MacroInsights #06

Macro outlook, global focus and micro perspective for March 2024.

Macro outlook

The RealTimeTracker, our real-time monitoring and forecasting model, estimates that quarterly GDP growth will reach +0.8% in Q1 2024, beating expectations from the start of the year. We anticipate somewhat more moderate growth in Q2 2024. The tentative reading of the first half of the year already puts growth at +2.3% for 2024 as a whole, although significant domestic and international risks remain.

Global focus

One year after the launch of GPT-4, the studies carried out so far allow us to gauge the impact of generative AI:
Between 60% and 66% of jobs in advanced economies are significantly exposed. Of these, according to the IMF, around 35% would have low complementarity, while 25% could better complement their tasks with AI. This exposure is higher for professional services and the occupations typical of these sectors (HR, legal, management, training).

AI would improve productivity (+12% to +37%) and quality (+14% to +40%) in these kinds of tasks, according to the first experiments carried out in various companies with real-world work teams. These improvements are concentrated among workers who started out with less experience or poorer performance.

Micro perspective

Fewer than 10% of Spanish companies with 10+ employees use some type of AI, a share that rises to 32.4% in the information and communications sector. Models with functions already available before 2022 appear to be more widely used than new-generation ones. To advance their adoption, evidence from field experiments suggests:

1. Focusing on workers with the weakest indicators or the least prior experience.

2. Taking advantage of the most advanced general-purpose models such as GPT-4, but adapting them to processes that have already proven to work.

3. Designing new processes so that they help workers learn and adopt new ways of carrying out their tasks.

4. Putting forward flexible and adaptable models that fit into different ways of working and are subject to the final judgement of the worker.