Work and the Social Contract in the Age of AI: How Did We Get Here?

What It Is: The first conversation in a two-part Aspen Institute series from its Economic Opportunities Program and Future of Work Initiative, tracing the history of the American social contract and how work became the anchor of economic security, mobility, and civic identity, and asking how far AI is a genuinely new force. 

Why It Matters: The panel frames AI anxiety as arising within an existing crisis of confidence in the work-based social contract, not causing it, and asks whom that contract has historically served. Business leaders need that clarity to engage credibly on jobs, opportunity, and wages, a core Responsibility question about the systems the economy depends on. 

How to Use It: Use it to define what "social contract" means for your company before taking a public position on AI and work, then continue with the series' second installment, Where do we go from here? on November 18.