AI Is Coming for Your Job, Much Faster Than Anyone Thought

Every week brings another round of AI-driven layoffs. In May, Microsoft laid off over 6,000 software engineers as it leaned into AI for code generation and development. That same month, IBM cut thousands of HR jobs. In February, Meta laid off 3,600 employees—about 5% of its workforce—as it restructured around an AI-first strategy. These layoffs are not isolated incidents; they’re signs of a seismic shift in the global economy.

Last week, filings for unemployment benefits hit its highest level since last fall, with companies ranging from Procter & Gamble to Starbucks saying they’re planning big layoffs. How much of this is due to Trump’s trade war is uncertain, but the rise of automated, AI-driven systems that make mincemeat of rote work isn’t helping.

Welcome to the immediate downside to the Age of AI: economic displacement. And if it looks bad now, consider that we haven’t reached so-called artificial general intelligence, the next big phase in the AI Age. At that point, AI can understand, learn, and apply knowledge across a wide range of tasks, just like a human. AGI would be capable of reasoning, problem-solving, and adapting to new situations across any domain without being reprogrammed.

While many experts believe that AGI is still decades away, a growing number of experts say that it’s likely to happen within the next five years.

Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, made headlines last week when he repeated his warnings that AGI-level systems could emerge within two to three years. Daniel Kokotajlo, a former research analyst who left OpenAI on the grounds that the company was not taking safety risks seriously enough, said in a report published in May that AGI could arrive by late 2027.

And Ray Kurzweil, futurist and director of engineering at Google, continues to predict AGI will be reached by 2029, a date he reaffirmed last year in “The Singularity is Nearer.”

“To my mind, we’re roughly on track to human-level AGI by 2029,” said Ben Goertzel, CEO of SingularityNET, a decentralized, open-source platform that enables AI agents to cooperate, share data, and offer services over a blockchain-based network.

And after that? Goertzel and others believe the leap to “super intelligence” could be only a matter of a few years: “I think it’ll only be a few years from a human-level AGI to a super AGI, because that human-level AGI will be able to program and invent new chips and invent new forms of networking.”

Many experts believe that the final evolution to super intelligence could lead to a deep structural collapse of traditional employment, displacing everyone from the C-Suite to doctors, lawyers, PhD-level scientists and researchers, and even the very entrepreneurs who are currently building their fortunes on AI.

But the shift to AGI will be wrenching enough.

We’re nowhere near ready

Artificial general intelligence will extend far beyond automating routine tasks, with the ability to reason, adapt, and outperform humans across nearly every domain.

“Once AI becomes even slightly smarter than humans, we’ll see massive unemployment,” Goertzel told Decrypt. “It may start with junior white-collar jobs, but I think it will quickly extend to plumbers, electricians, janitors—everyone.”

Goertzel notes that AI has outperformed doctors in diagnostic accuracy for years, but industries like healthcare have resisted change due to institutional power and licensing requirements.

“Entry-level jobs have no one defending them,” he said. “Older people in powerful positions can protect their roles—and they’re the ones controlling how AI is rolled out. So, of course, they’re not going to replace themselves with AI.”

According to Goertzel, AI hasn’t disrupted blue-collar jobs as aggressively as white-collar jobs because physical hardware has yet to catch up. Because AI in software has far outpaced robotics, this disparity helps explain why white-collar jobs have borne the brunt of AI-driven layoffs, while blue-collar roles remain relatively untouched, for now.

Half of entry-level white-collar jobs could disappear

In a recent interview, Anthropic CEO Amodei warned that the job disruption from AI isn’t decades away—it’s already happening and will accelerate fast.

He estimates that up to 50% of entry-level white-collar roles could disappear within one to five years. These roles include early-career positions in law, finance, consulting, marketing, and technology—jobs that once offered stable on-ramps into professional careers.

As AI tools increasingly handle analysis, writing, planning, and decision-making, many of these human positions are being rendered obsolete. In a separate interview with CNN, Amodei reiterated his claim, warning that the shift would happen sooner than humanity can prepare for.

“What is striking to me about this AI boom is that it’s bigger, it’s broader, and it’s moving faster than anything has before,” Amodei said. “Compared to previous technology changes, I’m a little bit more worried about the labor impact, simply because it’s happening so fast that, yes, people will adapt, but they may not adapt fast enough.”

White-collar jobs already under threat

If you work behind a screen, then you’re already in the AI blast radius.

“The jobs most exposed are those requiring higher education, paying more, and involving cognitive tasks,” Tobias Sytsma, economist with the Rand Corporation, told Decrypt. “Historically, this type of AI exposure has been correlated with employment reductions.”

According to an April 2025 report by the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, computer engineering graduates face double the unemployment rate of art history majors at 3% versus 7.5%, respectively.

Here are just a few of the jobs that economists say are the most immediately exposed to AI:

• Software engineers: Companies are using AI to generate, review, and optimize code. In May, Microsoft upgraded its Github Copilot to a full AI agent.
• Human resources: AI is being used to screen resumes, evaluate employee performance, and write termination letters.
• Paralegals and legal assistants: AI can summarize case law, review contracts, and draft findings.
• Customer service representatives: Chatbots are being used to interact with customers and handle routine support tickets. With voice and video AI becoming widely available, call centers are being phased out.
• Financial analysts: AI models can analyze massive amounts of data and generate reports more efficiently and accurately than humans.
• Content creators: Writers, editors, and graphic designers are already competing with generative AI tools. In 2023, the Writers Guild of America went on strike, with AI protections being a key issue.

“Our research shows it’s mainly white-collar jobs—those requiring higher education, paying more, and involving cognitive tasks—that are most exposed,” Sytsma said.

However, healthcare professionals are relatively protected due to regulations. “Healthcare appears to be one where, for now, those barriers are insulating some workers. Still, exposure to these tools is increasing. What happens next remains unclear.”

“We could automate most jobs without reaching full human-level AGI, because most work is repetitive and based on prior examples—and AI handles that well,” Goertzel said. “Jobs requiring big, imaginative leaps are harder to replace, but most economic activity doesn’t rely on that.”

Goertzel suggested that superintelligence could even automate and replace political leaders. “Even the presidency could be automated,” he said, “but political norms make that off-limits—for now.”

Whether AI leads us to a post-work utopia or a deeply unequal dystopia, one thing is clear: If you still think AI is coming for blue-collar jobs first, then you’re already behind the curve. It’s coming for the desk next to you. And it’s not waiting.

Edited by Andrew Hayward