Americans Hold Contradictory Views on AI: Hope for Cures, Fear of Job Loss

A sweeping new poll by Anthropic—the Claude maker that recently filed to go public—finds that Americans hold strikingly contradictory views on artificial intelligence: They’re eager for its potential to cure disease and improve lives, yet deeply anxious about the economic and social disruption it may bring, and profoundly skeptical of the companies building it.

The survey, which Anthropic is calling the "Public Record," gathered responses from nearly 52,000 Americans in late 2025, making it one of the largest national polls on AI attitudes to date.

Job loss emerged as the dominant fear, with 64% of respondents expressing worry about AI-driven displacement—a concern that was the top-ranked fear among both Democrats and Republicans, and in every state surveyed. Notably, the anxiety was higher among more educated Americans, whose work overlaps more closely with what AI is increasingly being asked to do.

On the hopeful side, nearly half of Americans said curing diseases like cancer or Alzheimer's ranked among their top three wishes for AI, followed by helping people with disabilities at 36%. Notably, hopes that AI might substitute for human connection—such as offering therapy or reducing loneliness—ranked lowest among the options presented.

Despite that optimism, trust in the industry itself is remarkably thin. Only 15% of respondents said they trust AI companies to make decisions about how the technology is developed and used—lower than the federal government, state and local government, and international bodies, and far below independent experts at 43%.

The public's appetite for government oversight is broad and bipartisan. Over 70% of those surveyed said the government should play a role in regulating AI, with support running from 79% among Democrats to 68% among Republicans. Americans were most eager for government action on privacy, child safety, and corporate liability for harm.

Anthropic said it plans to repeat the survey regularly and expand it beyond the United States.