AI Isn't Coming for Your Job At Least Not Yet

So far, the technology has replaced only a small number of workers. But the future risks many more.

- By Jeremy Kahn

WHEN CEOS TALK to investors about layoffs, they usually blame economic uncertainty or business "headwinds." Now a new term is starting to crop up in these announcements: AI.

In recent months, shipping giant UPS announced plans to cut 12,000 office jobs that CEO Carol Tomé said were unlikely to return because the company was increasingly using AI to automate tasks these workers performed. Meanwhile, financial giant BlackRock said it would eliminate about 600 positions, couching the cuts as an effort to prepare for coming shifts in the asset management industry, of which AI is among several drivers.

Then there was Google, which recently laid off adsales staff partly because new AI tools were helping customers manage ad campaigns themselves. And IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said Big Blue would pause hiring for 7,800 roles because AI could now do the work instead.

To some commentators, these developments are early confirmation that long-standing predictions of AI causing widespread job loss, perhaps even ushering in an era of "mass unemployment," are about to be realized. This narrative of AI-driven job loss is so ingrained in the public consciousness that people often see evidence for it when none exists.

While the U.S. unemployment rate rose slightly to 3.9% in February, it remains near historic lows. Yet when executive search firm Challenger Gray & Christmas released a report saying there had been 4,600 U.S. job cuts directly attributed to AI from May to January, some commentators interpreted the relatively low number as evidence that firms were hiding the true extent of AI casualties because they feared public backlash.