Tech titan warns Americans are ignoring a looming jobs apocalypse ...
A billionaire tech leader has delivered a stark warning about the mass unemployment that could be brought about by artificial intelligence. AI could wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs in the next one to five years, according to Dario Amodei, CEO of leading AI company Anthropic. Amodei said AI could also soon raise unemployment to 10 to 20 percent.
He said the government and AI companies should stop 'sugar-coating' the job apocalypse on the horizon. 'We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming,' Amodei told Axios. 'I don't think this is on people's radar.' The billionaire said he is concerned that most Americans are 'unaware that this is about to happen.'
Concerns About Unemployment
Dario Amodei, CEO of leading AI company Anthropic, has warned of mass unemployment. Major companies have already begun mass layoffs, referencing advances in AI in making roles redundant. Meta recently announced that it is cutting 5 percent of its payroll. Zuckerberg said in a recent interview that the tech giant was developing AI that 'can effectively be a sort of mid-level engineer that you have at your company that can write code.'
Global Concerns
Amodei has previously warned about the dangers of advancing AI when he signed a 2023 'Statement on AI Risk' open letter. 'Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war,' the statement read. Amodei signed the letter alongside other notable AI leaders.
Other experts have also issued startling warnings. Stuart Russell, a professor of computer science at the University of California, Berkeley, previously told the Financial Times that the 'AGI [Artificial General Intelligence] race is a race towards the edge of a cliff.' Unemployment could rise to 10 to 20 percent, Amodei warned.
AI Race Risks
'Even the CEOs who are engaging in the race have stated that whoever wins has a significant probability of causing human extinction in the process, because we have no idea how to control systems more intelligent than ourselves,' Russell added. Earlier this year, an Open AI safety researcher labeled the global AI race a 'very risky gamble, with huge downside' for humanity as he dramatically quit his role. Steven Adler led safety-related research and programs for product launches and speculative long-term AI systems for OpenAI before resigning in January.
'I'm pretty terrified by the pace of AI development,' Adler wrote. He also criticized developments that have been quickly taking shape between world-leading AI labs and global superpowers.
