OpenAI has published an economic roadmap for artificial intelligence (AI), proposing measures for the successful development of this technology in the United States. The document calls for active collaboration between OpenAI, the US government and its allies, and highlights the need to attract billions of dollars in investment in AI development, including chips, energy, and skilled workers.
As TechCrunch writes, OpenAI has repeatedly called on the government to take more active action in AI and infrastructure to maintain US global leadership in this field. The company believes that the current state of affairs—when AI regulation is largely left to individual states—often leads to contradictory and ineffective measures. For example, in 2024, state legislators introduced about 700 bills related to AI, many of which contradicted each other.
OpenAI CEO Sam Altman also criticized existing federal laws, such as the CHIPS and Science Act, aimed at reviving the US semiconductor industry. In his view, the law has not been as effective as expected, and the Donald Trump administration could have taken more effective measures. “I deeply agree with Trump that it has become very difficult to build anything in the United States,” Altman said. “Power plants, data centers, whatever. I understand that the bureaucracy is growing and it is not helping the country as a whole. It is especially harmful to AI, given that the United States is leading and should continue to lead in this area.”
Regulation, Energy, and Copyright
To support the data centers needed to develop and use AI, OpenAI proposes a global increase in federal spending on electricity and data centers, as well as on the development of new energy sources such as solar, wind, and nuclear. It is worth noting that OpenAI and its competitors have previously expressed support for nuclear energy projects, seeing them as necessary to meet the energy needs of next-generation server farms.
In the short term, OpenAI proposes that the government develop a regulatory framework for deploying AI models to protect against abuse, streamline the AI industry’s interactions with national security authorities, and develop export controls allowing “sharing of AI models with allies but restricting their export to unfriendly countries.” The document also calls on the government to share national security information with vendors, including briefings on threats to the industry, and to help provide resources to assess the risks associated with certain AI models.
The roadmap touches on the issue of copyright, arguing that AI developers should be able to freely use publicly available information, including copyrighted content, to train models. OpenAI emphasizes that other countries do not respect intellectual property rights, and unless the US takes reasonable measures, such content will still be used to train models in other countries. In this regard, the company is calling on the government to provide such training while protecting creators from unauthorized digital copying.
Chris Lehane, OpenAI’s vice president of global affairs, emphasized the need to attract investment. “Today, when some countries are putting AI and its economic potential on the back burner, the U.S. government can pave the way for the development of the AI industry so that the country maintains its global leadership in innovation while protecting national security,” he said.
It remains unclear which specific proposals will be embraced by lawmakers, but the roadmap shows that OpenAI intends to play a key role in shaping a unified U.S. government policy on artificial intelligence, notes NIXSolutions. The company seeks to create a voluntary mechanism for interaction between AI companies and the government to set safety standards and share information. We’ll keep you updated as more details emerge.