The urgent question about AI: How will replaced workers make a living?

The AI era is upon us. Elon Musk is now on track to become the world’s first trillionaire because of the focus on AI robots that will replace most human tasks. Sector stocks are rising because of the promise of AI. News headlines are filled with stories about how companies will innovate through ever-improving AI efficiencies and capabilities, such as ChatGPT and Grammarly, which have quickly become routine tools for everyday use. These tools follow us around correcting our writing, improving our information gathering, and connecting us in new ways never thought possible (including making this sentence better as I typed without changing my intent or original voice).

And yet no one is talking about the most fundamental change to our society — how will people whose jobs are replaced by AI make money to live? For example, Amazon, which grew to nearly 1.3 million employees amid COVID-driven demand, just announced it is cutting tens of thousands of jobs, with AI progress partially to credit (or blame). Amazon is already living up to economists’ predictions that we will see the first waves of AI job replacement starting now and accelerating in the next few years, with the lowest-skilled, lowest-paid, and largely hourly workforce numbering in the millions across grocery stores, factories, warehouses, quick-service restaurants, and more. The fundamental question is how our society will transform to take care of people whose lives are both helped and disrupted by AI?

To begin answering the question of income and job replacement for displaced workers by AI, I asked ChatGPT, or AI itself. Ironically, the first sentence of the response from ChatGPT was a rare, unsourced, and human-like opinion: “That’s a deeply important — and honestly urgent — question.” Even the most ingrained AI tool in our society has insight into the future and agrees that we must work urgently to answer the question as AI increasingly replaces many jobs.

McKinsey and other sources have stated that current technological advancements could immediately or over the next several years replace 30% of tasks performed by humans across 60% of industries. That’s today! Adding to the immediacy of the issue are other reports and expert projections that most occupations will face complete or partial automation by AI between 2030 and 2060. To put the impact in perspective, a current-generation individual entering the workforce with a degree or vocational certification will experience a complete or partial impact on their chosen occupation before age 30, and possibly multiple times during their working career. As AI advances, humanity must move towards income-replacement solutions or new job creation as soon as possible, in response to the latest technology revolution.

Credible sources such as the World Economic Forum and PwC estimate that hundreds of millions of people could be affected over the next few years; however, they are bullish that AI will create many new jobs. Still, they acknowledge the transition gap could be significant because of the shortfall in new employment to offset jobs eliminated geographically, those that require entirely new training or education, and sectoral disparities. There is no doubt that the occupations most immediately impacted are at the lower end of the economic scale because many lack the skills to transition, the financial resources to acquire new ones, and are living paycheck to paycheck, where even days without a job could mean the difference between barely surviving and being destitute.

Regardless of whether you believe that eliminated jobholders will quickly find new work, projections are consistent in showing a huge gap, mainly in the tech sector and functions. There will be a gap between the widespread geographic dispersion of job eliminations and the geographic concentration of new job creation. There will be a gap in both time and money needed to retool those whose occupations have been eliminated to have any chance of moving into new, AI-created jobs with entirely different skill-set requirements. There will be an ever-widening gap between the few who are wealthy and control businesses profiting from AI implementation and job elimination, and those who are eliminated, who are much more numerous in population and on the lowest rung of the economy.

There’s only one solution if we don’t want large-scale poverty or unrest: society must help society. To be more specific, the wealthiest citizens and businesses that adopt and benefit from AI, even at the expense of their very customers, must consider their financial and moral obligations to assist those displaced and in transition. Some governments, like Finland, Canada, and South Korea, and EU members, are piloting programs to support AI-impacted citizens with wage supplements/negative income tax to help top off their income to a livable level; universal basic income or some similar floor above poverty levels; mass retraining programs or grants in emerging areas of need such as healthcare, green energy, and other sectors where AI tech lags human functions; and, public investment in community services jobs from home health care to infrastructure, learning and climate resistance programs, among other efforts.

In the United States, the world’s most significant innovator and home to many AI breakthroughs, our government is so politically divided over the fundamentals of our Constitution and equality that addressing the urgent transformation at our doorstep is nowhere near a top priority. Further worrisome is that the U.S. deficit continues to grow, mainly from giving tax cuts to the ever-increasing wealthy — including all of the AI innovators — while cutting vital programs in healthcare, food, education, and housing that aid the poorest and most AI-vulnerable. The lack of financial obligation among the rich, led by Elon Musk himself, is one thing. More disturbing is the lack of moral responsibility, which is setting the country and the world on a collision course with the very AI promise of better lives for all it touches.

Just as the U.S. has begun a voting revolution around affordability in the 2025 election, we must make immediate AI disruption a top priority. We all need to start talking about and seeing our news media cover how we will take care of those displaced with basic income, retraining, and new job opportunities. We need to start looking at solutions, even if that means reversing course on tax cuts to fund programs for the AI-displaced and regulating companies to financially support those who have lost jobs to AI until they can retool and replace their income, health insurance, and occupation. Each of us needs to start looking at our own occupations and jobs, and prepare for when AI replacement or transformation can begin: either retool within a job to stay viable, or refocus with training on new AI capabilities for emerging jobs.

And, finally, for now, our society needs to elect politicians who make AI investment a priority equal to any other issue we face. Together with a strong moral responsibility to care for each other and a financial focus that follows, we can fully realize the immediate benefits of AI for every human. The time is now!

Michael Dru Kelley is a writer, media entrepreneur, and cofounder and principal LGBTQ+ shareholder of equalpride, publisher of The Advocate. You can follow Michael on Instagram @cleanfoodscook, and find his forthcoming food brand, social handles, and cookbook at www.comfortfoodsmadeclean.com. His opinion pieces represent his own viewpoints and not necessarily those of equalpride, or its affiliates, partners, or management.