New Delhi, July 14 -- RICHLAND PARISH, La. - The superintendent of the local school district, Sheldon Jones, said this year that Meta's arrival had been "life-altering" for teachers and their families, and that it was transforming the schools. He did not mean a new curriculum or a grant-funded program. He meant that since Meta Platforms broke ground on a data center campus here in December 2024, enough money had moved through the local economy that people who had not seen meaningful income growth in years were beginning to feel something shift.

On Monday, Meta announced it would expand that campus to five gigawatts of capacity as part of what the company describes as more than $50 billion in total AI infrastructure investment. The announ...