3000 managers surveyed: They want to use AI to replace workers or pay them less but worry their own pay will be cut

[highplainsdem]

Welcome to the AI "assisted" economy.


https://www.techspot.com/news/102385-survey-reveals-almost-half-all-managers-aim-replace.html

A report by Beautiful.ai, which makes AI-powered presentation software, surveyed over 3,000 managers about AI tools in the workplace, how they're being implemented, and what impact they believe these technologies will have.

The headline takeaway is that 41% of managers said they are hoping that they can replace employees with cheaper AI tools in 2024. This backs up previous reports that looked at potential jobs losses caused by generative AI, including one from September that predicted the technology would replace over 2 million US jobs by 2030. An earlier study claimed that generative AI could affect 300 million jobs globally.

The rest of the survey's results are just as depressing for worried workers: 48% of managers said their businesses would benefit financially if they could replace a large number of employees with AI tools; 40% said they believe multiple employees could be replaced by AI tools and the team would operate well without them; 45% said they view AI as an opportunity to lower salaries of employees because less human-powered work is needed; and 12% said they are using AI in hopes to downsize and save money on worker salaries.

-snip-

But it's not just workers who feel like they are under threat from AI. Half of all the managers surveyed – 90% of whom say they are already using AI to increase productivity – said they are worried that AI tools will result in lower pay for those in management positions, while 64% said they believe AI's output and productivity are equal to or better than experienced human managers. Moreover, just under half of the participants think AI tools will fuel wage declines across the country.

-snip-

The paragraph snipped out partway through the excerpt above was about roughly 2/3 of managers saying their employees are worried AI is a threat to their salaries/jobs. Imagine that...


The AI company's blog post about the survey: https://www.beautiful.ai/blog/2024-ai-workplace-impact-report

[AllaN01Bear]

1. fire the managers .

[Conjuay]

2. you reap what you sow

[Prairie_Seagull]

3. Reason, is and has been indicating to us to beware, but

Is being outshouted by greed. Greed has a very loud and usually opaque voice.

[area51]

4. All the more reason

why we need a universal basic income in addition to universal healthcare. Unfortunately, we're unlikely to get either.

[brooklynite]

7. UBI is no less likely than any other country in the world.

It's not a policy concept, even in the most progressive countries.

[bluesbassman]

5. In some areas AI will be a huge benefit. Workers security, compensation, and rights is not one of them.

Progress is good, but progress has unintended consequences and in the realm of "productivity" it generally spells economic disaster and hardship for workers as they are cast aside in the name of profit. If those pushing AI as a "boon" to society were actually pushing it for the betterment of society there would be a parallel push for how to transition the workers displaced by the technology. I'm just not seeing that aspect of the issue from any of the players involved.

[usonian]

6. Managers:

Last edited Wed Mar 27, 2024, 11:55 AM - Edit history (1)

Hiring: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.
Firing: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.
Write Reports: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.
Plan: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.
Conduct meetings: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.
Spreadsheets: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.
Presentations: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.
Sexually harass employees: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better. Fake nudes as well. Much better.
Send out emails: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.
Alter financials: AI can do it. Is doing it. Better.

On edit: these are exaggerations of the sarcastic variety. I just hope that corner office people don't believe them.

Ultimate goal: one owner, zero employees. Twitter.

[Renew Deal]

11. AI is not better for hiring and can be pretty problematic

https://www.ml.cmu.edu/news/news-archive/2016-2020/2018/october/amazon-scraps-secret-artificial-intelligence-recruiting-engine-that-showed-biases-against-women.html

https://www.shrm.org/topics-tools/news/hr-magazine/applicant-tracking-system-hurting-recruiting-efforts

It could be better for writing reports if it's fed good quality information and a person reviews.
It could be good for planning.
It's not good at all for conducting meetings.
It's not great with spreadsheets, but it is good with analyzing data in spreadsheets.
It can be great for presentations.
AI is not better than humans at sexual harassment. Fake nudes are not a good example.
It can be good for sending emails based on existing information and with heavy human review.
It depends on what you mean by "altering financials."

That said, most managers don't have the negative aspects you portrayed.

You are correct about the ultimate goal. Many "owners" would like companies to be as lean as possible and that includes humans. That's why it's good to be the owner or the operator of the AI system.

[usonian]

13. Thanks for the thoughtful reply.

I was exaggerating, of course. I'll add a sarcasm emoji.

Of course, some corner office people might actually believe the exaggerations, based on ego, greed, or predictions about AI which are generated by AI.

https://archive.ph/62S4E
AI can predict the future better than humans.

[Renew Deal]

15. Have you seen Devs on Amazon Prime?

I think you'd like it.

[usonian]

16. Nope.

I'll ask my daughter, who has prime.

[Trekologer]

8. If the employees are replace with AI and/or automation, who is going to be buying the products and services?

Today's business managers can't see beyond their spreadsheets.

[patphil]

10. Exactly. The problem with managers is that they need to show increased productivity.

Eventually they also become victims of the great replacement of human workers with AI.
In a fully realized AI environment, only a truly socialist society can survive.

At least it will solve the immigration problem.

[XanaDUer2]

9. IMO, its going to be a bloodbath

I can't even imagine what its going to be like for employees who trained for high-paying careers. Its going to be bad. Very very bad. Hell, even crappy pay careers will be destroyed.

So, be a janitor, right? AI cant replace janitors. Well, when there are no employees to clean up after, or offices, then thats not going to work.

[Renew Deal]

12. The biggest example of that is software developers

Who are very susceptible to AI replacement. Some lawyers are also susceptible.

[Johnny2X2X]

14. Think of how much worse this will be when AI actually exists

In a decade or 2 when AI is invented, this is going to be an issue.

[David__77]

17. AI is like other tools in that it is people who must wield it ultimately.

Labor should be augmented by AI. What this looks like is another matter.

[usonian]

18. But will AI replace AI?

I watched too much Star Trek.
Maybe models will go to war with each other.
How do you purge war from training data?
It's a sad part of history. Too damn much of it.

Sci-Fi Writers?