File photo: Mary Daly at the American Economic Association annual meeting in San Francisco, Jan. 5, 2025. Photo: Xuthoria / Wikimedia Commons / CC BY-SA 4.0. Resized; blurred side panels added. Adapted image: CC BY-SA 4.0.
San Francisco Federal Reserve President Mary Daly’s presentation for a Stanford policy forum Thursday highlighted rising prices for technology equipment and a gap between businesses’ hopes for artificial intelligence and the gains they have seen so far.
The presentation published by the San Francisco Fed includes a slide titled “AI-Fueled Price Pressures.” It shows prices in the personal consumption expenditures information-processing equipment category rising 15.7% over the 12 months through September 2026.
That category contributed 0.2 percentage points to September’s 3.6% overall PCE inflation rate, according to the slide, which cites Bureau of Economic Analysis data and San Francisco Fed staff calculations. The 15.7% figure applies to technology equipment, not all consumer prices.
Another slide shows 24.4% of U.S. firms using AI in at least one business function in November. That measure comes from the Census Bureau’s Business Trends and Outlook Survey, with responses averaged to a monthly frequency.
The presentation also contrasts businesses’ experience with their expectations. In a separate U.S. Survey of Business Uncertainty conducted from May through July 2026, an estimated 83% of firms reported no AI effect on productivity over the previous three years, 16% a positive effect and 1% a negative effect. Looking ahead over the next three years, 59% expected a positive effect, 36% no effect and 5% a negative effect. Results are employment-weighted estimates and measure the effect on sales per employee.
The figures describe different things: more firms using AI does not mean all have already produced more per worker. They also do not establish that AI alone caused every technology-price increase.
Daly’s slides describe the labor-market impact as limited and show an October unemployment rate of 4.1%. The presentation does not announce an interest-rate decision.
Source: Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco.
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