The AI Revolution: Reshaping Work, Society, and Human Value

The End of Work As We Know It

CEOs call it a revolution in efficiency. The workers powering it call it a "new era in forced labor." I spoke to the people on the front lines of the AI takeover. For centuries, work has defined us. It has given us identity, purpose, and status in society. But what happens when work, our source of income, itself begins to disappear? Not because of war, depression, or outsourcing, but because of algorithms. What does it mean to work in an AI-driven economy? I spent this month of July interviewing several experts from diverse corners of the labor landscape. Through these conversations, a complex and often contradictory picture emerges, one filled with both promise and peril, efficiency and exploitation, displacement and dignity. From the C-suite, the AI revolution is viewed with a mixture of excitement and urgency. Dr. Elijah Clark, a consultant who advises companies on AI implementation, is blunt about the bottom line. "CEOs are extremely excited about the opportunities that AI brings," he says. "As a CEO myself, I can tell you, I'm extremely excited about it. I've laid off employees myself because of AI. AI doesn't go on strike. It doesn't ask for a pay raise. These things that you don't have to deal with as a CEO." This unvarnished perspective reveals a fundamental truth about the corporate embrace of AI: it is, at its core, a quest for efficiency and profitability. And in this quest, human labor is often seen as a liability, an obstacle to be overcome. Dr. Clark recalls firing 27 out of 30 student workers in a sales enablement team he was leading. "We can get done in less than a day, less than an hour, what they were taking a week to produce," he explains. "In the area of efficiency, it made more sense to get rid of people." Peter Miscovich, JLL's Global Future of Work Leader, sees AI as an "accelerant of a trend that was underway for the last 40, 50 years." He describes a "decoupling" of headcount from real estate and revenue, a trend that is now being supercharged by AI. "Today, 20% of the Fortune 500 in 2025 has less headcount than they had in 2015," he notes. But Miscovich also paints a picture of a future where the physical workplace is not obsolete but transformed. He envisions "experiential workplaces" that are "highly amenitized" and "highly desirable," like a "boutique hotel." In these "Lego-ized" offices, with their movable walls and plug-and-play technology, the goal is to create a "magnet" for talent. "You can whip the children, or you can give the children candy," he says. "And, you know, people respond better to the candy than to the whipping." Yet, even in this vision of a more pleasant workplace, the specter of displacement looms large. Miscovich acknowledges that companies are planning for a future where headcount could be "reduced by 40%." And Dr. Clark is even more direct. "A lot of CEOs are saying that, knowing that they're going to come up in the next six months to a year and start laying people off," he says. "They're looking for ways to save money at every single company that exists." While executives and consultants talk of efficiency and experience, a very different story is being told by those on the front lines of the AI economy. Adrienne Williams, a former Amazon delivery driver and warehouse worker, offers a starkly different perspective. "It's a new era in like forced labor," she says. "It's not slavery, because slavery is different. You can't move around, but it is forced labor." Williams, a research fellow at the Distributed AI Research Institute (DAIR) that focuses on examining the social and ethical impact of AI, is referring to the invisible work that we all do to train AI systems every time we use our phones, browse social media, or shop online. "You're already training AI," she explains. "And so as they're taking jobs away, if we just had the ability to understand who was taking our data, how it was being used and the revenue it was making, we should have some sovereignty over that." This "invisible work" is made visible in the stories of gig workers like Krystal Kauffman, who has been working on Amazon's Mechanical Turk platform since 2015. She has witnessed firsthand the shift from a diverse range of tasks to a near-exclusive focus on "data labeling, data annotation, things like that." This work, she explains, is the human labor that powers the AI boom. "Human labor is absolutely powering the AI boom," she says. "And I think one thing that a lot of people say is, 'teach AI to think,' but it's actually, at the end of the day, it's not thinking. It's recognizing patterns." The conditions for this hidden workforce are often exploitative. Kauffman, who is also a research fellow at DAIR, describes how workers are "hidden," "underpaid," and denied basic benefits. She also speaks of the psychological toll of content moderation, a common form of AI-related work. "We talked to somebody who was moderating video content of a war in which his family was involved in a genocide, and he saw his own cousin through annotating data," she recalls. "And then he was told to get over it and get back to work." Williams, who has worked in both warehouses and classrooms, has seen the harmful effects of AI in a variety of settings. In schools, she says, AI-driven educational tools are creating a "very carceral" environment where children are suffering from "migraines, back pain, neck pain." In warehouses, workers are "ruining their hands, getting tendonitis so bad they can't move them," and pregnant women are being fired for needing "modified duties." "I've talked to women who have lost their babies because Amazon refused to give them modified duties," she says. In the face of this technological onslaught, there are those who are fighting to preserve the dignity of human labor. Ai-jen Poo, president of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, is a leading voice in this movement. She champions "care work"â€"the work of nurturing children, supporting people with disabilities, and caring for older adultsâ€"as a prime example of the kind of "human-anchored" work that technology cannot easily replace. "That work of enabling potential and supporting dignity and agency for other human beings is at its heart human work," she says. "Now, what I think needs to happen is that technology should be leveraged to support quality of work and quality of life as the fundamental goals, as opposed to displacing human workers." Poo argues for a fundamental rethinking of our economic priorities. "I would create a whole new foundation of safety net that workers could expect," she says, "that they could have access to basic human needs like health care, paid time off, paid leave, affordable child care, affordable long-term care. I would raise the minimum wage so that at least people who are working are earning a wage that can allow them to pay the bills." For the care workers Poo represents, their work is more than just a job; it's a "calling." "The median income for a home care worker is $22,000 per year," she notes. "And people in our membership have done this work for three decades. They see it as a calling, and what they would really like is for these jobs to offer the kind of economic security and dignity that they deserve." The conversations with these specialists reveal a stark choice, a fork in the road for the future of work. On the one hand, there is the path of unchecked technological determinism, where AI is used to maximize profits, displace workers, and deepen existing inequalities. Adrienne Williams warns that AI has the potential to "exacerbate all these problems we already have," particularly for "poor people across the board." On the other hand, there is the possibility of a more democratic and humane future, one where technology is harnessed to serve human needs and values. Ai-jen Poo believes that we can "democratize" AI by giving "working-class people the ability to shape these tools and to have a voice." She points to the work of the National Domestic Workers Alliance, which is "building our own tools" to empower care workers. Krystal Kauffman also sees hope in the growing movement of worker organizations. "The company wants to keep this group at the bottom," she says of gig workers, "but I think what we're seeing is that group saying 'no more, we exist,' and starting to push back." Ultimately, the question of the purpose of work in an AI-driven economy is a question of values. Is the purpose of our economy to generate wealth for a few, or to create a society where everyone has the opportunity to live a dignified and meaningful life? Dr. Clark is clear that from the CEO's perspective, the "humanness inside of the whole thing is not happening." The focus is on "growth and that's maintaining the business and efficiency and profit." But for Ai-jen Poo, the meaning of work is something much deeper. "Work should be about a way that people feel a sense of pride in their contributions to their families, their communities and to society as a whole," she says. "Feel a sense of belonging and have recognition for their contribution and feel like they have agency over their future." The question is not just whether machines will do what we do, but whether they will unmake who we are. The warning signs are everywhere: companies building systems not to empower workers but to erase them, workers internalizing the message that their skills, their labor and even their humanity are replaceable, and an economy barreling ahead with no plan for how to absorb the shock when work stops being the thing that binds us together. It is not inevitable that this ends badly. There are choices to be made: to build laws that actually have teeth, to create safety nets strong enough to handle mass change, to treat data labor as labor, and to finally value work that cannot be automated, the work of caring for each other and our communities. But we do not have much time. As Dr. Clark told me bluntly: “I am hired by CEOs to figure out how to use AI to cut jobs. Not in ten years. Right now.†The real question is no longer whether AI will change work. It is whether we will let it change what it means to be human.

When progress doesn't feel like home: Why many are hesitant to join the AI migration

Want smarter insights in your inbox? Sign up for our weekly newsletters to get only what matters to enterprise AI, data, and security leaders. Subscribe Now When my wife recently brought up AI in a masterclass for coaches, she did not expect silence. One executive coach eventually responded that he found AI to be an excellent thought partner when working with clients. Another coach suggested that it would be helpful to be familiar with the Chinese Room analogy, arguing that no matter how sophisticated a machine becomes, it cannot understand or coach the way humans do. And that was it. The conversation moved on. The Chinese Room is a philosophical thought experiment devised by John Searle in 1980 to challenge the idea that a machine can truly "understand" or possess consciousness simply because it behaves as if it does. Today's leading chatbots are almost certainly not conscious in the way that humans are, but they often behave as if they are. By citing the experiment in this context, the coach was dismissing the value of these chatbots, suggesting that they could not perform or even assist in useful executive coaching. It was a small moment, but the story seemed poignant. Why did the discussion stall? What lay beneath the surface of that philosophical objection? Was it discomfort, skepticism or something more foundational? A few days later, I spoke with a healthcare administrator and conference organizer. She noted that, while her large hospital chain had enterprise access to Gemini, many staff had yet to explore its capabilities. As I described how AI is already transforming healthcare workflows, from documentation to diagnostics, it became clear that much of this was still unfamiliar. These are just anecdotes, yes, but they point to a deeper pattern redrawing the landscape of professional value. As in previous technological shifts, the early movers are not just crossing a threshold, they are defining it. This may sound familiar. In many ways, AI is following the arc of past technological revolutions: A small set of early adopters, a larger wave of pragmatic followers, a hesitant remainder. Just as with electricity, the internet, or mobile computing, value tends to concentrate early, and pressure to conform builds. But this migration is different in at least three important ways. First, AI does not just automate tasks. Instead, it begins to appropriate judgment, language and creative expression, blurring the line between what machines do and what humans are for. Second, adoption is outpacing understanding. People are using AI daily while still questioning whether they trust it, believe in it or even comprehend what it is doing. Thirdly, AI does not just change what we do; it reshapes how we see. Personalized responses and generative tools alter the very fabric of shared reality, fragmenting the cognitive commons that previous technologies largely left intact. We are in the early stages of what I have described as a great cognitive migration, a slow but profound shift away from traditional domains of human expertise and toward new terrain where intelligence is increasingly ambient, machine-augmented and organizationally centralized. But not everyone is migrating at the same pace. Not everyone is eager to go. Some hesitate. Some resist. This is not simply a matter of risk aversion or fear of change. For many professionals, especially those in fields like coaching, education, healthcare administration or communications, contribution is rooted in attentiveness, discretion and human connection. The value does not easily translate into metrics of speed or scale. Yet AI tools often arrive wrapped in metaphors of orchestration and optimization, shaped by engineering logic and computational efficiency. In work defined by relational insight or contextual judgment, these metaphors can feel alien or even diminishing. If you do not see your value reflected in the tools, why would you rush to embrace them? So, we should ask: What happens if this migration accelerates and sizable portions of the workforce are slow to move? Not because they cannot, but because they do not view the destination -- the use of AI -- as inviting. Or because this destination does not yet feel like home. History offers a metaphor. In the biblical story of Exodus, not everyone was eager to leave Egypt. Some questioned the journey. Others longed for the predictability of what they knew, even as they admitted its costs. Migration is rarely just a matter of geography or progress. It is also about identity, trust and what is at stake in leaving something known for something unclear. Cognitive migration is no different. If we treat it purely as a technical or economic challenge, we risk missing its human contours. Some will move quickly. Others will wait. Still others will ask if the new land honors what they hold most dear. Nevertheless, this migration has already begun. And while we might hope to design a path that honors diverse ways of knowing and working, the terrain is already being shaped by those who move fastest. Pathways of cognitive migration The journey is not the same for everyone. Some people have already embraced AI, drawn by its promise, energized by its potential or aligned with its accelerating relevance. Others are moving more hesitantly, adapting because the landscape demands it, not because they sought it. Still others are resisting, not necessarily out of ignorance but fear, uncertainty, or conviction, and are protecting values they do not yet see reflected in the tools. A fourth group remains outside the migration path, not because they overtly object to it, but because their work has not yet been touched by it. And finally, some are disconnected more fundamentally, already at the margins of the digital economy, lacking access, education or the opportunity to participate. These are not just attitudes. They are positions on a shifting map. They reveal who migrates by choice or pressure, who resists on principle and who might never join. The willing Some people have not hesitated. Like early gold miners heading for California, they have embraced AI out of curiosity, enthusiasm or a sense that it aligns naturally with their outlook. These are the willing migrants, those comfortable at or near the frontier: Consultants using language models to refine client proposals, developers accelerating their coding process, storytellers using AI-generated video. Some are exploring AI as a creative partner, others as a tactical advantage. For this group, the terrain feels not just navigable, but exciting. But even within this group, motivations differ. Some see how AI can amplify their own productivity or extend their reach. Others are drawn to the novelty and enjoy playing with the tools. Many are experimenting in a relatively unstructured environment, learning what AI can do before it is formally required or widely governed. To them, this is still the wild west. And what they adopt, refine or normalize will shape the cognitive landscape the rest of us enter. Their enthusiasm is valuable. It pushes cognitive migration forward and carries quiet power: Even if they do not know it, they are setting the terms for how value, fluency and legitimacy are being redefined. The pressured For many, migration is not optional; it is expected. These are the pressured migrants: Those adapting because their organization, industry or clients demand it. AI is now embedded in areas like project management, customer service and marketing workflows, making fluency less of a differentiator and more of a baseline requirement. Yet, formal support is often lacking. A 2025 global KPMG-University of Melbourne study found that 58% of employees intentionally use AI at work, with a third doing so weekly or daily. However, a McKinsey survey found a fifth of employees had received minimal to no support from their companies, and nearly half want more formal training. For example, a marketing manager is now expected to generate first drafts with AI, even though no one has shown her how to prompt effectively. These migrants navigate a tenuous middle ground. Some are cautiously optimistic, seeing AI as essential for staying relevant. Others are anxious, sensing that falling behind could mean irrelevance or redundancy. If the "willing migrants" are blazing the trail, the pressured are following close behind. They often do so warily, with little bandwidth to question the terrain, but a clear awareness that stopping is not an option. The resistant Some have chosen not to migrate, at least not yet, and perhaps not at all. These are the resistant migrants: Those who hesitate out of fear, uncertainty or conviction. Many perform roles grounded in presence, empathy, discretion or ethics. They may be therapists, teachers, writers, chaplains or coaches. For them, the premise of cognitive outsourcing raises not just technical questions, but existential ones. This group often sees AI tools as misaligned with the deeper value they offer. In their view, tools may simplify what should be nuanced or automate what requires trust and human connection. They might worry that using AI to draft a letter, summarize a meeting or respond to a client flattens nuance, dilutes trust or undermines relationships built over time. A longtime therapist could plausibly suspect that AI-generated notes miss the emotional texture of a session. Their resistance is not a refusal to evolve. It is, in many cases, a defense of meaning, judgment and humans themselves. This echoes a theme in Jen Gish's "The Resisters": A quiet defiance, not of technology itself, but of the belief that everything worth doing can be done by a machine. The unreached Another group of people are not migrating, at least not yet. These are the unreached migrants: Workers whose roles have not been meaningfully affected by AI. They include tradespeople, farm workers, bus drivers and line cooks. These are people whose daily work is physical, place-based and shaped more by coordination or skill than purely by cognition. They may have considerable domain knowledge, but they are not broadly considered knowledge workers. For them, AI may appear in the headlines or workplace chatter, but it has little relevance to their routines. Their distance from this migration is not about resistance or lack of interest. The cognitive landscape that AI is currently reshaping is not the one they occupy. The embodied AI tools are not yet available for what they do. The physical robots have not much invaded their workplace. Whether that remains true will depend on how AI evolves, and whether the physical and manual domains of work eventually become targets of transformation. For now, most of them are watching a journey that feels like it is happening somewhere else, to someone else. The disconnected Then there are those for whom migration is not just irrelevant, but out of reach. These are the disconnected: Individuals who are already marginalized within the digital economy. They may lack access to technology, consistent connectivity, formal education or the support systems that make digital learning and adaptation possible. AI may be in the news or their communities, but it is not part of their world in a usable or trustworthy form. This group is aware of change, but they are often left out of it. If this cognitive migration continues to define new norms of value, intelligence and legitimacy, they risk becoming a new underclass, not because they opted out, but because they were never truly included. This migration, and others before it Before we look at how this moment compares to past technology-driven shifts, it is worth acknowledging that the typology above is, by design, a simplification. People do not always migrate into clean categories. They move in and out of roles, contexts and stances. A plumber might use AI to write a children's book after hours. Some may shift from enthusiastic to cautious depending on the context. Yet even these broad strokes reveal something essential about how AI adoption is unfolding. And they offer a lens through which to revisit a familiar question: How does this migration compare to technological shifts we have seen before? We have seen this pattern. The arrival of electricity, the internet and mobile computing each followed a similar arc. In every case, the tools began with promise, spread unevenly and gradually redrew the boundaries of work, skill and participation. This migration also reflects a familiar tension between productivity and displacement. Just as machines replaced manual labor during the Industrial Revolution, AI is reshaping what it means to be useful, efficient or skilled in the cognitive domain. And as with other transitions, early benefits tend to concentrate among those with access, fluency and flexibility, while the risks fall more heavily on those slower to adapt. Yet even as we recognize these familiar rhythms of technological change, three fundamental differences suggest this migration may unfold in ways that surprise us. It is not just changing how we work. It is redrawing the boundary between human and machine. Where earlier technologies extended physical power or accelerated communication, AI appropriates judgment, language and creativity. It does not just speed up cognition; it starts to perform it. What makes this shift more disorienting is the pace and the reach. AI is being integrated into everyday tools faster than governance or understanding can keep up. It is so tantalizing that many are using it before they fully trust it or even comprehend what it is doing. Adoption is outpacing orientation. Perhaps most consequentially, AI alters not just what we do, but how we see. Personalized outputs and generative interfaces are fragmenting the shared cognitive terrain that once underpinned professional and personal identity, institutional norms and cultural consensus. This is not merely a migration of function. It is a migration of meaning. The road ahead Cognitive migration is not just a change in tools. As multiple technology leaders have suggested, it may be as significant as the discovery of fire. It could lead to remarkable abundance, offering greater knowledge, improved financial circumstances and more creative outlets. But it could also result in a more dystopian outcome, marked by concentrated wealth, widespread unemployment and narrowed opportunity. In either case, this migration will reorder roles, values and entire professional classes. For some, it may be a season of experimentation, adaptation and fulfillment. For others, it could be a forced migration, shaped less by choice than by economic necessity. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei recently warned that AI could eliminate half of all entry-level white-collar jobs and drive unemployment to 10 to 20% within five years. This was amplified by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, who said that certain job categories, such as customer support, would be eliminated by AI. It is evident now that what AI can do is expanding faster than most institutions or individuals are prepared for. And it is not just entry-level work that may be affected. Fidji Simo, OpenAI's incoming CEO for Applications, recently described AI as "the greatest source of empowerment for all." In a widely shared essay, she praised her own business coach and noted that "personalized coaching has obviously been a privilege reserved for a few, but now with ChatGPT, it can be available to many." What then becomes of the coach at the beginning of this article, a member of what we might now call the 'resistant' class? We do not know how this migration will unfold. There will likely be no single moment when it is declared complete. But many may find themselves suddenly outside the borders of professional relevance, with little warning and fewer options. In the push for efficiency, competitive pressures rarely wait for consensus or lead to soft landings. Institutions must quickly develop concrete responses, such as retraining programs that go beyond basic AI literacy, social safety nets that account for cognitive rather than just physical displacement, and new frameworks for measuring contribution that honor human qualities that AI cannot replicate. Otherwise, the fallout may be as psychologically dislocating as it is economically profound. This is not a call for panic. It is a call for clarity. The migration has already begun. The question is not whether it will reshape work, identity and opportunity, but how prepared we are to live with the shape it takes.