Opinion: The AI wars are on – a modest proposal for Vermont

November 24, 2025  |  By Alison Despathy

The AI wars are on. The battle for data to host the “smartest,” most comprehensive, machine-learning-capable Artificial Intelligence is the ultimate goal. AI destroys the soul of entire sectors and human capacity, as life is commodified and infinitely extracted for data to feed and train the AI and scale the data markets.

There will never be enough; it will never be complete. More wireless systems and technologies, including apps, sensors, surveillance cameras, smart meters, vehicles, QR codes, biometrics, devices and digital records are designed for this key aspect of AI – the ravenous need for ever more data through surveillance, monitoring and tracking. 

Extract, extract, extract

This extractive data economy is invasive and abusive. Data breaches are the norm, and privacy is dead. It's hard to escape, as all sectors move to dependency on these systems that require your digital data to participate.

In her book, “The Age of Surveillance Capitalism,” Harvard Business School social physiologist Shoshana Zuboff documents the history of data commodification and the precipice humanity faces. Will machines or humans run the world? “Technology users are no longer customers but the raw material for an entirely new industrial system,” Zuboff writes.  

Zuboff warns of this extractive system continually creating human dependence on tech layers that track, store, sell, manipulate, and digitally twin your data. 

Eyes are opening as humans bear witness to AI systems consuming as much energy as entire countries. All energy sources are rapidly ramping up to fuel this AI- and data-center demand, while countries and communities fight for resources, water, and bare necessities. 

Human creativity and expression are subjugated to AI machine dominance. Will our children be able to think and write on their own? 

AI is clearly an ethical issue. Humanity must assess the role it should or should not play in our world, its potential for harm or good, and its capacity to be a tool or weapon. 

Vermont’s approach

In 2022, the Vermont Agency of Digital Services entered a $29 million contract with Workday Enterprise Resource Planning, an AI-driven, cloud-based system to replace Vermont's existing systems for Human Resources, Budget, Finance, Labor and Transportation.

Workday is antithetical to longtime Vermont goals of reduced energy consumption, stewardship, affordability and community. 

Existing systems are functional and have capacity for lower-cost upgrades. Vermont's Joint Fiscal Office estimated $72 million to kickstart this system by 2031, with no promises that it will work. Estimated costs have increased to $139 million, with an annual projected operating cost of $5 million. 

Meanwhile, Maine and Iowa have backed out of contracts with Workday, after spending $35 million and $16 million, respectively. 

Workday utilizes cloud storage, which is highly vulnerable to hacking attacks and fraud. As cyber warfare escalates, subscription costs will increase, further burdening taxpayers. 

Also, two independent reviews outlining risks, costs, and deficiencies were submitted to Vermont's Joint Information Technology Oversight Committee. 

Vermont should keep human resources and communications within government, human. Government is by the people and for the people. Holding onto humanity in this moment is pivotal to ensuring oversight and accountability in an ever-expanding technocratic world. 

Humans using tools versus being used by tools is a better scenario and will prove an ongoing challenge. How many layers of dependency and interference must we create in order to do business and participate in society? You should not need a device, app, or digital ID to interact with your government and local institutions. 

Reality check: You cannot have an energy-guzzling AI Workday program with a Global Warming Solutions Act mandating greenhouse gas reductions and higher costs. These are diametrically opposed and expose the existing hypocrisies within the State House.

A modest proposal

Vermont's Legislature should simultaneously reject the GWSA and Workday. It is immoral to unnecessarily charge people more for basic necessities such as heat and transportation while at the same time supporting exorbitant costs and energy demands embedded in the Workday AI data mining system. 

It is well past time for a GWSA repeal and an end to Vermont's Workday contract before more money is wasted and more damage is done. Keeping Vermont centered on humanity and the environment will carry us through the storm. Putting AI in its place early on and moving past Workday and the GWSA would allow this ultimate win-win for Vermonters. 

Alison Despathy lives in Danville.