James MagazineJames_July-August_2026_web - Flipbook - Page 19
rtificial Intelligence is everywhere. It is
now affecting
how people
do their jobs
and those jobs
themselves.
The future is
clearly with those who have found
a way of making themselves indispensable by using AI, and not with
those who resist or actively fight
it. You may not be interested in AI,
but AI is interested in you.
Even in jobs considered safe
from automation, AI is shaping
daily work, from running a hospital nurses’ station to helping an
electrician check available replacement equipment.
I mention those two jobs because they are the most frequently
listed as being secure and unlikely
to be taken over by AI. That doesn’t
mean they won’t be touched by the
unseen hand of AI. It is everywhere
and on the move.
Graduates now leaving the
colleges and universities are
having a tough time finding work.
Many workers who thought they
were set for life are refining their
resumes, particularly those in the
computer field. Meta, owner of
Facebook, has laid off 8,000 workers, and an additional 7,000 will be
reassigned to AI-focused positions.
The job market isn’t only reflecting AI doing the work across
industries, but also the immeasurable hesitation of companies to
hire for jobs that may later be taken
over by AI. “Better to hold on and
see” is a common attitude in firms
that aren’t sure whether AI will, in
fact, help them meet their needs.
Many savants in the AI industry have warned of job losses
across the employment landscape
as AI takes hold. These include An-
thropic’s Dario Amodei and Open
AI’s Sam Altman. The Economist
writes about a job “catastrophe.”
My view, shared by many I
have interviewed, is that there will
be a sharp global drop in employment, followed by a post-revolution
expansion of employment that
allows for the flourishing of AI and
its benefits. Open AI’s Altman has
predicted a similar scenario, but he
hasn’t identified when the upturn
might occur— in years or decades?
There are those who believe
that governments will have to
provide a universal basic income to
compensate for the inroads of AI.
That’s unlikely.
The first impediment is that all
the advanced countries are already
spending beyond their means,
including the United States and the
United Kingdom. Where will the
new money come from with fewer
people paying taxes?
J U LY/AU GUST 2026
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