- The jobs market will see “massive” disruption as AI becomes more prominent, a professor has warned.
- Even more utopian forecasters have said that AI could affect millions of jobs.
- There is no safety net capable of containing the consequences of the impact of AI, says Eric Posner.
Artificial intelligence will upend the job market even in the best-case scenario – and there is no social safety net for workers who risk being permanently put out of work, according to Professor Eric Posner of the University of Chicago .
In an opinion piece for Project Syndicate, Posner highlighted growing concerns about the labor market’s growing reliance on AI, with some researchers warning that a significant number of workers could be replaced by intelligence technology artificial in the decades to come. According to a 2024 study, 90% of workers could see their jobs affected by AI, and 9% of workers could be completely supplanted by AI in the next 10 years.
Some tech commentators have said these job losses could be supplemented by government assistance, such as a form of universal basic income.
However, this type of help does not address a key problem with an AI-powered workforce: the possibility that many former employees will suffer emotionally from the perception that they are not contributing to society, has warned Posner.
“The loss of self-esteem and sense of meaning and purpose is inevitable in a society that values work and looks down on the unemployed and unemployable,” Posner wrote. “Even if taxes or subsidies can keep alive jobs that produce less value than AI substitutes, they will only delay the moment of reckoning.”
The “anti-work” movement has gained ground in recent years as Americans, particularly members of Generation Z, avoid the exploitation by their employers and the drudgery that characterizes the work experience of other generations. But most employed Americans seem to love their jobs: 51% of U.S. workers say they are satisfied with their jobs overall, according to a 2023 Pew Research study.
Higher unemployment rates have also been associated with increases in depression, alcoholism, anxiety and other mental health problems, even in studies that control for income, Posner noted.
He cited the “China shock” that hit the United States in the early 2000s, when a flood of cheap imports from China led to job losses for about 2 million Americans, according to a study by the Cato Institute. This shock is attributed to a growing number of “poor mental health” days in the United States, according to another study.
“Even if humans are able to adapt to a life of leisure in the long term, the most optimistic projections of AI productivity portend massive short-term disruptions to labor markets, comparable to the impact of the China shock,” Posner said.
“This means significant – and for many people, permanent – unemployment. There is no social safety net generous enough to protect people from the mental health and societal effects of political unrest that would result from disappointment and of such widespread alienation,” he added.
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