{"id":318051,"date":"2023-11-24T06:26:04","date_gmt":"2023-11-24T06:26:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/popularindinews.com\/?p=318051"},"modified":"2023-11-24T06:26:04","modified_gmt":"2023-11-24T06:26:04","slug":"will-ai-reduce-working-hours","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/popularindinews.com\/celebrity\/will-ai-reduce-working-hours\/","title":{"rendered":"Will AI Reduce Working Hours?"},"content":{"rendered":"

In 1930, John Maynard Keynes predicted that by 2030 technology would be so advanced that three hours of work per day would suffice.
Has AI brought about the transformation that Keynes predicted, asks Atanu Biswas.<\/strong><\/p>\n

As you and I argue over the 70-hour workweek proposed by N R Narayana Murthy for India’s youth, Elon Musk has made alarming claims regarding artificial intelligence’s (AI’s) impact on the world economy and labour market.<\/p>\n

‘There will come a point where no job is needed — you can have a job if you want to have a job for sort of personal satisfaction, but AI will be able to do everything,’ Mr Musk said to British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak at the recent AI Safety Summit in Bletchley Park, UK.<\/p>\n

Will the AI-impacted global job market really evolve towards such an alarming scenario? Or is it over the top?<\/p>\n

One may remember that just a year ago, at a tumultuous beginning in his leadership at Twitter (renamed X), Mr Musk advised staff members to be prepared for 80-hour workweeks for survival.<\/p>\n

With that template, how would one judge his current prophecy?<\/p>\n

Mr Musk startles us with his outrageous forecasts on various issues. He now thinks that AI may be the ‘magic genie’ that would bring about a ‘universal high income’.<\/p>\n

However, doesn’t ‘no human work needed’ seem just as scary, if not more so, than an 80-hour workweek?<\/p>\n

Many disagreed with Mr Musk’s prediction that AI would transform the workplace like this. At least for the time being.<\/p>\n

‘I think that certainly over a 50-year period, we should be concerned,’ Mustafa Suleyman, a British AI researcher and co-founder of DeepMind, stated.<\/p>\n

However, because AI has such a huge footprint, the global work culture will invariably experience a paradigm shift. And there will inevitably be less work for humans to carry out.<\/p>\n

In fact, the history of human civilisation, from the development of wheels to the introduction of machines in Nottingham’s textile industry, and from steam engines to electricity, demonstrates that technological revolutions not only boost productivity but also shift some human labour to machines that humans have created, thereby decreasing human workloads.<\/p>\n

Thus, nearly every new technology should cause some instability in the labour market, despite offering significant societal advantages.<\/p>\n

Isn’t AI just another technology that will, in some ways, reduce the need for human labour?<\/p>\n