Economic Research
The Economic Research team studies how AI is reshaping the economy, including work, productivity, and economic opportunity. Through rigorous data collection and analysis, we track AI's real-world economic effects and publish research that helps policymakers, businesses, and the public understand and prepare for the changes ahead.
What We Do
We build the empirical foundation for understanding AI's economic impact. Our flagship Anthropic Economic Index tracks how AI tools are actually being used around the world and across every sector of the economy—moving beyond speculation to measure adoption patterns as they unfold. Alongside our index reports, we produce novel research that studies the implications of AI usage and diffusion—as tracked in the index—for workers, for firms, and for the broader economy.
Why It Matters
Economic transitions create both opportunity and disruption. The speed of AI development means the stakes are unusually high. We need reliable data to inform the decisions that workers, employers, and policymakers make about the future. Our research provides evidence to address uncertainty and helps society navigate this transition in ways that are broadly beneficial.
Anthropic Economic Index report: Learning curves
Anthropic's fifth Economic Index report studies Claude usage in February 2026, building on the economic primitives framework introduced in our previous report.
Labor market impacts of AI: A new measure and early evidence
In this paper, we present a new framework for understanding AI’s labor market impacts, and test it against early data.
Anthropic Economic Index report: Economic primitives
This report introduces new metrics of AI usage to provide a rich portrait of interactions with Claude in November 2025, just prior to the release of Opus 4.5.
Anthropic Economic Index report: Uneven geographic and enterprise AI adoption
Claude usage has shifted toward educational and scientific tasks with users delegating complete work rather than collaborating. AI adoption concentrates in wealthy regions, with first-time analysis of enterprise API patterns.
Publications
- How Australia Uses Claude: Findings from the Anthropic Economic Index
- Anthropic Economic Index report: Learning curves
- Labor market impacts of AI: A new measure and early evidence
- India Country Brief: The Anthropic Economic Index
- Anthropic Economic Index: New building blocks for understanding AI use
- Anthropic Economic Index report: Economic primitives
- Estimating AI productivity gains from Claude conversations
- Anthropic Economic Index report: Uneven geographic and enterprise AI adoption
- Anthropic Economic Index: Tracking AI’s role in the US and global economy
- Anthropic Economic Index: AI’s impact on software development