Embracing GenAI: a cross-country comparison
David Loschiavo, Olivier Armantier, Antonio Dalla Zuanna, Leonardo Gambacorta, Mirko Moscatelli, Ilaria Supino · Applied Economics · 2026
Using data from nationally representative surveys, we study household-level adoption of Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI) in two contrasting economies, the U.S. and Italy. We find that GenAI usage is significantly higher in the U.S. for both occasional and regular use. A Blinder – Oaxaca decomposition shows that this gap is explained almost entirely by differences in demographic composition – particularly age and education – rather than country-specific factors. Furthermore, we find that households in both countries report broad scepticism about GenAI’s impact and trustworthiness, with significant cross-country differences in expectations and trust related to data protection.