IViR Lecture Series: AI and Poverty

Many people worry about inequality in Europe. Artificial intelligence (AI) adds new dimensions to inequality, especially when AI systems are used to make decisions about people. Indeed, AI can have discriminatory effects towards persons with low socio-economic status (SES). For instance, AI-enhanced price differentiation can lead to higher prices for poor people. States that use AI to detect fraud may focus on poor people and welfare fraud, rather than on high-SES people who avoid taxes.

Meanwhile, many non-discrimination statutes protect people against discrimination concerning identity-based protected grounds, such as ethnicity, gender, religion, disability, age, and sexual orientation. But most non-discrimination statutes do not protect against discrimination based on poverty or SES.

This paper explores how non-discrimination law could react to AI-enhanced stratification. Prompted by AI scenarios, our findings more generally apply to non-discrimination law. We explore two policy options: inclusion of SES as a protected category in EU non-discrimination law, and specific accommodation measures going beyond mere non-discrimination rules.

The presentation is based on a draft paper by Prof. Philipp Hacker (European New School of Digital Studies) and Frederik.

Frederik Zuiderveen Borgesius is professor of ICT and law. He works at the iHub the interdisciplinary research hub on digitalization and society. The iHub is an institute of the Radboud University in The Netherlands. Frederik is a law professor but teaches mostly at the computer science department. His research predominantly concerns fundamental rights, such as the right to privacy and non-discrimination rights, in the context of new technologies. He often enriches legal research with insights from other disciplines. He has co-operated with, for instance, economists, computer scientists, and communication scholars. He regularly advises policymakers, and has given expert testimony at the Dutch and the European parliaments, and committees of the Council of Europe and the United Nations.