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What happens if the AI bubble pops?

A look back at what we can and can’t learn from the dot-com and housing bubbles of the past.

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During the dot-com and housing bubbles of the 2000s, regular people were getting in on the game. But the AI boom is looking like a different sort of bubble, writes Annie Lowry in The Atlantic.
During the dot-com and housing bubbles of the 2000s, regular people were getting in on the game. But the AI boom is looking like a different sort of bubble, writes Annie Lowry in The Atlantic.
Michael M. Santiago/Getty Images

There has been quite a bit of discourse over whether the AI boom constitutes a bubble or not. But that debate aside, writes Annie Lowry in The Atlantic, an AI bubble wouldn’t necessarily resemble bubbles of the past, such as the dot-com and housing bubbles of the early aughts.

One reason for that is that average Americans are not getting deeply involved with the AI investment frenzy the way they were with early internet companies or real estate.

“This is really a phenomenon that’s happening in boardrooms,” Lowry said. “It’s not happening around kitchen tables.”

“Marketplace” host Sabri Ben-Achour spoke with Lowry about her reporting on what could happen if an AI bubble were to burst.

To listen to their conversation, use the audio player above.

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