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Artificial general intelligence (AGI), technology which matches or surpasses human intelligence and cognitive abilities, is just three to five years away and could cause unemployment of up to 15-20%.
The rise of AI is a continuing theme at the Future Investment Initiative summit in Riyadh this week, with government leaders, financiers, technology, and business leaders considering its use and impact on society, as well as the value of AI companies.
But Dan Schulman, managing partner, of New York-based investment company Valor Capital Group, was among the first to address the elephant in room – the growing potential for AGI causing unemployment in certain sectors.
AI was pressed into use once again, as it has been throughout the summit, when an AI avatar called Sophie responded to a question about the over valuation of AI companies.
“With a $600 billion gap between AI market expectations and actual revenue, according to Sequoia, the current valuations are excessively inflated,” she said.
But Schulman dismissed the valuation question as a “surface issue” compared to the pressing need to address potential societal problems brought about by the technology.
The former president and CEO of online payment firm PayPal said based on his conversations with 50 top US CEOs, AI is going to have profound impacts on their organisational structure, and will replace 80% of customer service jobs, 50% of legal teams, and all of basic software programming.
Initial pilots at PayPal had shown 35% of productivity improvements in software programming using AI copilots, Schulman said, and the technology could also replace 50% of analysts in banks.
“CEOs I spoke to said they will take half to 60% of productivity savings into productivity, more output happening, but almost half will result in op ex savings,” he said.
This created a potential scenario of 15-20% unemployment as a result of AI, he said, a level that is very problematic in democracies where it means less tax revenue, and therefore less public services provided.
“We need to think, do we have enough work for four or five work days going forward? When we talk about valuations of AI, this is a surface question,” he said.
Julie Sweet, chair and CEO of consulting firm Accenture in response to a question about whether business leaders are considering the need to be responsible in AI, or, are purely focused on bottom lines, said responsible AI is in everyone’s interests as bypassing responsibility, regardless of regulation, kills companies.
“Our research shows if you have a bad incident with a consumer company, then it can knock 20-25% of your market cap,” she said.
(Reporting by Imogen Lillywhite; editing by Bindu Rai)
