AI to Threaten Human Jobs: Re-skilling is the Only Way Out, Experts Say

With automation, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and disruptive technologies increasingly replacing human beings, industry experts on Tuesday called for re-skilling techies for their retention and creating more jobs for future. 

“The skills that were required for jobs 20 years ago and the present day are not the same just as the skills that will be required are. So, we have to keep retraining our people,” said International Finance Corporation’s Director, East Asia and Pacific region, Vivek Pathak at a panel discussion during the 11th Asian Financial Forum in Hong Kong. Mr. Pathak was quoted on The Economic Times.

Addressing a session on “Jobs of the Future - Supporting the Next Generation of Entrepreneurs” at the two-day financial summit that concluded on Tuesday, he said that countries need to create ecosystems to encourage and support start-ups. 

“If jobs are being lost in the IT sector due to automation technologies, they are being created in other areas. Governments and public at large should focus on whether techies and people in other professions are skilled enough for the new jobs,” Pathak said. The newspaper reported.

The good news is that policymakers and technology experts are thinking about this, and instituting plans aimed at avoiding the “Robots are going to take all of our jobs” doomsday scenario.

“The best solutions are always going to come from minds and machines working together,” said Andrew McAfee, co-director of the MIT Initiative on the Digital Economy, and author of “The Second Machine Age.” But that balance of minds and machines won’t always be the same. In five years, that balance will be totally different in, say, customer service and driving. Mr. McAfee was quoted on IEEE Spectrum.

Artificial intelligence is intelligence displayed by machines, in contrast with the natural intelligence displayed by humans and other animals.