Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei doubled down on his warning that artificial intelligence could soon cause mass unemployment, even as the technology’s current capabilities lag behind many predictions.
Amodei, who runs one of the world’s leading AI labs, warned that the technology is advancing “very quickly” and has already begun replacing jobs at Axios’ AI+ DC Summit on Wednesday.
“This is already happening,” Amodei said.
Amodei’s comments come as recent data points to a labor market that is weakening quicker than expected. The unemployment rate hit a three-year high last month, and the economy is adding relatively few jobs compared to recent years. It is unclear whether the labor market slowdown is related to AI technology, though.
In many cases, AI remains more about its promise than its current returns. Apple, for example, found that an AI-powered Siri assistant wasn’t up to its quality standards, and in several cases, the use of AI chatbots has been linked to mental health spirals.
This isn’t the first time Amodei has sounded the alarm about AI’s potential to wipe out jobs. In May, Amodei warned that the AI tools that Anthropic and other companies are racing to build could eliminate half of entry-level, white-collar jobs and boost unemployment to as much as 20% in the next one to five years.
“When an exponential is moving very quickly, you can’t be sure. This could happen faster than I imagine, this could happen slower than I imagine, or something very different could happen,” Amodei said on Wednesday.
“But I think it is likely enough to happen that we felt that there was a need to warn the world about it,” he added.
Amodei also suggested the government may need to step in and support people in adapting to the AI revolution, perhaps by taxing AI companies’ gains.
Some critics have suggested that Amodei’s repeated warnings sometimes serve more to burnish his image as a responsible leader in the field or to elevate his technology’s market position.
But Amodei argued on Wednesday that many people are underestimating AI.
“I think there’s a little disconnect here, where people will sometimes say, ‘Oh, you’re worried about what AI is going to do to jobs, but AI can’t do this, AI can’t do that,’” he said. “Well, we’re talking about today’s AI. The technology is moving quickly.”