AI is NOT taking away your jobs!’ I know, it’s kind of hard to believe this given the current hype surrounding AI. But these exodus of jobs narratives are often inflated. These aren’t just my words. Meta’s president of global affairs, Sir Nick Clegg said on BBC’s Today Program, “AI hype has somewhat run ahead of the technology” And he’s not alone! OpenAI’s own Sam Altman echoed this sentiment, stating that AI is widely overhyped in the short-term. So, IS AI taking away our jobs? What’s really going on here? Let’s dive into it.
First understand, why do businesses integrate AI?
Businesses are integrating AI for two main reasons. Firstly, their old systems become outdated or inefficient. Just like every iteration of new technology, makes the older ones obsolete. Take call centers, for example. These new AI chatbots can now answer customer FAQs and troubleshoot basic issues. Companies like Dukaan have already made this shift. Then there’s the potential for cost cutting. And businesses love themselves some cost cutting. There are new use cases where AI helps businesses not only to cut costs and increase productivity, but also helps improve their decision-making capabilities.
Take Duolingo for example – it’s one of the most widely used language learning apps. They recently laid off 10% of their contract writers and translators to rely more on AI for content creation. But let’s not forget. Duolingo clarified that AI is here to support experts, not replace them. AI can be a powerful tool, but human expertise remains crucial for tasks requiring judgment and social skills. And that’s mainly because of this thing called – Hallucinations in AI
Hallucinations in AI
Hallucination in AI is when the system starts seeing things that just aren’t there. And it’s a big problem. Both OpenAI and Google admit their generative AI isn’t perfect. Sometimes, it gives incorrect responses. Google’s recently launched ‘AI Overview’ suggested a user to use glue on pizza? It gathered this information from a Redditt post that was made 11 years back. And that’s not all. It also said that geologists recommend humans should eat one rock per day. Talk about a rocky start! This bizarre answer was basically picked up from a satirical article from The Onion. If you don’t know the Onion, it’s like a satirical news website that published comical takes on the current US and world political landscape. Anyway, Google’s AI treated this unusual health advice as facts. Scary right?
These aren’t just funny mistakes – they’re symptoms of a larger issue. And this isn’t the first time Google has run into these issues. Earlier this year, in February, Alphabet’s share price dipped 7% in a day after its chatbot, Bard (which is now known as Gemini), provided factually incorrect information, in its first public demonstration no less!
So now, instead of saving time, we end up fact-checking the AI’s work, spending more time than before. So, the whole saving of time is much less than we originally thought it is. Even this article was written with the help of AI, but we did end up editing almost all of it due to missing information, or too concise points rendering parts of our research useless. Now this thing happens for certain types of cases, but you get the point.
AI in Legal and Recruitment
In 2023, a New York lawyer, Peter LoDuca, included fabricated references in a legal brief. These references were generated using ChatGPT. This highlights the importance of fact-checking AI output, even in critical fields like law. Researcher Fabrizio Dell’Acqua found that recruiters relying on high-quality AI for decision-making became less skilled, making worse hiring decisions than those who used no AI at all.
It’s crucial to remember, AI is a tool. And like any tool, it should be used thoughtfully and critically to augment human capabilities, not replace them entirely. According to the World Economic Forum, the AI industry is expected to create 97 million new jobs by 2025. So, AI is not taking away out jobs? Amm! Not exactly. In some cases, it is. But it’s more complicated than that. Let’s understand the job cycle with an example.
AI Job Cycle
JPMorgan’s introduced an AI system COIN, short for Contract Intelligence. This program can review financial contracts in seconds what would take lawyers 360,000 hours. That sounds like bad news for lawyers, right? But look closer. Other banks started using similar tools. Like Goldman Sachs uses Arteria AI to help digitize and create structured contractual data. Suddenly, it wasn’t about replacing jobs – it was about staying competitive. And those lawyers? They started focusing on more complex tasks.
So, while the number of people needed for document review decreased, the overall demand for legal and financial expertise shifted to more advanced areas, ultimately balancing out job opportunities and even creating new ones in areas like AI oversight and data analysis. This pattern is repeating across industries. AI is changing jobs, not necessarily eliminating them. But there’s another factor at play here: the hype.
AI companies are in a race to showcase their latest advancements. Remember Google’s Gemini demo? Turns out, it was heavily edited, and actually A LOTT! The demo video for Google’s chatbot, Gemini, was impressive. But Google later admitted the video was edited to condense response cycles and show a reduced latency.
So where does this leave us? It’s pretty obvious by now that some jobs will change. Some might disappear. But new ones will emerge.
Jobs not coming back
Now, let’s be honest, some jobs just flat-out stink. Remember those endless phone queues and robotic customer service voices? Yeah, not exactly a dream career. So, good riddance if AI can handle that stuff. The same goes for tasks like bookkeeping or accounting.
But here’s the thing: technology does hit a plateau eventually. Remember those bulky old cell phones? Now we have sleek smartphones that fit in our pockets. But modern smartphones have not changed their form factor for more than a decade now. The same goes for AI. Once the optimization settles, you’ll stop seeing these dramatic milestones, but new opportunities will still emerge under the radar. The real race isn’t between humans and AI, it’s about who understands AI best. We need to be adaptable, to learn new skills and build on the outdated ones.
Think about it – would a bullock cart rider be qualified to drive the very first set of cars? Skills evolve, just like technology. Also, let’s not get carried away with this efficiency craze. Companies love to squeeze out every last drop of profit, and automation is a quick way to do that. But there’s a limit. Once everyone’s optimized, the real competition starts again.
The key isn’t to compete with AI – it’s to adapt it. Learn to work alongside it. Understand it. This isn’t the first-time technology has shaken up the job market. The steam engine didn’t end transportation jobs – it transformed them. We have the highest number of driving jobs than we ever did before the steam engine came around.
So, what can you do?
- Understand AI: Not just how to use it, but how it works.
- Focus on what AI can’t do: Things like creativity, complex problem-solving, emotional intelligence are still a dark area for AI.
- Be adaptable: The skills valued today might be different tomorrow.
- Be Physical: A lot of jobs requiring physical intervention are still very safe from AI, mainly because robotics still remains expensive and not easily unscalable.
AI isn’t ‘THE FUTURE‘ but it surely is ‘IN THE FUTURE’. It’s a tool for human intelligence, not a replacement.
The AI revolution isn’t about machines taking over. It’s about humans learning to work smarter, instead of harder.
In our next video, we’ll dive deeper into how specific industries are adapting to AI. Stay tuned.
But it’s not sunshine and rainbows. Big tech is snatching up AI talent left, right and center; trying to nip an industry of competitors in the bud; way before they could take roots. The power is concentrating in the hands of a few. To know about how specific industries are adapting to AI click on the link here.
