Introduction To The Mission for America

The Mission for America is a comprehensive, detailed plan for a 10-year national mobilization to build a new, clean economy capable of providing prosperity, security, and freedom for all. We are writing this blueprint for the president who enters the White House in 2029, their administration, and the leadership of the 121st Congress.

They will inherit a convergence of historic crises:

• A decades-long disintegration of American society and the unraveling of its means of making a living
• The breaking of a 2.6 million-year climate cycle, threatening the conditions for life on Earth
• The collapse, for better or worse, of the U.S.-led international order
• And, above all, the mass replacement of workers across all sectors by artificial intelligence and robotics

Technology has been automating away jobs since long before AI, which is why real wages for the bottom half of U.S. workers stagnated for decades while GDP skyrocketed. Until now, lost jobs were replaced by low-wage service work, gig labor, or what anthropologist David Graeber called "bullshit jobs"—roles that are largely unnecessary and do not make the economy more productive. AI presents an unprecedented challenge: the new industries it makes possible will be staffed by AI, not humans. They will not replenish the jobs they destroy.

In one of history's most unexpected twists, AI will rapidly displace professionals, managers, and knowledge workers before it replaces manual laborers. The physical infrastructure for this white-collar replacement is already in place—it is the same network of screens, keyboards, and enterprise systems that enable remote work. When an AI can perform tasks, make business decisions, and control those enterprise systems as well as a human, the marginal cost of making the switch is zero. While the replacement of manual laborers with robotics will also accelerate, it will proceed more slowly because building, installing, and maintaining physical robots still carries a tangible unit cost.

Imagine January 2029: a vast segment of the professional-managerial class is sitting at home without income, unable to make their house payments, and stripped of their imagined futures. Simultaneously, a huge portion of the working class is laid off as collateral damage from the ensuing collapse of consumer demand.

The Mission for America is a roadmap for what the president and our government must do in that moment. It includes sweeping, immediate programs to get people into meaningful, lucrative work while simultaneously laying the groundwork for a new, clean economy that guarantees shared prosperity forever with radically reduced working time.

Even after the great AI replacement, there will still be an enormous amount of vital work to do that requires humans:

• Building a replacement for the doomed fossil fuel economy, which continues to radically alter our atmosphere and heat the planet, even when the news media and policymakers look away
• Rebuilding and upgrading our homes and buildings for energy efficiency, health, safety, and quality of life
• Restoring our public infrastructure and hardening it to withstand severe climate impacts
• Establishing the care economy as a source of rewarding, well-paid jobs that ensure dignity for our elders and everyone who needs care
• Building the best health care and education systems the world has ever seen

Capitalism alone does not possess a mechanism to channel labor and resources into these essential missions, even with the incredible productivity gains brought by AI and robotics — especially not when most potential customers have had their incomes cut off. If we want this work done, society must organize to make it happen. We need comprehensive plans and institutions with the power and resources to execute them.

To achieve this, the U.S. must switch from "decline mode" back into "mission mode"—a state of national action modeled on the exceptional U.S. industrial mobilization around World War II. The Mission for America calls for restoring our capacity for public investment and economic coordination, primarily through a revived Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC). The RFC will operate as a massive public development bank and venture fund, financing the launch of entirely new industries, creating tens of millions of high-wage jobs, and supplying the world with the technology required to transition to a clean economy.

The plan is organized into a series of targeted, 10-year "national missions." Most are associated with a specific sector of the economy—such as clean power, electric vehicles, public transportation, or green steel. Others are designed around solving specific challenges, like drawing down atmospheric greenhouse gases or guaranteeing access to clean and safe water for all Americans. Each mission will require relentless "Mission Leadership"—a president willing to eliminate the filibuster, battle obstructionism, and use executive powers to push the mobilization forward.

The Mission for America is not merely a plan to deal with AI. It is not just a climate plan. Or a jobs plan. It is a blueprint for the total, sweeping upgrade of our economy needed to solve the defining crises of the 21st century and unleash an era of radical abundance.