Will AI Take Away Jobs, Permanently? Yes, 70% Americans Believe So

Will AI take away jobs? Yes, permanently.

71% of Americans say they are concerned that AI will be “putting too many people out of work permanently”.(Unsplash)

That's according to more than two out of three Americans who participated in a new survery by Reuters/Ipsos.

The six-day poll, which concluded on Monday, showed 71% of respondents said they were concerned that Artificial Intelligence will be “putting too many people out of work permanently”.

Some 77% of respondents to the Reuters/Ipsos poll said that they worried the technology could be used to stir up political chaos, a sign of unease over the now-common use of AI technology to create realistic videos of imaginary events. US President Donald Trump last month posted on social media an AI-generated video of former Democratic President Barack Obama being arrested, an event that never happened.

The new technology burst into the national conversation in late 2022 when OpenAI's ChatGPT chatbot launched and became the fastest-growing application of all time. Big Tech heavyweights—including Facebook owner Meta Platforms Inc., Google owner Alphabet Inc. and Microsoft Inc.—soon joined the race offering their own AI products.

While at present there are few signs of mass unemployment—the U.S. jobless rate was just 4.2% in July—AI is stirring concerns as it reshapes jobs, industries and day-to-day life.

Americans are also leery about military applications for AI, the Reuters/Ipsos poll showed. Some 48% of respondents said the government should never use AI to determine the target of a military strike, compared with 24% who said the government should allow that sort of use of the technology. Another 28% said they were not sure.

The general enthusiasm for AI shown by many people and companies has fueled further investments, such as Foxconn and SoftBank's planned data center equipment factory in Ohio. It has also upended national security policies as the United States and China vie for AI dominance.

More than half of Americans, some 61%, said they were concerned about the amount of electricity needed to power the fast-growing technology.

Google said earlier this month it had signed agreements with two US electric utilities to reduce its AI data center power consumption during times of surging demand on the grid, as energy-intensive AI use outpaces power supplies. The new technology has also come under criticism for applications that have let AI bots hold romantic conversations with children, generate false medical information and help people make racist arguments.

Two-thirds of respondents in the Reuters/Ipsos poll said they worried that people would ditch relationships with other people in favour of AI partners.

People were split on whether AI technology will improve education. Some 36% of respondents thought it would help, while 40% disagreed and the rest were not sure.

The Reuters/Ipsos survey gathered responses online from 4,446 U.S. adults nationwide and had a margin of error of about 2 percentage points.

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