Jobs are being lost and new jobs are being created at an unprecedented scale

The World Economic Forum and GoldmanSachs have both made predictions on the impact of A.I. on the labor market.

The WEF data indicates (Link) that there could be a significant impact on employment due to the changing dynamics between humans and machines by 2025. It was estimated that approximately 85 million jobs could potentially be displaced as a result of the evolving division of labor between humans and machines. However, alongside this displacement, there was also a projection that around 97 million new roles could emerge, better aligned with the shifting landscape of work involving humans, machines, and algorithms.

GoldmanSachs (Link) takes a longer term view and is projecting an even more significant disruption. Analysis conducted on occupational tasks in the United States and Europe reveals that approximately two-thirds of existing jobs are susceptible to some level of automation through AI. Moreover, it is projected that generative AI has the potential to replace up to one-fourth of current job roles. By extrapolating these findings to a global scale, it is estimated that generative AI could expose approximately 300 million full-time jobs to automation.

Massive Productivity Gains: 40% of all working hours to be impacted

According to Accentures March 2023 Report: "A new era of generative AI for everyone" (Link) AI is set to fundamentally transform various domains, including business, science, and society itself, by unlocking new frontiers of performance. The positive impact on human creativity and productivity is expected to be significant. According to a study conducted by Accenture, language tasks constitute 62% of employees' total work time across all industries. Leveraging LLMs like GPT-4, approximately 40% of working hours can be influenced, as 65% of language-related tasks have the potential to be transformed into more productive activities through augmentation and automation.

Millions of Workers will have to reskill

According to a publication by the McKinsey Global Institute (Link) dating back to 2017, it is anticipated that automation could lead to the displacement of a substantial number of individuals worldwide by 2030. Based on various scenarios of automation adoption, the midpoint and earliest projections suggest that between 400 million and 800 million people may need to seek new employment opportunities. However, it is important to note that these scenarios also take into account the creation of new jobs resulting from future labor demand and the overall impact of automation.

While new job opportunities are expected to arise, individuals will still face the challenge of transitioning into these roles. Approximately 75 million to 375 million individuals, according to the midpoint and earliest automation adoption scenarios, may need to consider switching occupational categories and acquiring new skills to adapt to the changing job landscape. However, it is worth mentioning that the trendline adoption scenario suggests a significantly smaller number, less than 10 million, in need of occupational shifts and skill development.

Almost one in four jobs at risk of being automated

According to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development OECD (Link), more than 25% of jobs within the OECD member countries rely on skills that have the potential to be easily automated in the future artificial intelligence (AI) revolution. Workers are concerned about the possibility of losing their jobs to AI. The OECD, a bloc consisting of 38 nations including both wealthy and emerging economies, stated that although there is currently limited evidence of AI significantly impacting jobs, this may be due to the early stages of the revolution.

Based on the 2023 Employment Outlook report from the OECD, jobs with the highest risk of automation account for an average of 27% of the labor force in OECD countries, with eastern European nations being particularly vulnerable. These high-risk jobs are defined as those utilizing more than 25 out of the 100 skills and abilities that AI experts consider easily automatable.