Even If You Don't Use AI, You're Paying For It

AI is radicalizing me because what do you mean my energy bill is going up to pay for SLOP.

As someone who has their fair share of MAGA family members, there’s a maddening reality about getting into arguments: evidence doesn’t matter. This makes arguments that immigration is good for the economy, that trans people aren’t who women should be afraid of, that climate chaos is real, and that trickle-down economics doesn’t f****ng work all moot. These should be settled questions we’ve moved on from by now. Instead, like quicksand, we’re stuck sinking further and further from a solution fighting the literal truth. We can’t move on to fixing problems because we don’t share the same reality. How we treat evidence creates the impasse.

So, there’s a particular rage I feel when I see my energy bill tick up month by month. It started last year, but in the course of a few seasons, it’s doubled. Last year, heating my 900-square-foot Brooklyn apartment cost me $300 in the winter. This year? It’s topping $655 per month, and that was before the temperature dropped to subzero levels. I shudder to think what it will be for January. My rage isn’t solely directed at the fact that renewable energy sources have been gutted, meaning I’m forced to pick fossil fuels to warm my home. It’s that my bill is going up because America has culturally gotten itself into the habit of providing welfare for tech billionaires and their endeavors while screaming *freeloader* if a child gets a meal through SNAP benefits.

Data centers are popping up all over the country, with over 3,000 under construction and 4,000 currently in operation. The boom has been building over the last few years as AI adoption skyrockets. This, coupled with an increase in cloud storage needs, means not only that Amazon Web Services is *raking it in* (reminder: Amazon doesn’t make most of its money through its retail services) but that you and I are paying more in energy costs. That’s right, even if you don’t use AI, you are subsidizing its costs.

A Bloomberg investigation explains this tidily: about two-thirds of the power consumed in the US runs off a state or regional grid, where the system operator manages the trading of energy. Those wholesale commodity costs are passed on to households and businesses on their utility bills, which then include other charges to maintain and expand the network. That impacts customers who aren’t in close proximity to a data center, since their energy relies on the same grid.

The net-net is that energy costs are shared. But, because this is America, not equally. In 2020, wholesale electricity prices around the country hovered around $16 per megawatt-hour. Since then, wholesale prices have more than doubled in some markets, and many areas with the biggest jumps — like Baltimore — are near data center hot spots.

But are we sure we just aren’t using too much energy at home? Are millennials leaving the lights on too much while eating their avocado toast? A Yale climate analysis shows that of all our energy use, residential has the slowest growth. This means you and I are subsidizing the massive uptick in business energy consumption. As the analysis notes, a report by the Harvard Law School Environmental and Energy Law Program, “Extracting Profits from the Public,” lays out some of the reasons why Big Tech is able to offload its costs onto the public.

You read that right. Big Tech gets to offload its costs onto the public. At a time when we are in an affordability crisis—with SNAP benefits being slashed, healthcare premiums going up, and tariffs jacking up the price of all goods—why are Americans, particularly Republicans, so quiet when they provide welfare to corporations and so loud when it goes to their communities?

It’s an effective PSYOP, so much so that AI data centers are increasingly popping up in Republican-led states. At first, red-leaning communities are fine accepting the “free market.” Then their bills start to go up and, as in the case of one Texan town, locals are told to shower less so the data centers can guzzle up their water. The rub? These data centers don’t provide that many jobs, so in some cases, their construction is also subsidized by taxpayers under the false promise of giving the community work. While I have my opinions on the constant trade of economic growth for our literal ecological survival, this is the worst of all worlds. Tech companies get tax incentives to create systems that steal your water, energy and as a result, your money. In America, there’s only room for one welfare queen: tech billionaires.

You may be wondering why a lady who talks about skincare is ranting about AI. Well, there’s the self-interest. My own budget is shifting now that I’m giving my paycheck over to the AI overlords, but also, if we can’t get politicians to regulate AI, we are screwed. My industry looses so much credibility. Creators who help beauty brands have no accountability. Even more unrealistic standards of beauty are promoted. Watching crusty men give tutorials on how to run multiple AI avatars to make videos to sell you slop… Is this how AI is going to “better humanity?” By further eroding our shared reality? By making us even less likely to look at evidence? By white men making POC and women say whatever they want? I can’t scroll on TikTok without seeing some avatar shilling skincare or fashion. Trust is already on its last leg, do we need slop to further divide us?

I don’t want this technology to be accessible to everyone if it’s going to be abused and if AI companies can’t pay their fair share. People deserve social safety nets, not companies that wantonly consume energy as they desperately try to determine their revenue model. You have enough money for a petty Super Bowl spot? Sounds like you have enough money to not only pay for your energy bill, but subsidize mine. Make. Them. Pay. If it gets too expensive to sell, then that’s also good. People will stop using AI for wasteful slop. We all know what happens when we say corporations are too big to fail while we let American families pay for the foolishness of a few powerful men. The things that should be accessible for Americans? Energy. Water. Healthcare. Food. Not an AI avatar tool.

If you don’t know how to make your company work without government handouts and usurping natural resources at an unprecedented scale, maybe don’t launch it. The other reality? We shouldn’t be financially rewarding the CEOs behind these companies if they can’t make money without stealing from the pockets of everyday Americans.

Working on a list of politicians fighting for regulations on data centers. Common asks are that they pay more in taxes and their fair share. Some, like Bernie Sanders, are demanding moratoriums until it’s figured out, which, hell yeah. Affordability, as we’ve learned over and over again, is a uniting force. You can’t tell Americans it’s a hoax because we see what is happening to our spending power. And subsidizing AI should make you want to see so much change.