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February 29, 2024

The Age of Uncertainty—and Opportunity: Work in the Age of AI

Abstract The question of how artificial intelligence will affect jobs, skills, and the future of work is open-ended, and answers have been uncertain and contradictory. As AI has advanced, forecasts of labor market impacts have increasingly emphasized AI’s potential to automate tasks that require skills—including creativity, writing, and social and emotional learning—previously believed to be beyond the technology’s reach. In the face…

February 20, 2024

Planning a Career in the Age of AI

After decades of industrial robots, factory layoffs, and outsourcing, automation has finally arrived in the cubicle. A recent Wall Street Journal article spotlighted how the new “robots for the mind”—the complex algorithms and language models of generative AI—are creating rising uncertainty in the professional class.  In the past, automation has generally been more of a concern for blue-collar workers, especially those in the…

January 12, 2024

Get Ready for AI-Driven Skill Democratization

For decades, automation has been a rough road for middle-skill workers. These jobs used to provide plentiful, family-supporting employment opportunities for those with only a high school education or even less. Robotics and, to a lesser extent, trade dramatically reduced the number of middle-skill jobs leading to what economists called a “polarized” labor market: many high-skilled and low-skilled…

November 27, 2023

How AI with “Theory of Mind” Could Help in the Workplace

The practical advantages of machines better at interpreting, explaining, and anticipating human actions. Recent advances in artificial intelligence demonstrate its growing, and somewhat surprising, potential to imitate sophisticated reasoning tasks previously thought to be reserved to human beings. A new study from researchers at Google, Google DeepMind, the University of Southern California, the University of Chicago, and Carnegie Mellon University reveals progress in developing an…

November 16, 2023

Work in a World of Abundance

AEI’s Michael Strain contends that, at least for the next several decades, it is highly unlikely that artificial intelligence (AI) will all but eliminate human jobs. This is largely due to the “creative” side of creative destruction. Innovation creates wealth, wealth creates demand, demand spurs employment. The amount of work to be done always increases. Over the…

November 13, 2023

The Jobless AI Future Is Still a Long Way Off

Tech billionaire Elon Musk recently prophesied that there “will come a point where no job is needed,” owing to advances in artificial intelligence. But the fear that AI will cause mass unemployment is rooted in a zero-sum mentality that fundamentally misunderstands how economies evolve. WASHINGTON, DC – In a recent discussion with British Prime Minister Rishi…

November 6, 2023

Upskilling from the Top

As artificial intelligence (AI) continues its rapid advance, upskilling is shifting from a luxury good to a necessity for almost all workers. Traditionally, upskilling efforts have focused on frontline and production staff. That approach is unlikely to work when it comes to AI. To reap the benefits of this technology, we need commitments at all…

November 3, 2023

The Biden AI Executive Order: Dark Brandon or Uncle Joe?

President Biden’s executive order this week on artificial intelligence (AI) brings to mind his split media personality, which consists of the avuncular “Uncle Joe” and the more Machiavellian “Dark Brandon.” This bifurcated political personality has the advantage of keeping his opponents guessing, but in the case of the EO, it creates a policy jumble that is going…

July 27, 2023

Perspective: Can artificial intelligence teach us to be better workers?

So-called ‘soft skills’ are in short supply in the workforce and society at large. AI could help us get better A few weeks ago, McKinsey & Company published updated estimates on when key anticipated characteristics of artificial intelligence might arrive — including things like creativity, logical reasoning, and social/emotional reasoning, sensing and output. McKinsey’s timeline for increased capacity across a range of such capabilities…

July 14, 2023

Do We Need a Reboot? Challenging Prevailing Narratives on AI

It is hard at times to tell which is likely to be more disruptive: artificial intelligence (AI) or the multiplying efforts to regulate this powerful, potentially transformational, and highly beneficial technology. With multiple calls for pauses and increasing calls for new regulation, we are clearly at a critical moment in a debate that could either…