Politics aside, this is a very interesting point.

Contrarian opinion: We are not "intelligence constrained" as a society/economy.

Intelligence gives you factually correct answers. Factually correct answers are not the desired outcome much of the time. I don't just mean in politics, where the scientists and central intelligence agency are often ignored, but in the private sector: look at McKinsey, etc. Most often the desired outcome is what the stakeholders wanted to hear.

I cannot overstate how big a realization this was for me.

Part of the reason that we are not ready for AI, is that we don't want to hear about inconvenient facts.