To think that AI is taking over jobs far, far, FAR quicker than we anticipated?

[Themarchoftime]

Obviously, am aware of AI's presence for some time. But I'm shocked how AI features seem to be on all platforms now, email/web etc, and how many roles are being diminished by the use. It seems week on week it's progressively spreading.

Someone who works with AI suggested to me that it's happening so much quicker than anyone expected, that we could all be looking at no jobs across many sectors in 10-12 years.

This has totally depressed me, especially as I'm early fifties, looking to skill up/change roles! And scared me, a bit, also for my kids.

Am i being a catastrophic thinker?

I’m a marketer and I think my job will be pretty much non existent in a couple of years time.
Already companies are getting AI to create their photos and write their content (poorly) to save money on personnel, and there are fewer jobs around.
I need to think about retraining in something that AI can’t do - any ideas?

@Dappy777 I understand part of your view

but what are we going to live on if we are not masters of tech? Which the majority of us won't be.

Don't fall for the hype, so far, AI is ok at summarising things but that's about it.

I wonder how this will affect the stock market?

And banks?

If people don’t have a salary they can’t get a mortgage.

Mortgage loans make up a big part of a retail bank’s earnings.

So would that sector just dry up? No more lending, no more house buying?

And would nobody move up the ladder?

To be fair, there are plenty of stinkers written by human hand!

Seriously, though, I agree that the creative industries are under great threat from AI. I’ve long wondered whether we might need some law about labelling works produced by/with AI: a bit like country of origin or ‘free range’.

What will happen when there are millions of unemployed people, people who can't afford a roof over their heads, elderly people and people who are too anxiety ridden to do anything? Where will the money come from to feed and house the people who are obsolete? There'll be no UBI because the rich shareholders need all the money. Will people be just allowed to die off due to no health provision? Starve because of no food? Be euthanised? Will we all be housed in huge refugee type tent villages and spend all day scratching for food on the ground? Only the very rich will survive.

I read a great quote 'AI won't take your job, someone who can code AI will.'

Well yes, back in the dark ages when I had a three year old that was my only choice. But after a particularly long day when I was feeling uninspired I'd definitely have been tempted to ask Gemini for help if I'd had the choice.

Dunno

We recently installed copilot and I can see it's not that spectacular really

Yes it's can synthesize information quickly but so can I

Not sure if that's the type of AI you mean

The very rich need customers. Netflix/Amazon/Apple are only as valuable as their customer base will allow them to be. The people at the top of the financial pyramid can't just hover in mid air.

Plumbing and heating engineering
Electrician
Nursing/social care/nursery worker
Building and joinery etc.
Civil engineering worker
Cleaner
Animal Care
Clothing alterations/seamstress
Gardening

Opened my emails the other day, we use Google and the current features makes my assistant redundant! It’s pretty sad. There is alot it still cannot do, but if it just needs to learn what we want, it will probably be up to scratch in a few years.

I think jobs that require physical or in person interactions will grow. Practical stuff - we still need buildings, things designed - but I do worry that it will make the job pool so much narrower. Where you needed a team of 10, a team of 2 would do - for example.

I tell my DD you need to be a thinker. Problem solving with AI is the future across all fields.

Once again, no, AI can't physically do a lot of those jobs (though it could do things like, say, garden design and planting schemes).

But there has to be someone with enough money to pay you to do those jobs. Will there be?

What about therapy/counselling/cooking? Are these jobs at risk?

Maybe for those us 40+ will be near or retired when it really takes over but for those generations behind us I can see how it'll be more terrifying for them in terms of jobs.

I'm still wondering how travel agents are still in business you can have AI plan your whole trip for you, it won't necessarily book it all but I'm sure that will come soon. Last yr I hurt myself I literally dropped my itinerary into char gpt and asked to make it more accessible. Super quick and easy. I doubt a travel agent could of done that without a lot of googling.

Honestly… we’re actively trying to use it at work and it’s so hit and miss. Everyone’s saying it’s going to be soooo great but the results are fine as a starting point. After that it still needs a lot of human interaction (in the area that I work - legal). I’m glad it’s progressing but my role is also shifting now. I don’t think it’s the end of legal services at all. Just a readjustment of my own role. I’m not overly worried as I think there is so much left for improvement tbh.

Can't see AI taking my job.

It's about the relationships I have, my reputation in a particular market and a load of knowledge and experience that you can't look up anywhere.

But never say never.

Currently I'd advise a teenager to go to uni if they can get into a great uni, but otherwise to do an apprenticeship in something practical.

What jobs can someone who's mid fifties, been most in creative profession, retrain in to avoid becoming obselete?

Undertaker.

QVC product demonstrator.

Stand up comedian.

No need to catastrophise so much. AI will be used instead of humans to produce the goods and services which have made our society wealthy beyond all imagining. Our economy and political systems will inevitably evolve to accommodate this. I say inevitably because the alternative is warehouses full of goods without an economic system that enables those goods to be consumed. And services available with no one to sell them to. Economies have always adapted organically with the help of politics to generate goods and to distribute them.

I like your thinking

Proper jobs, like people used to do. Yah

Yes, the online AI customer services is really bad. I always end up requesting to speak to a real person or, if possible, choose the real person option first.

Thank you. I wasn’t suggesting you combine the jobs though.

A wise-cracking undertaker who shows the deceased’s family the many fabulous features of a home exercise bike might not work.

You should be worried. My DS put his law exam paper through AI and whilst it scored lower than he did it did pass. Expect paralegal jobs to go within a few years and a lot of other well paid office roles. AI can already read medical scans better than humans. And we haven't even started to grasp the security issues around intelligent machines that know everything that we have on the internet.