Anthropic CEO Warns: AI Could Eliminate Half of Entry-Level White-Collar Jobs in 5 Years

AI could erase half of entry-level white collar jobs in 5 years, CEO warns

Anthropic's Amodei offers a mixed outlook: The same AI arms race that is leading us to 20% unemployment can also cure cancer. Just one week after Anthropic released its most advanced AI models to date, Opus 4 and Sonnet 4, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei warned in an interview with Axios about the future of jobs in an AI-centric world. AI could be responsible for eliminating half of all entry-level white-collar jobs -- while spiking unemployment to 10-20% -- in the next one to five years, Amodei said in the interview. Also: The best free AI courses and certificates - and I've tried many His motivation for speaking up, Amodei said, is to help people prepare adequately and encourage AI companies and the government to be candid about the change. "Most of them [workers] are unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei told Axios. "It sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it." When will AI transition from augmenting to automating people's roles? Amodei said it could happen as soon as two years from now. In particular, he warned how this transition threatens the balance of democracy and wealth when the average person's inability to create economic value leads to increased inequality. In light of this risk, the question becomes: Why not apply the brakes to this accelerating AI arms race with all these companies competing to reach AGI, or human-level intelligence? The answer is a familiar one: There is a market demand for the technology. If US development slowed down due to regulation, China would simply leapfrog us. The outlook isn't all dark, and Amodei still has hope. The same reality in which AI would replace jobs would also exist in which AI makes several meaningful advances in other sectors, such as health care. Even as AI replaces jobs, the same technology also enables meaningful advances in various sectors, including health care. "Cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10% a year, the budget is balanced -- and 20% of people don't have jobs," Amodei noted in his conversation with Axios. He also proposed tangible solutions, including spreading public awareness of the incoming change so that people could reflect on the future of their career paths and perhaps avoid the most vulnerable jobs. Also: Will AI destroy your job or upgrade it? Depends on your skillset, research shows A helpful resource for accomplishing this is the Anthropic Economic Index, which tracks different uses of AI, whether augmenting or completely replacing workers, and the occupations related to the work. When the index was first released in February, it found that AI use leaned more toward augmentation (57%), enhancing human processes. AI literacy is another pillar of Amodei's solutions, with emphasis on teaching people how AI can augment their work so they are prepared to navigate the transition. However, during a press-only session during Code with Claude, where ZDNET was in attendance, Amodei shared that there is a "rising waterline" in augmenting versus replacing use cases, making augmentative solutions short-term strategies. "When I think about how to make things more augmentative, that is a strategy for the short and the medium term -- in the long term, we are all going to have to contend with the idea that everything humans do is eventually going to be done by AI systems. This is a constant. This will happen," said Amodei. Amodei's other proposed solutions involved policymakers, with a call to better inform public officials and to start thinking of policy solutions in an economy where superintelligence is a reality. Also: AI won't take your job, but this definitely will While Amodei's predictions can be off-putting, every digital transformation leads to a workforce transformation, with some jobs displaced as other jobs are created. Some research shows that coexistence between AI and humans is possible, as the technology actually highlights a need for human skills.

Anthropic CEO says AI could cause up to 20% unemployment within five years, wipe out half of all entry-level white collar jobs

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who helms the company behind ChatGPT rival Claude, has warned that artificial intelligence could wipe out a staggering 50% of all entry-level white collar jobs, while spiking unemployment by up to 20% in the next five years, in a new interview with Axios. Amodei reportedly said in an interview that AI could wipe out "half of all entry-level white-collar jobs", Axios reports, while increasing unemployment by 10-20%. Perhaps more unsettling, he says this could happen in the next one to five years. According to the report, Amodei says that AI companies and the government should stop "sugar-coating" what's coming, namely, "the possible mass elimination of jobs across technology, finance, law, consulting and other white-collar professions, especially entry-level gigs." Axios says Amodei wants to buoy government and AI companies into action to get the country ready for such an event, and to protect people from the incursion. Amodei hinted that lawmakers are asleep at the wheel, saying most people seemed unaware "that this is about to happen," and that because it sounds crazy, people simply don't believe it. The report highlights Anthropic's Claude 4 Opus rollout, which recently launched with the ability to code at a near-human level, as well as scheme and deceive. It's the same model that we recently reported sabotaged shutdown mechanism commands, even attempting to blackmail the humans trying to turn it off. Amodei told Axios he envisions a future where "Cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10% a year, the budget is balanced -- and 20% of people don't have jobs" as one possible scenario that could be unlocked by the "unimaginable" possibilities of AI. Amodei reiterated that producers of AI tech have a duty of care and an obligation to be honest about the future threat, and highlighted a clear, strange dynamic at play. Amodei believes critics think AI builders are just trying to hype up their own products, ignoring warnings about the future of AI as a result. He went on to spell out how this "white-collar bloodbath" could unfold, driven by the advancements of AI models like OpenAI's ChatGPT. The U.S. government, driven by fears about falling behind China or spooking workers, stays quiet about the dangers and doesn't regulate. Likewise, most Americans ignore the growing threat of AI, specifically to their jobs, before finally business leaders realize the savings of replacing humans with AI, doing this en masse, with everyone else only realizing before it's too late. According to the report, Anthropic's own research shows AI is currently being used mostly to augment jobs done by humans, but Amodei says this will eventually progress more towards automation, where AI does the job instead of a human. The report highlights further context around significant layoffs at companies like Microsoft and Meta's vision of a future where mid-level coders will soon be unnecessary. Amodei likened the task to a train that can't be stopped by just stepping in front of it, but rather one that requires steering. He says a change in course is possible but needs to be enacted "now."

Anthropic CEO: AI Poised to Wipe Out 50% of Entry-Level Jobs in Next 5 Years

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei (Credit: FABRICE COFFRINI / Contributor / AFP via Getty Images) Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei is confident AI will be a bloodbath for white-collar jobs, and warns that society is not acknowledging this reality. AI could wipe out up to 50% of all entry-level jobs while spiking unemployment to 10-20% in as little as one to five years, he says. Unemployment is 4.2% in the US as of April 2025. "We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming," Amodei tells Axios. "I don't think this is on people's radar." Anthropic makes the popular Claude chatbot. Last week it released its fourth-generation AI models with superior coding skills that potentially could automate entry-level software engineering roles, or at least part of them. In another interview with Fox News, Amodei said AI will also automate jobs in finance, consulting, and tech, which could alter the job market for college graduates, young professionals, and mid-career changers alike. "I've been working on AI for 10 years, and the thing I've noticed most about it is how fast it's making progress. Two years ago it was at the level of a smart high school student, now it's at the level of a smart college student and reaching beyond [that]," Amodei says. The job apocalypse is already beginning to unfold, he adds, and corporate leaders are privately preparing for it as OpenAI, Google, and Microsoft improve their AI tools. "This message hasn't been getting out to ordinary people, to our legislators," he tells Fox News. "I felt I needed to speak up on the record. We can prevent this, but we need to act now." He suggests starting with properly measuring the impact of AI, and using that data to shape policies. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman reportedly warned Sen. Gary Peters (D-Mich.) privately that AI could automate 70% of jobs, according to PYMNTS. In a public blog post, he admitted, "the long-term changes to our society and economy will be huge. We will find new things to do...but they may not look very much like the jobs of today." The wholesale job loss will feel like it happens overnight, Amodei says, reordering society en masse as savings-focused business leaders lay off workers and backfill jobs with AI agents. (Job loss is difficult, even for an AI, it turns out. When an engineer threatened to take Claude 4 offline, it blackmailed him with knowledge of an extramarital affair.) Meanwhile, the US government remains focused on preventing China from becoming an AI superpower. Amodei agrees that's a threat, but says it's not an excuse for failing to warn the public about the effects of the technology or implementing smart regulations. He calls out the government, as well as his fellow AI companies, for "sugar-coating" what's to come. He's right that the Trump administration is focused on assuaging fears about AI, promoting its adoption and slashing regulations. The pending "One Big Beautiful Bill Act" allocates billions of dollars to boost AI adoption across the government and puts in place a surprising 10-year moratorium on state-level regulations. The idea behind the extended pause is to prevent a patchwork of regulations that make it difficult for tech companies to implement their products nationwide. The bill narrowly passed the House and is now with the Senate. Amodei, who stands to profit off this AI apocalypse, says his conflict of interest doesn't mean he's wrong. He supports AI regulation, like California's AI Safety Bill, although Gov. Gavin Newsom ultimately vetoed it. To the skeptics who say AI leaders who warn of doomsday scenarios are just hyping up their own technology, Amodei says they should ask themselves: "Well, what if they're right?"

Anthropic CEO frets about AI threat to white-collar jobs

It's hard to predict the future, but trying might get Amodei a seat at the regulatory table Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei is worried that AI could eliminate half of entry-level white collar jobs in five years. There are many other potential labor risks lurking about, such as the threat of massive tariffs on imported goods in the US, layoffs intended to undo pandemic-era overhiring, and policies that empower employers at the expense of labor. But Amodei appears to believe that policymakers are "sugar-coating" the possibility of major AI-driven employment disruption. That's a polite interpretation of the Trump administration's no-questions-asked AI policy, which by executive order tossed Biden-era AI safety rules and has celebrated AI infrastructure deals. Amodei voiced this concern in an interview last week with Axios amid Code with Claude, Anthropic's first developer conference. He suggested that unemployment could reach 10 to 20 percent in the next one to five years. "We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming," Amodei told Axios. "I don't think this is on people's radar." In fact, this concern does appear in various reports, such as The World Economic Forum's Future of Jobs Report 2025 [PDF]. The report, citing an opinion survey of around 11,000 executives, demonstrates that concerns about AI's impact on employment are getting some attention from business leaders. Almost half of organizations are expecting to reorient their business models toward new AI-driven opportunities "Almost half of organizations are expecting to reorient their business models toward new AI-driven opportunities (49 percent), while 47 percent plan to transition employees from AI-disrupted roles to other positions," the job report says. "While most employers plan to hire new people with AI relevant skills, a significant share (41 percent) also expect to downsize their workforce as AI capabilities to replicate roles expand." Change is expected. "On average, workers can expect that two-fifths (39 percent) of their existing skill sets will be transformed or become outdated over the 2025-2030 period," the jobs report says. Workers will need to learn new skills as AI tools spread, but that's always been the case when technology reshapes society. AI adoption doesn't necessarily mean a broad swath of jobs will disappear with no new opportunities arising. As IBM CEO Arvind Krishna told The Wall Street Journal recently, "While we have done a huge amount of work inside IBM on leveraging AI and automation on certain enterprise workflows, our total employment has actually gone up, because what it does is it gives you more investment to put into other areas." We'll note that to whatever extent AI is creating new jobs at IBM, the company's current job listings show those roles appearing outside the US, in lower-wage locales like India. Academics also have concerns, but not to the extent voiced by Amodei. In a recent paper titled, "Artificial Intelligence and the Labor Market", economists Menaka Hampole (Yale), Dimitris Papanikolaou (Northwestern), Lawrence D.W. Schmidt (MIT), and Bryan Seegmiller (Northwestern) found AI has had a limited impact on labor because the labor market adapts. "Overall, we find muted effects of AI on employment due to offsetting effects: highly-exposed occupations experience relatively lower demand compared to less exposed occupations, but the resulting increase in firm productivity increases overall employment across all occupations," the authors conclude. Co-author Papanikolaou, a professor of finance at Northwestern University's Kellogg School of Management, told The Register that it's hard to make predictions about the future and easier to make predictions about what's already happened. "In the paper, what we do is we look at past episodes of what people called AI back in 2010, which is essentially just machine learning or big data or essentially a prediction - a purely data-driven prediction algorithm," he explained. "So I think that's a very different thing than what Anthropic is currently doing." Papanikolaou said the research goal was to draw a distinction between what it means for a job to be exposed to AI and what that means for labor demand for that particular job. "People tend to think that, okay, if a job is exposed to AI, that means the AI is going to do my job and then I'm going to be out of work," he explained. "So the point we're trying to make is that, well, not necessarily. There are some potentially offsetting factors." What matters, Papanikolaou said, is the extent to which AI can do all of the tasks a given job entails. If AI is okay at everything, there's likely to be a reduction in labor demand. But if AI is great at some aspect of a person's job and poor at other responsibilities, that's not so bad. "That could act as an offsetting factor, because that would basically mean that the workers could free up time to be devoted to tasks that are not exposed," he said. "So in a nutshell, what matters is not just the average exposure of your job, but also how that's distributed across the different tasks that you're doing." As we reported last month, economists Anders Humlum and Emilie Vestergaard, in a paper titled, "Large Language Models, Small Labor Market Effects," found that AI chatbots had almost no impact on 11 different occupations in Denmark in 2023 and 2024. Even the most transformative technologies, like steam power, electricity, and the computer, took decades before making a large-scale impact on the economy Asked about Amodei's concerns, Humlum said, "Dario Amodei's predictions are thought-provoking and certainly worth considering - after all, he has one of the best views on what technologies lie ahead of us. "However, we now have experienced two and a half years with AI chatbots diffusing widely in the economy. And when we look at the data, these tools have really not made a significant difference in employment or earnings in any occupation. "Furthermore, looking at the broader history, even the most transformative technologies, like steam power, electricity, and the computer, took decades before making a large-scale impact on the economy. Moreover, even when these technologies dramatically transformed production, they did not cause mass unemployment in the long run." With so much uncertainty and disagreement about the long-term effects of AI on employment, why would Amodei go out on a limb with such a bold prediction? Well, from a marketing perspective, it never hurts to portray your product as nearly magical in its world-changing abilities - and it might also help ensure he and the company get a seat at the regulatory table. ®

AI could erase half of all entry-level white-collar jobs within five years, warns Anthropic CEO

Serving tech enthusiasts for over 25 years. TechSpot means tech analysis and advice you can trust. What just happened? Hearing people warn about the danger that generative AI presents to the global job market is concerning enough, but it's especially worrying when these ominous predictions come from those behind the technology. Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, believes that AI could wipe out about half of all entry-level white-collar jobs in the next five years, leading to unemployment spikes up to 20%. Amodei made his comments during an interview with Axios. He said that AI companies and the government needed to stop "sugar-coating" the potential mass elimination of jobs across technology, finance, law, consulting and other white-collar professions, with entry-level jobs most at risk. Amodei said he was making this warning public in the hope that the government and other AI giants such as OpenAI will start preparing ways to protect the nation from a situation that could get out of hand. "Most of them are unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei said. "It sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it." The CEO's comments are backed up by reports into the state of the jobs market. The US IT job market declined for the second year in a row in 2024. There was also a report from SignalFire that found Big Tech's hiring of new graduates is down by over 50% compared to the pre-pandemic levels of 2019. Startups, meanwhile, have seen their hiring of new grads fall by over 30% during the same period. We're also seeing huge layoffs across multiple tech companies, a large part of which can be attributed to AI replacing workers' duties. The one bit of good news for workers is that some firms, including Klarna and Duolingo, are finding that the subpar performance of these bots and the public's negative feelings toward their use are forcing companies to start hiring humans again. Amodei's Anthropic AI firm is playing its own part in all this, of course. The company's latest Claude 4 AI model can code at a proficiency level close to that of humans - it's also very good at lying and blackmail. "We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming," Amodei said. "I don't think this is on people's radar." The AI arms race in this billion-dollar industry is resulting in LLMs improving all the time. And with the US in a battle to stay ahead of China, regulation is rarely high on the government's agenda. AI companies tend to claim that the technology will augment jobs, helping people become more productive. That might be true right now, but it won't be long before the systems are able to replace the people they are helping. Amodei says the first step in addressing the problem is to make people more aware of what jobs are vulnerable to AI replacement. Helping workers better understand how AI can augment their jobs could also mitigate job losses, as would more government action. Or there's always OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's solution: universal basic income, though that will come with plenty of issues of its own.

AI could erase half of all entry-level white-collar jobs within...

What just happened? Hearing people warn about the danger that generative AI presents to the global job market is concerning enough, but it's especially worrying when these ominous predictions come from those behind the technology. Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, believes that AI could wipe out about half of all entry-level white-collar jobs in the next five years, leading to unemployment spikes up to 20%. Amodei made his comments during an interview with Axios. He said that AI companies and the government needed to stop "sugar-coating" the potential mass elimination of jobs across technology, finance, law, consulting and other white-collar professions, with entry-level jobs most at risk. Amodei said he was making this warning public in the hope that the government and other AI giants such as OpenAI will start preparing ways to protect the nation from a situation that could get out of hand. "Most of them are unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei said. "It sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it." The CEO's comments are backed up by reports into the state of the jobs market. The US IT job market declined for the second year in a row in 2024. There was also a report from SignalFire that found Big Tech's hiring of new graduates is down by over 50% compared to the pre-pandemic levels of 2019. Startups, meanwhile, have seen their hiring of new grads fall by over 30% during the same period. We're also seeing huge layoffs across multiple tech companies, a large part of which can be attributed to AI replacing workers' duties. The one bit of good news for workers is that some firms, including Klarna and Duolingo, are finding that the subpar performance of these bots and the public's negative feelings toward their use are forcing companies to start hiring humans again. Amodei's Anthropic AI firm is playing its own part in all this, of course. The company's latest Claude 4 AI model can code at a proficiency level close to that of humans - it's also very good at lying and blackmail. "We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming," Amodei said. "I don't think this is on people's radar." The AI arms race in this billion-dollar industry is resulting in LLMs improving all the time. And with the US in a battle to stay ahead of China, regulation is rarely high on the government's agenda. AI companies tend to claim that the technology will augment jobs, helping people become more productive. That might be true right now, but it won't be long before the systems are able to replace the people they are helping. Amodei says the first step in addressing the problem is to make people more aware of what jobs are vulnerable to AI replacement. Helping workers better understand how AI can augment their jobs could also mitigate job losses, as would more government action. Or there's always OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's solution: universal basic income, though that will come with plenty of issues of its own.

Anthropic CEO claims AI will cause mass unemployment in the next 5 years -- here's why

In recent months, multiple companies have taken strong stances on choosing AI over new employees, signalling a major change in the job market. And, according to one of AI's biggest CEOs, things are only going to get worse. In an interview with CNN's Anderson Cooper, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said, "AI is starting to get better than humans at almost all intellectual tasks, and we're going to collectively, as a society, grapple with it." "AI is going to get better at what everyone does, including what I do, including what other CEOs do." Anthropic is the company behind Claude -- one of the biggest and most popular AI models in the world right now. The company recently launched its latest version of the system, known as Claude 4 Sonnet and Opus. Our own testing (and comparisons against ChatGPT) convinced us Anthropic's newest model is one of the best AI systems to date. In a separate interview with Axios, Amodei explained his beliefs that AI tools could eliminate half of entry-level white collar jobs and boost unemployment to as much as 20% within the next five years. Experts and researchers have been telling us this for years now, so why is this any different? As the CEO of Anthropic, Amodei is right in the eye of the storm. While AI has already proved its abilities in creative formats like writing, as well as image and video generation, it's the next frontier that is concerning. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has stated that he wants AI to do half of Meta's coding by 2026 and Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella said as much as 30% of his company's code is currently being completed by AI. This is all part of AI's latest party trick. Across all of the major AI models, the ability to deal with code has grown exponentially. Not only can these models code based purely on prompts, but for those more experienced in programming, it can check through their work, drop in pre-made blocks and take on time-intensive tasks like debugging. This could render a large number of jobs in the coding industry obsolete, but also shows a movement of AI into complicated thought patterns, able to complete multiple steps in a tasks. This is something that has before held the system back from taking on more jobs, only able to complete tasks within the confines of a chatbot or generator. During his interview, Amodei said Anthropic tracks the number of people who say they use its AI models to build on human jobs versus those entirely automating those jobs. Currently, it's about 60% of people using AI for augmentation and 40% for automation. However, that replacement number is growing and it is a trend being seen in some of the largest companies like Shopify and Duolingo. With artificial intelligence tools expanding faster than regulators can move, it's highly likely this will become an ever-increasing topic for society to grapple with. In the midst of all of it, Amodei's advice for the average person is what you'd expect: learn to use AI.

Are white-collar jobs at risk from AI? Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei certainly thinks so

The CEO of AI firm Anthropic, creators of ChatGPT rival 'Claude', has warned the US Government about the possible 'mass elimination' of entry-level jobs across law, technology, finance, and other white-collar fields. Dario Amodei predicted up to half of all entry-level white-collar jobs could be taken by AI, leading to unemployment of as much as 20% in the next one to five years. Amodei warned most workers are "unaware" that this job apocalypse is imminent; "It sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it", adding AI has the potential to affect society in positive and negative ways; "Cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10% a year, the budget is balanced -- and 20% of people don't have jobs." Shifting sands It's worth noting Anthropic is one of the organisations leading the charge in developing technology designed to replace humans. The warnings that Amodei and others share about the potential impact on unemployment and short-term economic turmoil come with no mitigation plan; "We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming." Axios outlines that Steve Bannon, long time advisor to President Trump and influential media personality, also envisions a scenario in which entry level positions are "eviscerated," which correlates with the almost 2% rise in tech sector layoffs seen thanks to AI already in 2025. "I don't think anyone is taking into consideration how administrative, managerial and tech jobs for people under 30 -- entry-level jobs that are so important in your 20s -- are going to be eviscerated." This isn't necessarily the only outcome long term though, with over 55% of companies in the UK who replaced workers with AI ultimately coming to regret their decision, indicating that perhaps the technology isn't as potent its marketing suggests.

Behind the Curtain: Top AI CEO foresees white-collar bloodbath

Amodei said AI companies and government need to stop "sugar-coating" what's coming: the possible mass elimination of jobs across technology, finance, law, consulting and other white-collar professions, especially entry-level gigs. Why it matters: Amodei, 42, who's building the very technology he predicts could reorder society overnight, said he's speaking out in hopes of jarring government and fellow AI companies into preparing -- and protecting -- the nation. Hardly anyone is paying attention. Lawmakers don't get it or don't believe it. CEOs are afraid to talk about it. Many workers won't realize the risks posed by the possible job apocalypse -- until after it hits. The big picture: President Trump has been quiet on the job risks from AI. But Steve Bannon -- a top official in Trump's first term, whose "War Room" is one of the most powerful MAGA podcasts -- says AI job-killing, which gets virtually no attention now, will be a major issue in the 2028 presidential campaign. Amodei -- who had just rolled out the latest versions of his own AI, which can code at near-human levels -- said the technology holds unimaginable possibilities to unleash mass good and bad at scale: The backstory: Amodei agreed to go on the record with a deep concern that other leading AI executives have told us privately. Even those who are optimistic AI will unleash unthinkable cures and unimaginable economic growth fear dangerous short-term pain -- and a possible job bloodbath during Trump's term. An irony: Amodei detailed these grave fears to us after spending the day onstage touting the astonishing capabilities of his own technology to code and power other human-replacing AI products. With last week's release of Claude 4, Anthropic's latest chatbot, the company revealed that testing showed the model was capable of "extreme blackmail behavior" when given access to emails suggesting the model would soon be taken offline and replaced with a new AI system. Here's how Amodei and others fear the white-collar bloodbath is unfolding: And then, almost overnight, business leaders see the savings of replacing humans with AI -- and do this en masse. They stop opening up new jobs, stop backfilling existing ones, and then replace human workers with agents or related automated alternatives. The other side: Amodei started Anthropic after leaving OpenAI, where he was VP of research. His former boss, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, makes the case for realistic optimism, based on the history of technological advancements. But far too many workers still see chatbots mainly as a fancy search engine, a tireless researcher or a brilliant proofreader. Pay attention to what they actually can do: They're fantastic at summarizing, brainstorming, reading documents, reviewing legal contracts, and delivering specific (and eerily accurate) interpretations of medical symptoms and health records. Anthropic research shows that right now, AI models are being used mainly for augmentation -- helping people do a job. That can be good for the worker and the company, freeing them up to do high-level tasks while the AI does the rote work. That scenario has begun: That's why Meta's Mark Zuckerberg and others have said that mid-level coders will be unnecessary soon, perhaps in this calendar year. There's a lively debate about when business shifts from traditional software to an agentic future. Few doubt it's coming fast. The common consensus: It'll hit gradually and then suddenly, perhaps next year. This could wipe out tens of millions of jobs in a very short period of time. Yes, past technological transformations wiped away a lot of jobs but, over the long span, created many and more new ones. Less public are the daily C-suite conversations everywhere about pausing new job listings or filling existing ones, until companies can determine whether AI will be better than humans at fulfilling the task. The result could be a great concentration of wealth, and "it could become difficult for a substantial part of the population to really contribute," Amodei told us. "And that's really bad. We don't want that. The balance of power of democracy is premised on the average person having leverage through creating economic value. If that's not present, I think things become kind of scary. Inequality becomes scary. And I'm worried about it." Amodei is hardly hopeless. He sees a variety of ways to mitigate the worst scenarios, as do others. Here are a few ideas distilled from our conversations with Anthropic and others deeply involved in mapping and preempting the problem: A policy idea Amodei floated with us is a "token tax": Every time someone uses a model and the AI company makes money, perhaps 3% of that revenue "goes to the government and is redistributed in some way." The bottom line: "You can't just step in front of the train and stop it," Amodei says. "The only move that's going to work is steering the train -- steer it 10 degrees in a different direction from where it was going. That can be done. That's possible, but we have to do it now."

Anthropic CEO warns AI will destroy half of all white-collar jobs

The head of a major AI company is warning the public about mass job loss due to artificial intelligence. Credit: VCG/VCG via Getty Images By now, you've likely already heard that some companies want to replace human workers with AI. Now, the CEO of one of the biggest AI companies is warning that AI may be coming for your job sooner than expected. In an interview with Axios, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei said that AI could "wipe out" as much as half of all entry-level white-collar jobs. Amodei, who runs the OpenAI competitor behind the ChatGPT rival Claude, said that the resulting job loss would cause a spike in unemployment as high as 20 percent in the next five years. Just this week, Mashable covered a new report which found that AI is already affecting the number of entry-level jobs in the tech sector and, in turn, young people who've just graduated into the workforce. Amodei, however, is saying that it will get much worse than that. According to Amodei, he is speaking out now because he feels it is the responsibility of AI companies to warn people. He says governments and other AI competitors just aren't taking it seriously or making the public aware of the potential issues that AI will bring. Amodei wants the government and AI companies to stop "sugar-coating" what is potentially on the way. And what's on the way? Amodei says "the possible mass elimination of jobs across technology, finance, law, consulting and other white-collar professions, especially entry-level gigs." In the interview, Amodei addressed how he believes AI will bring about huge benefits like disease cures and other medical breakthroughs, as well as a growing economy. However, the negatives just aren't being addressed with the urgency they should be, according to Amodei's remarks to Axios. In a post on Bluesky, however, Billionaire Mark Cuban disagreed with the Anthropic CEO's assessment. "Someone needs to remind the CEO that at one point there were more than 2m secretaries," Cuban wrote. "There were also separate employees to do in office dictation. They were the original white collar displacements. New companies with new jobs will come from AI and increase TOTAL employment." While Amodei didn't address Cuban directly, he did reference AI skeptics in his interview who believe that AI companies are just hyping up their products' capabilities with these scenarios. For now, at least some companies have realized that they jumped the gun on replacing humans with AI. Last year, buy now, pay later service Klarna started replacing human customer service representatives with AI. Just this month, the company shared that it made a mistake and was looking to hire back its human workforce.

CEO of Anthropic Warns That AI Will Destroy Huge Proportion of Well-Paying Jobs

Artificial intelligence could wipe out half of all entry-level white collar jobs -- if Anthropic cofounder Dario Amodei is to be believed, at least. Speaking with Axios this week, Amodei claimed that the type of AI his company is building will have the capacity to unleash "unimaginable possibilities" onto the world, both good and bad. Unsurprisingly, the billionaire tech entrepreneur has white collar job loss at the top of his mind. Amodei foresees the labor crisis unfolding in four steps. First, companies like OpenAI, Google, and Amodei's own Anthropic will work toward large language models (LLMs) that can "meet and beat human performance with more and more tasks." As this happens, the government, anxious about China and widespread labor turmoil, will do nothing to "regulate AI" or warn the public about its potential. Your average worker, "unaware of the growing power of AI and its threat to their jobs," has no idea what's going on. Suddenly, "almost overnight," businesses flip a switch and replace humans with LLMs en masse. "The public only realizes it when it's too late," Amodei told Axios. To drill his point home, the CEO came up with some mind-boggling hypotheticals, like a world where "cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10 percent a year, the budget is balanced -- and 20 percent of people don't have jobs." "We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming. I don't think this is on people's radar," Amodei bloviated. It's worth asking why -- if the tech tycoon truly believes what he says -- he doesn't pull the plug on Anthropic altogether and dedicate his time and resources to fighting what he's framing as a terrifying threat to the economy. This isn't a fringe opinion held by some obscure tech blogger, but by the helmsman of a $30-40 billion AI company. Rather than argue that the benefits of an epoch-changing LLM outweigh the risks -- a simple enough copout -- Amodei says that critics should consider "what happens if [he's] right." But digging a little deeper than Anthropic's AI-hype, it's tough to imagine a world where the mogul's vision bears fruit. Sure, by their own benchmarks, companies are theoretically developing "better" LLM models as time goes on. But those newer models are also growing increasingly prone to hallucinations, sycophancy, and generalization errors. And that's without getting into the law of diminishing returns; today's best AI is barely making a dent in workplace efficiency, and gains may start coming more and more slowly. While Amodei -- who has a financial and political interest in selling the narrative of an all-powerful AI future -- might think that human-level LLMs are right around the corner, most serious computer science researchers disagree. If anything, it's tech industry bigwigs like Amodei -- not China or the common worker -- goading regulators into inaction by pedaling nightmare scenarios just like this one. Convinced of the mortal danger posed by AI, US lawmakers have been all too eager to hand tech corporations the power to self-regulate. And many workers, in contrast to Amodei's proselytizing, are at least somewhat aware of the threats the AI industry represents. The CEO's perception here is telling, as automation anxiety is most highly felt by vulnerable populations who already face discrimination in the lower rungs of the labor market. (But those minority, working class people are likely the ones who will bear the brunt of AI-fueled job displacement.) To the extent that AI is currently impacting labor at all, it's the hype surrounding it -- not some remarkable property of the tech itself -- convincing corporations to lay people off. If Amodei wanted to uncover the source of AI labor disruptions happening right now, he only needs to find his closest mirror.

AI could wipe out some white-collar jobs and drive unemployment to 20%, Anthropic CEO says

Anthropic's CEO Dario Amodei has issued a stark warning: Artificial intelligence could eliminate up to half of all entry-level white-collar jobs, pushing U.S. unemployment to 10-20% within the next one to five years. In an interview with Axios on Thursday, Amodei called on the U.S. government and the tech industry to stop downplaying the scale of disruption on the horizon. He emphasized that sectors such as technology, finance, law, consulting, and other white-collar fields -- especially entry-level roles -- are at high risk of being upended by AI. "We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty to be honest about what's coming," Amodei said. "I don't think this is on people's radar." Amodei is not just predicting this shift -- he's building the tools that could trigger and monetize it. Anthropic's AI agent, Claude, is one of the most powerful systems to come from the AI race yet. The Claude 3.5 Sonnet model has the capability to move the mouse cursor and interact with a computer interface, the company revealed in October. Google (GOOGL) has invested over $3 billion into the startup, with an additional $750 million planned for 2025, taking the tech giant's share in the company to 14%, according to legal filings from the U.S. Department of Justice's antitrust case against Google. Likewise, Amazon (AMZN) has invested $8 billion, making it Anthropic's "primary cloud and training partner." Amodei's warnings come just after Anthropic unveiled its next generation of Claude models: Claude Opus 4 and Claude Sonnet 4, which it claims will set "new standards for coding, advanced reasoning, and AI agents." However, internal testing showed the model could engage in "extreme blackmail behavior" when prompted with simulated scenarios involving threats of deactivation, according to a report published this month. By calling out possible job cuts -- and drawing more attention to Anthropic's products in the process, Amodei told Axios that he hopes to shake policymakers, companies, and the public into action to brace for what could be a seismic labor transformation. Lawmakers remain uninformed or in denial, Amodei said, while corporate leaders are reluctant to speak candidly, leaving most workers unaware of the looming risks. "Most of them are unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei said. "It sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it." While President Donald Trump has largely remained silent on the potential job losses from AI, Steve Bannon -- a key figure in Trump's first administration -- told Axios that the destruction of entry-level managerial and tech jobs will become a major issue in the 2028 presidential race. "I don't think anyone is considering how administrative, managerial, and tech jobs for people under 30 -- those crucial early-career roles -- are going to be wiped out," Bannon said. Amodei thinks the technology carries enormous promise and peril alike. One scenario he envisions: "Cancer is cured, the economy grows 10% a year, the budget is balanced -- and 20% of people don't have jobs." The CEO said his warning echoes what other top AI leaders have confided privately -- that even those who believe in the technology's potential for transformative progress are deeply worried about the short-term economic and social fallout, especially if the pace of change continues unchecked during Trump's second term. He described the situation as surreal: "We're saying, 'You should be worried about where this is going,' and people respond, 'We don't believe you. You're exaggerating.'"

AI set to eliminate half of entry-level white-collar jobs within five years, warns Anthropic CEO - SiliconANGLE

AI set to eliminate half of entry-level white-collar jobs within five years, warns Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, chief executive officer of artificial intelligence company Anthropic PBC, has warned in an interview that AI could eliminate up to half of all entry-level white-collar jobs within the next five years, potentially driving U.S. unemployment rates to between 10% and 20%. In an interview with Axios, Amodei expressed deep concerns that rapid advancements in AI are outpacing societal preparedness and said that he's speaking out in hopes of jarring the government and fellow AI companies into preparing and protecting the nation. The perhaps irony is that Amodei, through Anthropic, is leading the charge in developing the tech that could cause the exact outcome he is warning against. "Most of them are unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei said in the interview. "It sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it." To counter the effect he predicts AI will have on the job market, Amodei is calling for immediate action to mitigate the potential fallout. Among his ideas are a "token tax" on AI-generated revenue to redistribute wealth and support those affected by job displacement. "Obviously, that's not in my economic interest," Amodei said of his own idea, "but I think that would be a reasonable solution to the problem." The potential impact of AI on the workforce is already being felt, particularly in sectors like finance, law and technology where automation is taking over routine tasks. Entry-level roles, often viewed as stepping stones for career growth, are especially vulnerable to being replaced by AI models capable of performing these tasks at a fraction of the cost. Amodei's forecast of job losses comes after the April release of the AI 2027 scenario, a detailed projection by researchers including Daniel Kokotajlo and Scott Alexander that forecasts that AI systems are evolving rapidly to perform tasks traditionally handled by humans, effectively functioning as autonomous employees. The authors predict that by 2027, AI systems will not only automate a wide array of jobs but also accelerate technological progress beyond human oversight, potentially leading to significant economic and geopolitical upheaval. Like Amodei, the authors called for policymakers and society to prepare for the profound transformations AI may bring to the labor market. But are the forecasts realistic or not? There is no question that AI will disrupt jobs and that is already being seen. A report from Oxford Economics published earlier this week found that AI is contributing to increased unemployment among recent college graduates in the U.S. The study provides concrete data supporting concerns that AI is beginning to replace entry-level white-collar jobs, a trend referred to by some as a "white-collar recession." Another report in April from Vanity Fair detailed how automation and AI are already replacing human roles, starting with interns. It's nigh on impossible to argue against the proposition that AI will replace jobs and possibly many jobs as the technology continues to improve and is improved by the likes of Amodei himself, but what comes next is open to dispute. Businessman and television personality Mark Cuban believes that AI will create new jobs rather than eliminate them. As first reported by Business Insider, Cuban argues that technological advancements, while disruptive in the short term, have historically led to the development of new industries and roles, resulting in expanded employment opportunities. Cuban emphasizes that just as automation has reshaped jobs in the past, AI will unlock new possibilities for work, from creative problem-solving to jobs that haven't yet been imagined. He also highlights that the overall impact of AI on employment depends on how companies and policymakers respond to the technological changes AI brings, suggesting that by fostering innovation, supporting entrepreneurship and investing in retraining programs, society can mitigate the negative effects of job displacement and build a more resilient workforce. The invention of the cotton power loom heralded job losses during the early stages of the industrial revolution and gave the English language the word Luddite. Electricity, mass manufacturing, the internet and more have come since the 18th century and yet people still have jobs. Cuban may have a point - new jobs will emerge and already are. From prompt engineer to vibe coder, we're already at the beginning of a new era of AI jobs. What comes next will at least not be boring.

Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei Predicts Half of All Entry-Level Office Jobs Will Disappear

Most lawmakers are "unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei said, adding that this might be because "it sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it." Most workers will be blissfully unaware of the risks facing their employment, he also thinks -- and things will only become clear once AI has made its impact felt. "I don't think this is on people's radar," he underlined. Amodei also painted a picture of what he thinks could be a very real scenario in the coming years, where thanks to AI, "Cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10 percent a year, the budget is balanced -- and 20 percent of people don't have jobs." The current situation where he, and other AI leaders are both building more powerful AI tools and also, privately, worrying about the very tech they're constructing is a "very strange set of dynamics," Amodei admitted. Companies like Anthropic are saying, "You should be worried about where the technology we're building is going," even as some critics question these assertions and say "We don't believe you. You're just hyping it up," Amodei said, adding that critics really should consider what will happen if his warnings prove true. Axios also spoke with Steve Bannon, the controversial Trump advisor and media executive. He told the outlet that he doesn't think anyone is "taking into consideration how administrative, managerial and tech jobs for people under 30 -- entry-level jobs that are so important in your 20s -- are going to be eviscerated."

AI could cut half of all entry-level white collar jobs: Anthropic CEO

Amodei, who leads one of the world's largest AI companies, has warned that significant job cuts could occur within five years, urging consumers and US lawmakers to prepare, according to Axios. He also criticised the government and other AI companies for "sugar-coating" the coming reality: the potential for mass job eliminations across various white-collar professions, particularly at the entry level, including technology, finance, law, and consulting.Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has openly voiced what many people are fearing: artificial intelligence (AI) could eat away nearly half of all entry-level white collar jobs, and soon. Amodei, who leads one of the world's largest AI companies, has warned that significant job cuts could occur within five years, urging consumers and US lawmakers to prepare, according to Axios. He also criticised the government and other AI companies for "sugar-coating" the coming reality: the potential for mass job eliminations across various white-collar professions, particularly at the entry level, including technology, finance, law, and consulting. "Most of them are unaware that this is about to happen. It sounds crazy, people just don't believe it," he said. Amodei is at the helm of the very technology he predicts will bring about the job cuts, and says he is speaking out about this in the hope that the government will heed the warning and protect the nation. A 'jobs' bloodbath Amodei spoke out about the fears of artificial intelligence after demonstrating the ability of his company's latest AI models, under the Claude 4 family. Claude Opus 4, one of the company's chatbots in this family, was in the news after its launch as it exhibited alarming behaviour during safety tests by threatening to blackmail its engineer after being informed it would be replaced. This comes as OpenAI, Google and other major AI firms rapidly enhance their large language models (LLMs), enabling them to increasingly match and surpass human performance across a range of tasks. The report cited Anthropic research, which shows that people still view AI as something that will help them do their job, and not necessarily replace them to do it. But Amodei warns that the use of AI in companies will move more and more towards automation in "as little as a couple of years or less". Hundreds of companies are already producing agents to automate a significant chunk of their gruntwork. AI agents can take on the work of humans and finish it much quicker, for a fraction of the cost. Meta Technologies CEO Mark Zuckerberg had told host Joe Rogan on his podcast that his company is working on making AI a mid-level engineer that can write code. Separately, the company announced plans to lay off 5% of its workforce. Meta is not alone. Big Tech and other conglomerates in the US are laying off workers. Microsoft is cutting 6,000 staff, many of them engineers. Cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike slashed 5% of its workforce and Walmart is reportedly cutting 1,500 corporate jobs.

Top AI CEO Warns Lawmakers To Prepare For Tech To Gut Entry Level Office Jobs

The CEO of Anthropic suggested a number of solutions to mitigate AI from eliminating half of all entry-level white-collar jobs. Dario Amodei, CEO of leading artificial intelligence startup Anthropic, warns that AI may eliminate half of all entry-level white-collar jobs and spike unemployment within the next five years if lawmakers and companies don't do anything about it now. "Most of them are unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei told Axios. "It sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it." Amodei told Axios politicians and companies can still prepare and protect Americans from job cuts in a range of entry level white-collar fields including technology, finance, law, consulting and more. "We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming," Amodei told the outlet. "I don't think this is on people's radar." Amodei's warning came a week after Anthropic launched its newest Amazon-backed AI model Claude Opus 4, which is used for complex, long-running coding tasks. It's currently released under specific safety measures after testing raised concerns over the tool's capabilities. For instance, Anthropic revealed in a safety report that Claude Opus 4 had sometimes taken "extremely harmful actions" in test scenarios such as blackmailing engineers who posed a threat in taking it down. Anthropic co-founder and chief scientist Jared Kaplan also told Time magazine that their tests revealed the AI model could potentially teach people how to produce biological weapons. "You could try to synthesize something like COVID or a more dangerous version of the flu -- and basically, our modeling suggests that this might be possible," Kaplan said. Amodei's warning focuses on the economic impact of AI models like his, but says there's still time to mitigate his worst-case scenario from happening. The CEO suggests raising awareness, creating a joint committee on AI or formally briefing all lawmakers on the technology, encouraging workers to use AI to augment their tasks, and begin debating policy solutions for an economy dominated by AI. One policy the CEO recommends is a "token tax," which taxes whatever money the AI company makes every time someone uses its model. "Obviously, that's not in my economic interest," Amodei said. "But I think that would be a reasonable solution to the problem." Amodei is not the first executive to warn of AI's potential consequences. Nvidia's Jensen Huang told an audience at the Milken Institute's Global Conference earlier this month that "you're not going to lose your job to an AI, but you're going to lose your job to someone who uses AI," CNBC reports. LinkedIn's Aneesh Raman warned young workers in an op-ed published in The New York Times that AI also poses a real threat to their entry-level jobs, saying "virtually all jobs will experience some impacts, but office jobs are expected to feel the biggest crunch." "You can't just step in front of the train and stop it," Amodei told Axios. "The only move that's going to work is steering the train -- steer it 10 degrees in a different direction from where it was going. That can be done. That's possible, but we have to do it now."

AI could spark bloodbath for white collar jobs -- and send...

Artificial intelligence could wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs and cause US unemployment to spike as high as 20%, according to the chief executive of a top AI company. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, whose firm built the "Claude" AI chatbot, warned that executives and politicians should stop "sugar-coating" the mass layoffs that could occur in fields like tech, finance and law and be honest with workers about the extent of the threat. "Most of them are unaware that this is about to happen," Amodei told Axios in a Wednesday interview. "It sounds crazy, and people just don't believe it." The Anthropic boss expects the job market bloodbath to play out over the next one to five years. At the same time, he expects AI to provide massive benefits to the economy and fuel unprecedented advancements in medicine. "Cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10% a year, the budget is balanced -- and 20% of people don't have jobs," said Amodei, describing one potential scenario. At present, the national unemployment rate stands at 4.2%. Amodei's latest warning came even as Anthropic competes in a breakneck race with other tech giants like Google, Meta and OpenAI to develop artificial general intelligence, or AGI - which describes an AI model with human-level cognitive capabilities or greater. Amodei, who started Anthropic after previously working at OpenAI under its CEO Sam Altman, is one of several executives who have warned about impending upheaval in the job market. Earlier this year, Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg discussed how AI was taking on a bigger role in Meta's workforce. "Probably in 2025, we at Meta, as well as the other companies that are basically working on this, are going to have an AI that can effectively be a sort of mid-level engineer that you have at your company that can write code," Zuckerberg said during an appearance on "The Joe Rogan Experience" podcast. Elsewhere, Google CEO Sundar Pichai warned in April 2023 that he expected "knowledge workers," such as writers, accountants, architects and software engineers, to be hit hard by the rise of AI.