European Central Bank
RSS FeedAI adoption and the productivity promise: what workers report
Original Published: August 26, 2026
🎯 Sentiment Impact: Positive
📋 Summary
- AI use in euro area workplaces has doubled in two years, from 26% of workers in 2024 to 41% in 2025 and 52% in 2026, with the median user saving three hours per week (7.7% of working time), according to an ECB Consumer Expectations Survey of ~20,000 people.
- Coding/debugging tasks yield the largest time savings (nearly 8 hours/week) despite only 8% of workers using AI for this purpose, while managers show the highest adoption, biggest time savings, and most positive sentiment about AI.
- Barriers remain significant: 41% of workers are simply uninterested in using AI (34% of managers), and about half of firms are not investing in AI training despite this being the top factor workers say would encourage adoption.
💡 JR Insights
- 💼 Implications: There is no evidence of AI reducing total employment at the firm level in the euro area, and managers who adopt AI most are positioned to help steer broader organizational adoption.
- 🚨 Risks: Overall sentiment toward AI has slipped from 43% positive to 41% positive year-over-year, correlating with broader economic pessimism—a signal that economic conditions, not just AI itself, shape worker attitudes.
- ✨ Advice: Workers should push employers for AI training, since half of firms already plan to invest in it and workers who receive training report the highest time savings and most positive outlook on AI at work.