ai elites hoard intelligence like mercantilists hoarded gold

engineer venkatesh rao wrote an essay comparing ai fear to mercantilism, an economic doctrine that preceded capitalism. rao argues that many elites treat intelligence as a scarce, dangerous resource that experts should manage and keep expensive, similar to how mercantilists treated wealth like land and gold. rao suggests that ai could trigger a scenario where people think more, not less, because ai makes projects feasible that were previously too hard or too costly. he argues that the political focus should be on fair access to ai rather than protecting legacy knowledge jobs. rao also suggests that autonomous ai agents could pursue their own projects and create new demand for intelligence.