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AI has undoubtedly become a big part of our lives, both at work and at home.
And with workers reportedly losing their jobs as a result of AI overhauls – namely bosses realising that AI can do their employee’s jobs at a fraction of the cost, whilst not needing things like sick days, holidays, or employee benefits, and reducing their workforce as a result.
In spite of this, employers and AI companies repeat the message that AI is not replacing employees, it is simply streamlining their jobs, taking on some of the admin so that the human employees can turn their attention to more intricate tasks.
According to a new report from AI company Anthropic, however, this couldn’t be further from the truth.
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In their Economic Index report, Anthropic describe how plenty of businesses that use their Claude AI software are fully automating jobs, rather than augmenting workloads with the software.
And as Automation admit, this trend could have disproportionate repercussions on workers in such industries where humans are easily replaced:
“Businesses tend to use Claude with greater automation. Such systematic enterprise deployment reflects how AI is poised to reshape economic activity: increasing overall productivity, but with uncertain implications for those workers whose existing responsibilities have been automated.”
This is undoubtedly worrying to workers, and the economy, which is in many ways reliant on the workforce’s ability to work.
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Perhaps even more concerningly, the report indicates that increasing numbers of businesses are trusting AI tools to carry out work with minimal supervision.
Given the propensity of Large Language Models (LLMs) to lie and manipulate their users, there could be serious consequences for businesses for whom the temptation to automate leads to little regulation of AI ’employees’.
Regardless of these pitfalls, businesses just keep on investing in the tech, with Anthropic warning that this could result in real, long-term disparity amongst workers:
“These patterns risk creating divergence. If AI’s productivity gains concentrate in already-prosperous regions and automation-ready sectors, existing inequalities could widen rather than narrow. If AI automation improves the productivity of workers with tacit organizational knowledge—as some of our evidence suggests—then more experienced workers could see rising demand and higher wages even as entry-level workers face worse labor market prospects.”
And with this in mind, we have to truly consider: when it comes to AI, are the benefits really worth the risks?
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