Backlash against the AI industry is growing globally. In recognition of the significant costs and risks borne by society to realise a technology of dubious value, policymakers, civil society, and the public are increasingly calling for action against AI companies. At the same time, AI proponents are loudly declaring that regulatory and ethical burdens are stifling innovation and risk losing the ‘AI arms race’. General-purpose AI systems pose severe and highly uncertain risks for society, and yet are sold predominantly on the basis that they enable economic growth and competitiveness, with little attention given to social or non-financial benefits. Economic growth is no guarantee of economic equality, and yet many of the risks and costs of AI are socialised.
For policymakers tasked with balancing fundamental and individual rights and EU values on the one hand, and innovation and free market competition on the other, striking a balance between these extremes is a seemingly impossible task. In this article we argue that a change of priorities is urgently needed in EU tech policy. We show how current policy predominantly focuses on risk mitigation rather than delivering socially beneficial tech. Making tech less risky does not guarantee it will be socially beneficial. The scales of policy must be tipped in favour of societal interests due to the substantial (in)direct subsidies paid to support the AI industry via tax breaks, public funding, privileged access to public lands, resources, data, and infrastructure, deregulation of data protection, labour, environmental and intellectual property laws. The public is in all but name a shareholder of AI companies, and yet is promised little in return to justify subsidies given on their behalf.
We propose adding a third pillar to re-balance EU AI policymaking: happiness. When policymakers are deciding whether subsidies should be granted or extended for the AI industry, they should require companies to concretely predict measurable benefits for public happiness, and hold them accountable for delivering on their predictions. To unpack this proposal, we examine decades of research in psychology to identify key determinants of happiness, focusing on three widely accepted traits: relatedness, competence, and autonomy.
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Prof. Dr. Sandra Wachter is Professor of Technology and Regulation at the University of Oxford at the Oxford Internet Institute and is Humboldt Professor of Technology and Regulation at the Hasso Plattner Institute. At the Oxford Internet Institute, Professor Sandra Wachter leads and coordinates the Governance of Emerging Technologies (GET) Research Programme that investigates the legal and ethical implications of AI, Big Data, and robotics as well as Internet and platform regulation. Professor Wachter also serves as a policy advisor for governments, companies, and NGOs around the world on regulatory and ethical questions concerning emerging technologies.
Professor Wachter publishes widely in top journals, including Science and Nature and focuses on legal, ethical, and technical aspects of AI and inferential analytics, explainable AI, algorithmic bias, platform regulation, profiling, as well as emotion- and facial-recognition software. The societal impact of generative AI and hallucinations in areas such as the future of work, misinformation, free press, and human rights is also at the heart of her research agenda.
Professor Wachter is an affiliate and member at numerous institutions, such as the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University, World Economic Forum’s Global Futures Council on Values, Ethics and Innovation, UNESCO, European Parliament Working Group on AI Liability, Law Committee of the IEEE, World Bank’s Task Force on Access to Justice and Technology, United Kingdom Police Ethics Guidance Group, British Standards Institution, Law Faculty at Oxford, Bonavero Institute of Human Rights, Oxford Martin School and the Oxford University Press.
Previously, Professor Wachter was a visiting Professor at Harvard Law School. Prior to joining the OII she studied at the University of Oxford and the Law Faculty at the University of Vienna. She has also worked at the Alan Turing Institute, Royal Academy of Engineering and the Austrian Ministry of Health.
Professor Wachter has been the subject of numerous media profiles, including by the Financial Times, Wired, Nature, TechCrunch, der Spiegel, and Business Insider. Her work has been prominently featured in several documentaries, including pieces by Wired , Reuters, and the BBC, and has been extensively covered by The New York Times, Time Magazine, Reuters, Forbes, Fortune, CNN, Harvard Business Review, Guardian, BBC, Telegraph, CNBC, CBC, Huffington Post, Washington Post, Science, Nature, MIT Tech Review, New Scientist, HBO, The Sunday Times, and Vice Magazine.
Professor Wachter has received numerous awards, including the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation Research Award (2025) which grants EUR €3,5 Mio in funding, the O2RB Excellence in Impact Award (2018 and 2021), the Computer Weekly Women in UK Tech award (2021), the Privacy Law Scholar (PLSC) Award (2019) for her paper A Right to Reasonable Inferences: Re-Thinking Data Protection Law in the Age of Big Data and AI, and the CognitionX Outstanding Achievements & Research Contributions – AI Ethics Award X (2017 and 2023) for her contributions in AI governance.
Host
Dr Federica Fedorczyk is an Early Career Research Fellow at the Institute and a Research Fellow at Reuben College. Federica’s research lies at the intersection of criminal law, tech law and human rights. She examines how the use and regulation of AI are transforming contemporary criminal justice systems and reshaping the balance between public security and individual rights.