Generative AI probably will not take over most people’s jobs entirely but will instead automate a portion of their duties, freeing them up to do other tasks, a United Nations study said Monday.
It warned, however, that clerical work would likely be the hardest hit, potentially hitting female employment harder, given women’s over-representation in this sector, especially in wealthier countries.
An explosion of interest in generative AI and its chatbot applications has sparked fears over job destruction, similar to those that emerged when the moving assembly line was introduced in the early 1900s and after mainframe computers in the 1950s.
However, the study produced by the International Labour Organization concludes that: “Most jobs and industries are only partially exposed to automation and are thus more likely to be complemented rather than substituted by AI.”
This means that “the most important impact of the technology is likely to be of augmenting work”, it adds.
The occupation likely to be most affected by GenAI – capable of generating text, images, sounds, animation, 3D models and other data – is clerical work, where about a quarter of tasks are highly exposed to potential automation, the study says.
But most other professions, like managers and sales workers, are only marginally exposed, it said.
Still, the UN agency’s report warned that the impact of generative AI on affected workers could still be “brutal”.
“Therefore, for policymakers, our study should not read as a calming voice, but rather as a call for harnessing policy to address the technological changes that are upon us,” it said.
𝗖𝗿𝗲𝗱𝗶𝘁𝘀, 𝗖𝗼𝗽𝘆𝗿𝗶𝗴𝗵𝘁 & 𝗖𝗼𝘂𝗿𝘁𝗲𝘀𝘆: nypost.com
𝗙𝗼𝗿 𝗮𝗻𝘆 𝗰𝗼𝗺𝗽𝗹𝗮𝗶𝗻𝘁𝘀 𝗿𝗲𝗴𝗮𝗿𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗗𝗠𝗖𝗔,
𝗣𝗹𝗲𝗮𝘀𝗲 𝘀𝗲𝗻𝗱 𝘂𝘀 𝗮𝗻 𝗲𝗺𝗮𝗶𝗹 𝗮𝘁 dmca@enspirers.com