How Will AI Transform the Future of Work?

An anonymous reader shared this report from the Guardian:

In March, after analysing 22,000 tasks in the UK economy, covering every type of job, a model created by the Institute for Public Policy Research predicted that 59% of tasks currently done by humans — particularly women and young people — could be affected by AI in the next three to five years. In the worst-case scenario, this would trigger a 'jobs apocalypse' where eight million people lose their jobs in the UK alone.... Darrell West, author of The Future of Work: AI, Robots and Automation, says that just as policy innovations were needed in Thomas Paine's time to help people transition from an agrarian to an industrial economy, they are needed today, as we transition to an AI economy. 'There's a risk that AI is going to take a lot of jobs,' he says. 'A basic income could help navigate that situation.'

AI's impact will be far-reaching, he predicts, affecting blue- and white-collar jobs. 'It's not just going to be entry-level people who are affected. And so we need to think about what this means for the economy, what it means for society as a whole. What are people going to do if robots and AI take a lot of the jobs?'

Nell Watson, a futurist who focuses on AI ethics, has a more pessimistic view. She believes we are witnessing the dawn of an age of 'AI companies': corporate environments where very few — if any — humans are employed at all. Instead, at these companies, lots of different AI sub-personalities will work independently on different tasks, occasionally hiring humans for 'bits and pieces of work'. These AI companies have the potential to be 'enormously more efficient than human businesses', driving almost everyone else out of business, 'apart from a small selection of traditional old businesses that somehow stick in there because their traditional methods are appreciated'... As a result, she thinks it could be AI companies, not governments, that end up paying people a basic income.

AI companies, meanwhile, will have no salaries to pay. 'Because there are no human beings in the loop, the profits and dividends of this company could be given to the needy. This could be a way of generating support income in a way that doesn't need the state welfare. It's fully compatible with capitalism. It's just that the AI is doing it.'

Read more of this story at Slashdot.