The NYT got together a panel of experts to explain how jobseekers should prepare for the future of work. It’s a fascinating discussion, and the panelists aren’t homogeneous in their opinions on the subject. They sometimes contradict each other. It sheds light on how little even those regarded as experts know about how things will turn out.

The lack of consensus is troubling, but more so is the attitude of some of those consulted about efforts to ensure humans thrive in the new landscape.

For instance, Dean Ball, an advisor for the Trump administration on AI believes creating protections for workers could stifle innovation.

…unfortunately, I worry that the policy remedies they reach for are going to be things that lock in very vast kinds of labor protections. Things that create the kinds of problems Europe has, which is that their firms can’t take risks because taking risks involves doing things that might require you to fire people in five years if the thing you tried didn’t work out.

The reality is, U.S. workers need assurances that they won’t get fired every couple of years because companies see them as expendable in their quest to experiment — even more than European workers. After all, they have their health care tied to their jobs. Let me tell you from experience, getting sick and having your company leave you without healthcare is a scary thing. But if you believe innovation in technology is more important than human flourishing, workers’ rights are the last thing you’ll be concerned with. Remember, people with this mentality are the ones with the ears of our legislators.

From Clara Shih, former AI executive at Salesforce and Meta, there’s a fear that morals will impede the path of artificial intelligence taking a greater role in work.

I mean, you look at the reaction to Eric Schmidt’s commencement speech at the University of Arizona, the recent Gallup poll showing that a third of Gen Z Americans describe their feelings toward AI as anger. And these are people we want embracing AI so that they can help build this economy and they can find work. But they’re rejecting it on a moral basis.

I get the sense that morality is the last thing Shih believes should come into play in this discussion. Which is, again, concerning. Especially when the companies with whom she works need younger people to fall in line and embrace their products. When the companies pushing the artificial intelligence solutions (for good and ill) see themselves as at odds with their targeted consumers, what happens? At some point, you think they would have to wage a campaign for hearts and minds, or put more pragmatically, adjust their marketing approach.

It seems to me that the biggest things the mega-companies that are steering the direction of AI can do to improve public perception is to increase confidence in the output of the models and provide some sort of assurance that the technology won’t lead to mass disruption of the job market.

In the first case, stop working so hard on advancing capabilities and start ensuring that the models don’t consistently make stupid mistakes. If a model can do complex operations, but can’t do simple math (I ran into this the other day), all output becomes suspect. The direction that the AI players are taking reminds me of a software firm that keeps pushing new features while ignoring glaring bugs that undermine confidence in the product. Ahem, not that I’ve ever been there. Explaining the limitations of the models is not going to cut it. When an LLM gets something wrong, significantly wrong, the skeptics jump all over that as evidence of severe deficiencies and an underlying case that that AI cannot be trusted (as well they should).

The second part is a bit more tricky, at least in terms of prioritization and execution. When it comes to acceptance of the technology and positive regard, though, it’s necessary. The Luddites didn’t follow Ned Ludd into a violent campaign against the machines they saw replacing their capabilities because they were bored. People who read the wealthy owners of these companies telling them the technology being produced will render them poorer and enrich the makers of the technology are going to push back. Full stop. These companies are not going the change the self-preservation imperative built into human nature. If they are aggravating that sentiment by making careless statements such as the one from Microsoft AI CEO Mustafa Suleyman, they will lose the war of perception.

White-collar work, where you’re sitting down at a computer, either being a lawyer or an accountant or a project manager or a marketing person — most of those tasks will be fully automated by an AI within the next 12 to 18 months.

Fortunately, Suleyman walked back his original statement, saying he specifically used the word “tasks” and not “jobs” to indicate that the employment model wouldn’t be completely broken, just substantially changed. There are other signs that the executives with these companies are having a change of heart, even it comes from the unfortunate threat of personal violence and even if it is only in public.