AI is the future. Over the next decade, the application of artificial intelligence will fundamentally change how we live, make our decisions, and interact with the world around us. In the future, one key question for policymakers will be how to apply oversight to this new and exciting technology without inhibiting innovation.

Unfortunately, recent moves by Congress and the Department of Justice point to a need for more governmental understanding of how AI functions.

Congressional leaders, led by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, are working on an AI regulatory bill that they plan to pass in the lameduck session of Congress.

Their work is piggybacking off recent actions by the DOJ, which have included going after hotel companies for using AI algorithms as well as landlords for using AI-based property management pricing software. Time and time again, the DOJ has demonstrated that it believes algorithmic AI is generally used as a tool for price-gouging rather than a tool for fostering price efficiency.

Antitrust experts and economists across the political spectrum have criticized Congress and the DOJ for blaming algorithmic AI for price increases in these industries instead of today’s inflationary economic environment.

In the hotel case, a U.S. District Court even went so far as to recently throw the suit out, stating that the software enabling price-fixing is implausible because the hotels began using the AI at different times and never exchanged pricing........

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