belts on AI spending as early as this year, as the technology becomes more expensive and caters to more business outcomes.
Comyn said companies using AI will be more pressured to see a return on AI investment, particularly as data centre costs and workforce disruption place greater constraints on AI rollouts.
As a result, corporate AI tokens have increased in price, alongside the fact that these tools have greater “reasoning, the access to tools, the amount of context that you can put into it – your token costs do not scale on a linear basis”, he said, speaking at The Australian Financial Review conference.
“I won’t be surprised if over the course of this year, companies will be really scrutinising [the cost of AI],” Comyn said.
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Daniel Croft
Born in the heart of Western Sydney, Daniel Croft is a passionate journalist with an understanding for and experience writing in the technology space. Having studied at Macquarie University, he joined Momentum Media in 2022, writing across a number of publications including Australian Aviation, Cyber Security Connect and Defence Connect. Outside of writing, Daniel has a keen interest in music, and spends his time playing in bands around Sydney.