The impact of AI on the labor market will be so important that some already predict that humanity will not be obliged to work in the immediate future.
According to Vinod Khosla, co-founder of Sun Microsystems and one of the main investors in OpenAi, shared an important prediction about the future of human work with AI: “It is highly unlikely that a child who is five years old today will ever have to look for a job,” said the veteran investor. in an interview for Fortune. It is not the plot of a science fiction novel: it is the concrete prediction of one of the most influential investors in Silicon Valley.
80% of jobs, in the hands of AI. In one podcast interview Titans and Disruptors of Industry of Fortune. The veteran technology entrepreneur and Silicon investor predicted that, around 2030, artificial intelligence will be able to autonomously perform 80% of all jobs. He is not only talking about routine or manual jobs, Khosla includes doctors, radiologists, accountants, chip designers and salespeople on that list. Professions that until recently were considered safe havens from automation.
“There will be an interim period where each professional will have four AI agents that they will train to improve themselves, and I think that initial model of AI implementation will consist of AI assistants who will work for someone who is either a senior accountant or a doctor, or a chip designer,” Khosla predicted.
Work at zero cost. According to the OpenAI investor, this automation and the greater role in the labor market of the AI will lead to an economy of abundance of goods and services, carrying the price of labor to practically zero.
The investor put a piece of information on the table that illustrates the magnitude of the change: “15 trillion dollars of US GDP currently comes from work. These are 15 trillion dollars that, in practice, will disappear.” However, Khosla does not present this devaluation as a disaster, but as an economic reconfiguration unprecedented in modern history that would lead to a increase in purchasing power. “With $10,000 you can buy much more than you can if you have $100,000,” stressed the OpenAi investor.
A world without obligation to work. The most striking consequence of this scenario is that the new generations will not have to work out of economic necessity since, according to Khosla’s prediction, “line workers, commercial employees or accountants, all these services will be free and, in a competitive economy, that means lowering prices.”
This economic change also changes the formation equation as we know it today thanks to AI. Khosla maintains that university degrees they will lose their usefulness as a key to access the labor market, except in very specialized fields. It is something in which the investor’s vision matches that of other millionaires from Silicon Valley. “You won’t even need an engineering degree unless your passion is learning,” he noted during his interview.
If no one works, where will the money to live come from? This is an important debate that many believe they have the answer to: a universal income that covers the cost of those services for which you still have to pay. Relevant figures in the development of AI such as Sam Altman, Elon Musk or Bill Gates assure that the allocation of a universal income would cover these subsistence needs.
However, none of them has clearly specified where the money that will finance this universal income will come from or who should pay it. Khosla also warns that this entire scenario depends on governments managing the transition well and designing appropriate public policies to prevent the promised abundance from being concentrated only in the hands of a few.
What they do seem to be clear about Silicon Valley millionaires the thing is It won’t be your taxes.
An easier transition for the youngest. You can’t miss what you’ve never had. Therefore, Khosla recognizes that this change it will not be the same for everyone. For older generations, who have built their lives around work as the central axis of identity and livelihood, the transition to this new model dominated by AI automation may be more difficult.
On the other hand, for the youngest, the panorama It’s different from the beginning. They will grow up in a world where work will not be an obligation but a choiceand where their life horizons will not be defined by what the labor market demands of them.
In Xataka | “They are much more daring”: Gen Z is overturning all labor consensus in its massive entry into work
Image | Flickr (TechCrunch), Unsplash (Ludovic Toinel)
GIPHY App Key not set. Please check settings