AI is the popular cover excuse for layoffs.
I can’t think of a single job that modern AI could easily replace.
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AI can now do it very cheap so no need to give that job to a human anymore.
It could replace many workers, perhaps sacrificing quality, but that's considered quite acceptable by those making these decisions because of the huge labor cost savings.
It also could raise the quality of work product for those working at a senior level by allowing them to rapidly iterate on ideas and prototypes. This could lower the need for as many junior workers.
I know a handful of digital marketers, that work for different marketing firms - and the use of GenAI for those tasks have exploded. Usually tasks which they either had in-house people, or freelancers do the work.
Now they just do it themselves.
There is less upswing in reducing costs than in increasing profits. Companies want to increase profits actually, not just reduce costs which will be eaten away by competition. In a world where everyone has the same AIs, human still make the difference.
Coca Cola's christmas ad had AI slop in it last year. That doesn't seem very cheap or low stakes.
It could at least consolidate 5 of those people into 1 with increased efficiency.
I don't know what it is about AI that makes people think in absolutes.
This is known as Jevons Paradox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox
That I agree with. The problem with the assertion that AI took all these jobs is that the normalised point from which they took for assessing job losses is right at the peak of epic programmer hiring.
> I can’t think of a single job that modern AI could easily replace.
That I am less sure of.
(And that's if we agree about a 50% increase I'd say 5% is already generous)
As it stands, our governments are continuing on as normal despite the introduction of a technology which has the capability to erase an enormous amount of jobs from the pool (certainly many standard office jobs).
A world with less work and no general change in policy (no UBI or similar scheme) is a world with more unemployed people, falling living standards, more crime, and more instability.
And if you can (in some cases) substantially increase productivity, then logically you can reduce team size and be as productive with less.
With the right prompting, you can cut a copywriting team in half easily.
My business has one copywriter/strategist, who I’ve automated the writing part by collecting transcripts and brand guidelines from client meetings. Now she can focus on much higher quality edits, work with other parts of the strategy pipeline, and ultimately more clients than before.
I can easily imagine a corp with 100 junior copywriters quickly reducing headcount
Obviously companies like Apple isn’t going to cut corners straight away, but small and medium sized companies? Already doing it.
Collective delusion about AI (or similar craze) can be large enough to actually tank the economy.
Even increasing the average productivity by 10-20% is huge and in some areas (like copywriting as you've mentioned) the gains are much bigger than that. Of course there's also the argument of the infinite demand (i.e. demand will always overshadow any gains in supply caused by AI) but evidence is never provided.
You're right except you're missing the point
Do you think entry-level workers are handling high stakes projects? no, they're handling low stakes projects. Or they're generating a bunch of options, 90% of which are throwaway, which a higher skilled worker is evaluating/editing/giving input on, and then coming up with something for the higher stakes project.
Except that now, the higher skilled worker doesn't need the junior worker to generate the options or implement their edits, they can have an AI do it. And for low stakes projects, they can use the AI and call it a day.