Artificial Intelligence And The Potential Future Of Business

For now, artificial intelligence does not eliminate all jobs; it displaces some and creates others, such as with AI testing and programming in the latter case.  Certain jobs are easier to supplant with AI by nature, leaving others relatively safe for a time, and there would also have to be some persistent human oversight if this product of technology is to not in one way or another fail to benefit people (for instance, by a rogue AI seeking to eradicate the species).  While some kinds of output being enhanced or automated entirely by relying on AI can be helpful for business financials in the short-term, employees are the ones that suffer from this trend initially.  Depending on which of the logically possible directions the development of AI in business takes, though, workers left jobless would not be the only ones hurt.

A key problem for the very goal of relying on AI over workers—cutting costs such as those infernal employee wages or salaries to increase profits—is that there can be no profits when there is no consumer spending, and there will not be casual spending by the masses if they do not have jobs to generate income.  If companies were to abruptly, totally replace as many people with hardware or software at the earliest possible points, many workers would at large no longer have the financial freedom purchase a great many things (some might irresponsibly continue to do so).  Sales would decline because there would be little to no available money to spend, particularly on non-necessities.  This is if nothing else changed about a civilization other than its AI-related joblessness.  What if additional factors changed simultaneously?

Really, transitioning to AI to the point of sidestepping human labor would be positive if the machines addressed things like agricultural and other physical labor needs so that people could rest or focus on more philosophically important matters.  Again, some degree of human involvement would be necessary to ensure as much as possible that the artificial intelligence is acting in human interests, but many jobs could be eliminated as far as the need for constant, burdensome labor is concerned.  The problem in this case is not necessarily that machines could replace human workers; it is that if they do, many societies are intentionally structured so that resources would be needlessly kept from the people who would no longer have to conventionally work in order for there to be a thriving community, all for the sake of artificial class division, arrogance, and greed.

Workers being replaced by AI, aside from the unverifiable issue of whether a given AI is truly conscious and probably dangerous to humanity, does not have to be some devastating deathblow to millions of people with no morally valid (as opposed to the likes of stealing) or pragmatically obtainable way to survive other than professional labor under current social paradigms.  This does not follow.  It would depend on how and why it is implemented.  If advanced enough, machinery and artificial intelligence could absolutely deliver people from the drudgery, confinement, and risk of many kinds of labor.  At the same time, this would be if they had or were provided the resources to enjoy such a life—and American-style capitalism is not compatible with this.