Safe, beneficial AI, built in America.
Beneficial AI for America is an independent project started by Ben Caunt, for people of every party who want AI that helps people live healthier lives and do better work. It asks Republicans and Democrats to build that AI together: safe, made here and powered by data centers that pay their own way.
AI is already improving science and medicine
Lab tools that once took a big budget are now free or cheap for small teams and clinics.
- AI science won a Nobel PrizeGoogle DeepMind's Demis Hassabis and John Jumper shared half the 2024 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for AlphaFold, which predicts protein shapes.3
- AI helped catch more breast cancersIn a randomized Swedish trial of about 106,000 women, AI-supported screening was at least as safe as two radiologists and caught more of the cancers (80.5% vs. 73.8%), with no rise in false alarms and 44% less reading work.4
- An AI-discovered drug is now in late-stage trialsRentosertib, the first drug with both its target and molecule found by generative AI, had side effects similar to placebo and an early sign of benefit in a small, randomized trial (71 lung-disease patients, 12 weeks). A 320-patient phase III trial began in 2026.5,6
AI and robots can help care for an aging America
America is aging: more people will need care at home and in hospitals, with fewer working-age people for each person who needs it. Farms face their own aging workforce. AI and robots can help Americans live healthier, fuller lives, and that takes data centers built here.
- Fertility is at a record lowThe 2024 US fertility rate was 1,599.5 lifetime births per 1,000 women, about 1.6 children per woman. It has been below the replacement level of 2,100 every year since 2008.10
- Deaths are projected to outpace birthsThe Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects deaths will exceed births every year from 2030. Without immigration, the population would start shrinking in 2030.11
- Care jobs are growing fastThe government projects about 760,500 openings a year for home health and personal care aides, as jobs grow from 4.68 million in 2025 to 5.52 million in 2035.12
Practical robots already help on farms and in health care
Many of today's most useful robots don't look like people. They're sprayers, milking machines and delivery drones, each doing one hard job well. Next come robots that understand what they see and what we ask, built by leading labs on vision-language models trained in large data centers.14,15
- Care robots came with more care jobsIn Japanese nursing homes, adding robots (mostly for monitoring) was linked to more care-worker jobs, better staff retention, and fewer restraints and pressure sores.18
- Drone blood deliveries linked to fewer deathsIn a peer-reviewed observational study, Rwandan hospitals served by drone blood delivery saw 51% fewer in-hospital deaths from severe bleeding after childbirth.19
- AI models nearly doubled robot successWhen Google DeepMind trained a vision-language model to control a robot, success in new situations rose from 32% to 62%.14
- Robot brains are built in data centersAs of early 2026, computing for top AI training had grown about fivefold a year since 2020, and the largest AI data centers were nearing 1 gigawatt.20
AI is starting to cost some jobs, especially for people starting out. Most tech cuts in 2022–24 had other causes.
The 2022–24 tech layoffs mostly undid pandemic over-hiring, and most came before AI tools were in wide use. Some firms likely cite AI because investors like it.22
- Pandemic over-hiring drove early cutsIn November 2022, Meta cut more than 11,000 jobs, 13% of its staff, saying it had expected the pandemic boom to last.23
- AI was a small share of cuts in 2025Companies cited AI for 54,836 announced US job cuts in 2025, about 4.5% of the total.24,25 Oxford Economics suspects some firms relabel cuts from past over-hiring as AI-driven.25
- In 2026, AI is cited more oftenFrom January through October, companies cited AI for 121,401 cuts (about 20%), while total cuts fell 44% from the same months of 2025. These are reasons employers give, not measured job losses.26
- Early-career workers are feeling itAs of June 2026, employment of 22- to 25-year-olds in the most AI-exposed jobs ran about 19% below the trend for less-exposed peers, mostly from slower hiring. The authors call it a pattern, not proof of cause.27
- The national effect is small so farEven if every job young workers lost in these fields became unemployment, the Dallas Fed estimates it would add only about 0.1 percentage point to the national rate.28
AI helps people work faster and better, especially newcomers
In careful workplace studies, gains depend on the task, and people still need to check the work.
Each AI answer uses little energy; the total matters
A typical chatbot question uses about 0.3 watt-hours, by an independent estimate; very long inputs use more.31 Google reports 0.24 watt-hours for its median text prompt, not independently checked.32 Data centers used 4.4% of US electricity in 2023 and could use 6.7% to 12% by 2028, so how we power them matters.33 See energy, emissions and water in proportion.
- Support agents solved more problemsAmong 5,172 support agents, AI help raised issues resolved per hour by about 15%. Newer agents gained most, and customers responded better.30
- Consultants did better, within limitsAmong 758 consultants, AI users did 12.2% more tasks, 25.1% faster, at over 40% higher quality on tasks AI handles well. On a task beyond AI's strengths, they were 19 percentage points less likely to get it right.34
- More time for patientsAt Kaiser Permanente, 7,260 doctors using AI note-takers saved an estimated 15,791 hours of paperwork in a year, and 47% of 118 surveyed patients said their doctor looked at the computer less.35
Power bills are rising in some regions. Data centers must pay their full cost, and then they can help hold rates down.
Most of what big utilities collect pays for the grid itself: plants, poles, wires and financing. When that equipment carries more power, the cost per kilowatt-hour can fall, as long as there's spare capacity, big users ease off at peak times and they pay for anything built for them.
- Most of the cost is the grid, not fuelAt major investor-owned utilities in 2025, fuel was 10% of electric revenues, and fuel plus purchased power was under 30%. The rest mostly pays to build, finance and maintain the grid.39
- The grid is built for a few peak hoursAcross US grid operators, average demand is just 53% of peak, and more than 10% of the system exists to serve about 35 hours a year of extreme demand.40
- Growing states have tended to see lower pricesFrom 2019 to 2025, states where power use grew most generally saw inflation-adjusted prices fall, though the link is weaker for household rates. It runs both ways: low prices also attract new users.41
- An early study found a small benefitA 2026 study by economists at EPRI, a utility-funded research group, estimated that data center growth slightly lowered household rates in 2015–2024. It isn't peer-reviewed yet, and the authors warn the effect could reverse where supply is tight.42
- Flexible data centers fit in more easilyDuke researchers estimate the grid could absorb about 76 gigawatts of new load, about 10% of US peak, if that load can cut back 0.25% of the time. That doesn't replace new plants and lines.43
- AI is helping review grid hookupsIn 2025, PJM began working with Tapestry, from Google's parent company Alphabet, to use AI to help review grid connection requests.44
How AI and data center companies can earn trust
Every step below can start now.
- Pay the full cost of powerAccept utility rate rules like AEP Ohio's, where data centers over 25 megawatts (MW) pay for at least 85% of the capacity they reserve, for up to 12 years.47
- Pay for the lines built for youOver 95% of 130 PJM grid connection projects for data centers approved in 2024, worth $4.3 billion, passed their costs to all customers.48
- Build or buy your own new powerIn Minnesota, Google and Xcel announced in February 2026 plans for 1,900 MW of new wind, solar and storage, pending regulatory approval, with Google paying all grid connection and expansion costs.41
- Ease off when the grid is stressedTexas now requires new loads of 75 MW or more to accept curtailment in grid emergencies.49
- Pay full local taxesSkip property-tax breaks, as Microsoft has pledged.50
- Be a good neighbor, in the openName the company before local votes, with no secret deals. Publish expected power use, noise and permanent jobs before approval, and follow local zoning.
- Be honest about layoffsReport how many cuts come from automation and how many workers moved to new roles, including on state layoff notices.29
- Train your workersOnly 16% of Americans have had AI training from their employer, but 66% support on-the-job AI training.51
- Test for safety, independentlyFive leading labs let the federal Center for AI Standards and Innovation (CAISI) test models before release, but it's voluntary and results aren't public.52 And 75% of Americans want independent experts to test new AI.51
Republicans and Democrats already agree on the basics
Leaders of both parties have voted, signed and sponsored bills for safe, beneficial AI, and voters in both parties want the same things. Join in, whatever your party.
Shared principles
- Safety first: test the most powerful AI models for serious risks. Safety does not mean policing lawful speech.
- Build here, with skilled American trades, so America and its allies, not China's government, set the standard.
- Data centers pay their full cost, so households don't.
- Respect land and communities, including their right to say no.
- Share the gains with workers, and tell the truth about what AI can and can't do.
- The CHIPS and Science Act passed with bipartisan votesIt passed the Senate 64–33 and the House 243–187. Most Republicans voted no, but 17 Republican senators and about two dozen House Republicans voted yes.55
- The Senate voted 99–1 to protect state AI lawsIn July 2025, senators backed an amendment led by Sens. Marsha Blackburn (R-TN) and Maria Cantwell (D-WA) to keep states' power to pass their own AI laws.56
- Governors of both parties agree data centers should payIn January 2026, all 13 governors in the PJM grid region joined the Trump administration in saying data centers should pay for new power built for them.57
- Senators of both parties back safety-testing billsSens. Cantwell (D), Young (R), Hickenlooper (D) and Blackburn (R) reintroduced a bill in 2026 to write CAISI, the federal AI testing center, into law.58 Sens. Hawley (R) and Blumenthal (D) back one to evaluate advanced AI.59
- Voters in every party want safety firstOverall, 79% of Americans favor safety-first AI rules and 7% favor speed. Gallup finds that Democrats, Republicans and independents agree on safety-first rules, independent testing and worker training.51
Ask your representatives to work together
Lawmakers listen to their own voters. A short note in your own words helps.
Contact your representatives
Try: "I'm your constituent. Please work with both parties to require independent safety testing of the most powerful AI models and make sure data centers pay their full cost of power."
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Send it to a friend, especially one who votes differently. Ideas, corrections or want to help? Get in touch.
Who runs this site
Beneficial AI for America is an independent project started by Ben Caunt, for people of every party. Contact: bdcaunt@gmail.com.
AI helped research and draft this site. Every number links to its source below, and the page notes where the evidence is mixed. Read our methodology. Spot an error? Please send a correction.
Sources
Numbered in the order they first appear on this page.
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- Union of Concerned Scientists, news release on unreported data center transmission costs in PJM, September 2025. ucs.org/about/news/billions-dollars-unreported-data-center-costs-pjm
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