Op-Ed: We Keep Inventing AI, but China Is Actually Using It

America may excel at inventing cutting-edge AI, but it's China that's putting it to work on the assembly line, argues Jonas Nahm in a New York Times op-ed. He notes that Tesla's Shanghai plant dramatically outperforms its California factory on output per worker, and he sees that as a snapshot of a broader reality: China has reorganized manufacturing around automation, robotics, and AI, while the US largely has not.

Beijing has spent a decade pushing "smart factories" as a national project, with over 30,000 already in operation. It uses AI to flag production defects within seconds and adjust production in real-time based on inventory counts, for instance. He flags the fact that tech company Xiaomi requires just 76 seconds on average to produce a car in its Beijing plant thanks to its 700 robots and AI systems. Meanwhile, "Washington talks about AI as if it lives in research labs, venture capital, portfolios and data centers."

Nahm, a former White House economist, says Washington keeps viewing China's advantage as an issue of "trade flows rather than factory performance." US manufacturers—especially smaller ones—struggle with outdated equipment, manual data sources, and a dearth of workers who are skilled in using AI. Nahm's prescription: Lawmakers must get laser-focused about "helping manufacturers deploy digital tools." Read the full op-ed for more on what that looks like.