10% to 20% unemployment within 5 years

[eohrnberger]

Me too. Except I recall the same fears were current even in the 1950s.

It goes back allot further than that.

The Luddites were members of a 19th-century movement of English textile workers who opposed the use of certain types of automated machinery due to concerns relating to worker pay and output quality. They often destroyed the machines in organised raids.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite#cite_note-Conniff-1"><span>[</span>1<span>]</span></a><a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite#cite_note-2"><span>[</span>2<span>]</span></a> Members of the group referred to themselves as Luddites, self-described followers of "Ned Ludd", a legendary weaver whose name was used as a pseudonym in threatening letters to mill owners and government officials.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite#cite_note-auto-3"><span>[</span>3<span>]</span></a>​

​

The Luddite movement began in Nottingham, England, and spread to the North West and Yorkshire between 1811 and 1816.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite#cite_note-4"><span>[</span>4<span>]</span></a> Mill and factory owners took to shooting protesters and eventually the movement was suppressed by legal and military force, which included execution and penal transportation of accused and convicted Luddites.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite#cite_note-Trials-5"><span>[</span>5<span>]</span></a>​

​

Over time, the term has been used to refer to those opposed to the introduction of new technologies.<a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite#cite_note-6"><span>[</span>6<span>]</span></a>​

Luddite - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[eohrnberger]

Oh, whatever. This is just the usual Hype Cycle with a Luddite Twist.

On this we can agree.

AI is nowhere near good enough to replace workers for many jobs. It just isn't ready for prime time, and it's already consuming itself by flooding the Internet with AI Slop, and training itself on that same AI Slop.

AI can perform some tasks quickly, and I don't think we know all the use cases for it. But the idea that it's going to kill 20% of jobs, with the implication that it will create zero jobs, just doesn't add up.

 

[BirdinHand]

I've been hearing the 'You are going to be replaced by a machine" since the 1970's.

AI is a tool, not a replacement.

And more and more jobs HAVE been replaced by machines since the 1970’s

Lots of jobs will disappear.

The generations coming up need to be taught to be adaptive

There is no longer a world of graduate from school and do XYZ for your entire professional career.

 

[NJBob]

Where will they get their health insurance?

Not to worry, our robot masters will provide.

 

[uptower]

I've been hearing the 'You are going to be replaced by a machine" since the 1970's.

AI is a tool, not a replacement.

Me too. My first job out of college thirty years ago was a call center for insurance. Kept hearing that back then. Thirty years later there are more call centers round town not fewer, and their staff turnover is just as high.

As long as the customers want a human to interact with they'll be needed.

 

[JoeB131]

And more and more jobs HAVE been replaced by machines since the 1970’s

Lots of jobs will disappear.

The generations coming up need to be taught to be adaptive

There is no longer a world of graduate from school and do XYZ for your entire professional career.

Why should there be?

It cuts both ways.

The economy eliminates 13 million jobs annually due to companies no longer needing them, as their needs change. The economy also creates 15 million new jobs every year. The idea is to be nimble enough to get one of those new jobs.

In my long career, I've had four positions eliminated in reorganizations, and one because the company went out of business altogether. (This is the company that promoted an unqualified woman because another woman they fired was suing them.) I've also quit three positions to take better opportunities. So, yes, the days of Employer/Employee loyalty are long dead, and no one really misses it.

I couldn't imagine working at the same place for 40 years!

 

[Napoleon]

Where will they get their health insurance?

From you.

 

[jmotivator]

The only thing that can be predicted with confidence is that economic predictions are always wrong.

"Economists" as a group have a profound lack of imagination.

 

[jmotivator]

cc: @Sweden @JoeB131

The question is not "if" but "how" right the CEO's predictions might be. Technology does replace jobs. It will be a matter of which jobs and how quickly they mostly go away.

A few trivial examples to which others may easily expand; switchboard operators, elevator attendants, pinball boys, and going far into the past, wheelwrights, farriers and blacksmiths. Now the vulnerable class appears to be white collar skills and professions.

Your examples above ruins your argument. Losing a job only leads to unemployment if you don't find another job.

Your argument is undone because those Switchboard Operators, Elevator attendants and Pinball boys found other jobs.

 

[Along Came Jones]

Your examples above ruins your argument. Losing a job only leads to unemployment if you don't find another job.

Your argument is undone because those Switchboard Operators, Elevator attendants and Pinball boys found other jobs.

Show me the records of reemployment. The point is those jobs and others were eliminated and rendered nonexistent by technology.

 

[Fletch]

Uh uh uhhhhh, AI cannot be regulated for the next ten years.
MAGA lovers supported this.

And who in congress would know enough about AI to write the regulations?

 

[jmotivator]

Where will they get their health insurance?

Modern GPs are nothing but diagnosticians that write prescriptions.

Generally I think the jobs MOST in danger in the long term are in healthcare. AI pattern recognition and recall makes it ideal for GP work.

Specialists will be mostly safe for a long time, though.

 

[jmotivator]

Uh uh uhhhhh, AI cannot be regulated for the next ten years.
MAGA lovers supported this.

That whole argument is silly. AI "can't be regulated" unless and until Congress decides to regulate. Laws that are passed can be rescinded in the same fashion.

Also, taxes aren't regulation.

 

[jmotivator]

Show me the records of reemployment. The point is those jobs and others were eliminated and rendered nonexistent by technology.

So is it your assertion that elevator operators didn't find other jobs?

 

[Along Came Jones]

So is it your assertion that elevator operators didn't find other jobs?

It is my statement is that neither you nor I know what they found or did not find.

My assertion is that their jobs were rendered nonexistent by technology.

 

[ModernDiogenes]

AI finally has my attention.

Major company CEOs are talking about major worker cutbacks due to the emergence of AI tools. Ford Motor CEO Jim Farley predicts half of white-collar workers will be replaced. Marianne Lake, JPMorgan Chase CEO, could see her labor force reduced by 10%.

“This is a wake-up call,” [Micha Kaufman, CEO of Fiverr] wrote. “It does not matter if you are a programmer, designer, product manager, data scientist, lawyer, customer support rep, salesperson, or a finance person—AI is coming for you.”

There are executives who believe the alarm is overblown. Entry level jobs, they say, are not disappearing. Those tasks AI eliminates also create other employable jobs.

I doubt I'll be personally impacted one way or another. Now my grandchildren and their cousins most certainly will be. The question becomes how do young people now choose a reliable and stable career?

Post derived from CEOs Start Saying the Quiet Part Out Loud: AI Will Wipe Out Jobs, Chip Cutter and Haley Zimmerman, Wall Street Journal, 7/2/2025 (Paywall)

This is not unlikely. Blue collar factory jobs will be hit by automation even harder.

That’s why this “bring back manufacturing” is BS. in five years A.I. is going to speed up automation “progress” to the point that almost all factory and warehouse jobs will be robot’ized. The only difference now is that A.I. means white collar jobs will be automated as well.

I’ve been telling folks for years that advances in automation, globalization and increases in population are going to combine to force a paradigm shift in the labor market. There simply are not going to be enough 40 hour a week lobs at a living wage to feed and house everyone requiring it.

The numbers don’t lie.

We are going to be faced with conditions that are going to force new models. No idea about what they might look like, but they will be very different than today’s.

 

[jmotivator]

It is my statement is that neither you nor I know what they found or did not find.

My assertion is that their jobs were rendered nonexistent by technology.

I have no record of elevator operators breathing oxygen after they lost their jobs, either... they must have all asphyxiated.

 

[Along Came Jones]

I have no record of elevator operators breathing oxygen after they lost their jobs, either... they must have all asphyxiated.

Maybe so. Their jobs certainly evaporated.

 

[Along Came Jones]

I have no record of elevator operators breathing oxygen after they lost their jobs, either... they must have all asphyxiated.

You might enjoy this. A short film documenting the last switchboard belonging to the AT&T system. But, no, does not say anything about life for the operators after the switchboard passed into company history.

 

[NJBob]

I have no record of elevator operators breathing oxygen after they lost their jobs, either... they must have all asphyxiated.

There are elevator operators working for General Contractors during construction to this day.

Additionally, I know someone who was an elevator operator at the Athletic Club in lower Manhattan in the 1970s. I’m pretty sure he’s still alive and kicking.

 

[mrjurrs]

AI finally has my attention.

Major company CEOs are talking about major worker cutbacks due to the emergence of AI tools. Ford Motor CEO Jim Farley predicts half of white-collar workers will be replaced. Marianne Lake, JPMorgan Chase CEO, could see her labor force reduced by 10%.

“This is a wake-up call,” [Micha Kaufman, CEO of Fiverr] wrote. “It does not matter if you are a programmer, designer, product manager, data scientist, lawyer, customer support rep, salesperson, or a finance person—AI is coming for you.”

There are executives who believe the alarm is overblown. Entry level jobs, they say, are not disappearing. Those tasks AI eliminates also create other employable jobs.

I doubt I'll be personally impacted one way or another. Now my grandchildren and their cousins most certainly will be. The question becomes how do young people now choose a reliable and stable career?

Post derived from CEOs Start Saying the Quiet Part Out Loud: AI Will Wipe Out Jobs, Chip Cutter and Haley Zimmerman, Wall Street Journal, 7/2/2025 (Paywall)

That kind of structural unemployment will require federal government intervention. The govt will have to tax the shite out of AI profiteers to provide an income for unemployed people when there is no work available.

 

[Visbek]

That is the big question. If a young person were to ask me 10 years ago what fields they should study for I'd be able to offer advice.

Today? I don't have a clue.

The answer should be obvious.

MIT PE AI and ML - MIT Professional Education

AI AND ML: LEADING BUSINESS GROWTH

professional-education-nw.mit.edu

I don't remember who said it, but: It isn't an AI bot that will take your job. It's the person who knows how to use AI that is going to take your job.

By the way, Grok spewing Nazi propaganda this week should make it pretty clear that AI is still nowhere near ready for prime time.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

That whole argument is silly. AI "can't be regulated" unless and until Congress decides to regulate. Laws that are passed can be rescinded in the same fashion.

Also, taxes aren't regulation.

You and I both know this but "you better not contradict the official narrative!"
By the way, we hear the same nonsense when it's announced that "such and such tax cuts will now be made permanent".
Yeah, until someone "un-permanents" the "permanent" tax cuts.

My argument is that with the way Trump is behaving, might as well be up to states to do the time honored practice of state's rights.
AI will be regulated by various states, and what's the worst the administration can do, cut off federal funds to those states?
THAT IS ALREADY HAPPENING so it looks like Donald Trump shot his wad prematurely and states are considering the idea of preparing to do without federal funds.

 

[aociswundumho]

It is my statement is that neither you nor I know what they found or did not find.

Who the hell cares either way? The economy is not a jobs program.

My assertion is that their jobs were rendered nonexistent by technology.

Yes, and the result was a net benefit to society.