This is such an important point that AI advocates keep glossing over. It’s not even like there is an amount of education that will make up for it. All intellectual work is in line for being automated.

Automation that lets people go from tilling farmland to writing about what they are passionate for was (mostly) great. Some may mourn the loss of artisan crafts but the net result was positive. Automation that takes people from their writing jobs is not so great. Where are they supposed to go to now? To AI? They don’t own the platform, it’s not gonna get them a living wage. How are they supposed to afford this “cheaper stuff” with no money? Do they even want to go to AI if they even had the chance? Many people who work on writing and art would like to just be able to keep at it.

It’s easy and optimistic to expect that because it turned out well before it might do so again, but think of what the invention of automobiles meant for the horse population. While I doubt humans would go away so easily, with the automation of writing, arts, customer service, coding, we might be driven into sweatshop jobs rather than benefit in any way. Unable to outperform AI, many people will have to undercut machinery instead. What a future would that be…