00:00Artificial intelligence is already changing the job market, with young workers among those facing the greatest challenges.
00:07Research in the United States points to decline in employment and lower earnings in industries most exposed to AI,
00:15raising questions about the future of entry-level jobs and who will benefit from this technological shift.
00:21Our correspondent Dan Albright has more.
00:26Depending on which AI executive you ask, artificial intelligence is either coming for entry-level jobs or creating more of
00:34them.
00:34Half of all entry-level white-collar jobs.
00:37Well, that is the future we could see.
00:39The narrative that connects AI to job loss, it is just too lazy.
00:44The companies that I know that have adopted AI the most are also the ones hiring the most.
00:48All three run companies whose fortunes depend on AI.
00:53I'm at a job fair in Worcester, Massachusetts, where people trying to start their careers are already feeling the impacts.
01:02With AI, redoing how people are making resumes, you know, every time you look at a job posting,
01:08there's probably 200 people that have already applied before you.
01:11So it's difficult to feel like you're getting to the top of people's piles.
01:15Stanford payroll data show 22 to 25-year-olds losing ground the fastest in AI-exposed jobs like software development
01:23and customer service.
01:25Census researchers found early career employment down 12% in the most exposed industries, almost entirely through reduced hiring.
01:33A second census study found graduates from the most exposed majors 5% less likely to find work and earning
01:4213% less.
01:44Senior census economist Lee Tucker led that research.
01:48Fewer of those workers are going into industries like information, which includes tech and professional and business services,
01:55which includes things like consulting.
01:56And more of them are going into retail and restaurants.
01:59Tucker's paper compares the earnings hit to graduating into a major recession.
02:05It's kind of changed what the junior is meant to do, because like in the past, the junior was meant
02:09to, you know,
02:10write all the boiler play, set up unit tests.
02:13But now Claude can do all of that.
02:15Past technological advances have disrupted entire professions before,
02:20while eventually creating new types of work.
02:22The difference is speed.
02:24Generative AI became widely used as a workplace tool in just a few years.
02:29Some forecasts now put artificial general intelligence, or AGI,
02:34able to match or exceed humans across essentially all cognitive tasks just two to three years away.
02:41If reached, that could make far more kinds of work automatable.
02:45Congress has only begun debating support for displaced workers,
02:49while the Trump administration has set out to remove any and all regulatory barriers to AI's development.
02:56If AI eventually means far less human labor,
03:00retraining alone doesn't answer who gets the productivity gains, or what replaces wages.
03:05There's always the question with AI of like, is it different this time?
03:09Is it able to adapt quickly enough and broadly enough that, you know, there is sort of a broader economic
03:17effect?
03:18It is possible, and I think we should take those possibilities seriously,
03:21but I don't think that, you know, I have anything to point at and say,
03:24here's the evidence that that's likely to happen.
03:26For Telesor, Dan Albright, Worcester, Massachusetts.
03:29That's it.
03:31That's it.
