About this episode

Danielle Wood discusses the implications of transformative AI for Australia and its policy landscape.

Danielle Wood is an Australian economist and the current chair of the Australian Productivity Commission. Had a lot of fun chatting with Dani about how she's making sense of AI and its implications for policy. We discuss: whether AI will be more like the internet or the Industrial Revolution, where in the AI stack the profits will ultimately flow (and why it might not be the model layer), why diffusion is the "main game" for Australian policymakers, whether there's a case for government support of data centres, why the AI jobpocalypse story is too crude (and why humans may still have jobs even under transformative AI), whether AI will turn out to be a normal or abnormal technology, or both, and why in either case Australia shouldn't follow the EU in legislating an AI Act. Sponsors Effective Altruism Australia: how Australians give to GiveWell's top charities — tax-deductibly, and with 100% pass-through. Until June 30, 2026, EAA is matching new donations up to $300,000. Donate at https://www.eaa.org.au/joewalker . e61: a non-partisan economic research institute focused on Australian public policy. To receive a copy of the new essay I co-authored with e61 on data centres and…

People in this episode

Host: Joe Walker

Guest: Danielle Wood

Topics covered

• AI implications
• Australian policy
• economic impact
• technology legislation
• job market
• data centers

Keywords

• transformative AI
• Australia
• policy
• jobpocalypse
• data centers
• economic research
• legislation

Sponsors

Effective Altruism Australia, e61, Vanta

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Australian Productivity Commission

Places: Australia, EU

More episodes of The Joe Walker Podcast

• How Australia Actually Selects and Integrates Migrants — Mike Pezzullo [Immigration Series] · May 21, 2026 · 3h 23m
• "Bigger and Different": The Six Decades That Remade Australia — Mark Cully [Immigration Series] · May 21, 2026 · 2h 28m
• "We've built an economy that requires 2 million temporary migrants" — Martin Parkinson [Immigration Series] · May 19, 2026 · 2h 19m

Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the The Joe Walker Podcast podcast page.