AI Could Disrupt Job Market But Will Create New Opportunities: Sam Altman

OpenAI founder Sam Altman on Wednesday (June 7) said that artificial intelligence (AI) could disrupt the global job market to some extent. He, however, added that the emerging technology will also bring new avenues of employment for the labour market. 

Altman made the comments during an event organised by the Economic Times in New Delhi.

Citing the Industrial Revolution, Altman said that the adoption of AI would render some jobs useless but will also create ‘new and better jobs’. He added that the only difference would be the speed at which these new jobs would be created, making way for changes to the ‘socioeconomic contract’ and the way governments think about the AI space. 

He said that the emergence of AI would make the world ‘way wealthier’ and would bring about a productivity boom in the market. Altman added this will lead to the emergence of new jobs and the people ‘will find a lot of new things to do’.

Elaborating on this, the OpenAI founder claimed that AI will make workers ‘dramatically more efficient’ and, instead of replacing jobs, could help the IT industry make 3X more software to cater to the demand overhang across the globe. 

“Earlier people thought that AI was first going to replace the physical labour jobs.. then, it’ll come for the sort of easier kinds of cognitive labour, (and) then maybe eventually like computer programmers… and then you know… maybe for the creative jobs… And, of course, we can look now and say it appears like it’s going exactly the other direction…,” Altman said. 

His comments come at a time when experts and critics across the globe have flagged the issue of job loss on account of the adoption of AI technologies. A recent report by Goldman Sachs claimed that the emerging technology could potentially replace the equivalent of 300 Mn full-time jobs.

The report also claimed that AI could replace a quarter of work tasks in the US and Europe, adding that the technology could enable new jobs and a boom in productivity.

On a previous occasion, SaaS unicorn’s CEO Sridhar Vembu also claimed that AI could put millions of jobs at risk overnight and the adoption of the new technology, without safeguards, could result in ‘unprecedented disruption of the existing social order.’

During the same conversation, Altman also called on global leaders to regulate the burgeoning space, especially major players in the ecosystem such as Google and OpenAI itself.

Altman is in India on a multi-led tour, which also includes visits to countries such as Israel, Jordan, Qatar, the UAE and South Korea. He is also expected to meet Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Thursday (June 8).