Many organisations come to us asking what AI investment they should make. Some have stated they will not invest as they fear AI taking jobs.
When we hear this, we use imagination to reopen the conversation. Our hypothetical starts with, "Imagine it is the 1960s, and everyone in this room is there in the 1960s. We all have our present jobs. And we all have a secretary beside us, punching away at a mechanical keyboard. But more people are employed now than then, and we certainly do not have a secretary". It usually ends with agreement - it is not AI that they fear.
There is evidence to guide us. For example, James Besson, a successful entrepreneur and later an academic, studies technology's economic impacts on society. In the period leading into 2015, people were concerned that "automation" was taking jobs. He published a paper examining computer automation's impact on 317 occupations from 1980 through 2013. He found:
"Employment grows significantly faster in occupations that use computers more."
Last year, he followed up on this work, collecting survey data from 917 startups over five years. These startups produce commercial AI products and, through the carefully constructed survey, provide a glimpse into how their products impact labour across industries. Some key findings:
AI (appears to) enhance human capabilities rather than replace humans.
AI (appears to) create a shift in work from some occupations to others, meaning that some people will lose jobs, and new jobs will be created.
New jobs (appear to) require new skills, requiring workers to make investments and (perhaps) to endure difficult transitions.
And many more. In summary, this line of recent and long-term evidence suggests that AI is not and will not reduce jobs. Instead, AI creates efficiencies and increases quality, producing better products/services and driving demand, thus promoting employment growth. They also state:
"The evidence tempers concern about mass unemployment or disemployment of professionals. "
This is just one example, and yes, there are pros and cons to their methods and assumptions. However, there's some good evidence to invest in AI.