According to a new report by a human resource analytics company, artificial intelligence threatens to replace many traditionally female-held jobs.
Researchers at Revelio Labs have found that their findings reflect social biases, which have led women to be placed in roles ripe for AI, like administrative assistants or secretaries.
Revelio’s findings were based on the National Bureau of Economic Research report that identified around two dozen jobs as most likely to be affected by AI. It then identified the gender breakdown of those jobs.
It was noted that women held many of these jobs. These included payroll clerks, executive secretaries, and bill and account collectors.
Women and people of color are often assigned repetitive tasks. This means they will be disproportionately affected by fully automated jobs,” said Nicol Turner, director of The Center for Technology Innovation and senior fellow for governance studies.
She told TechNewsWorld that “these jobs have already been affected by the new technologies introduced.” AI is more likely to be used in jobs that are repetitive and can be automated. This automation can lead to the displacement of low-level employees.
People Needed for Loop
Will Duffield, a policy analyst at the Cato Institute, Washington, D.C., explained that AI would affect women who work in repetitive jobs with computers more. He was skeptical, however, that all of the jobs listed in Revelio’s report only required repetitive skills.
He told TechNewsWorld that it was “outlandish” to expect AI to replace a paralegal.
He said that copy editors and auditors are also needed to ensure no mistakes.
He continued: “AI could make workers more productive, so there might be fewer job opportunities, but the idea that jobs will be completely replaced is quite speculative.”
He noted, “AI must become more reliable to replace humans, and not just be another tool they can choose to trust.”
He acknowledged that AI will become more reliable but said, “Right now, this is all speculative.”
Turner Lee said there should be a human involved in the AI loop at all times to ensure it doesn’t create any biases or inefficiencies. You still need to have people manage that.
Massive disruptions are coming
Revelio’s warning on the impact of AI on women’s employment echoes one issued by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in 2018. The IMF estimated that AI and digital technologies could eliminate 11% of women’s jobs, a percentage higher than men’s.
A report by Boston Consulting Group found that women make up almost half of the workforce in financial services but only 25% of senior positions. The report stated that senior management positions are generally insulated from automation shocks.
It continued that women in this sector are more likely to be employed in clerical or administrative positions, like bank tellers (85% of whom are female).
This pattern is evident in industries with a high female representation, including health care, education, and education. These sectors are less affected by automation.
BCG predicts that AI will majorly impact employment patterns in the next few years. The BCG asserted that women, companies, and governments must all be ready to invest in the reskilling of workers for the next generation of jobs.
Duffield recommended, however, that workers focus on the present and not the future. He said that workers should focus on the present rather than the future.
Job Impact Hyped
AI can boost productivity. Deidre Diamn, the founder and CEO at CyberSN in Framingham, Mass., said, “It saves me money and time in my company.”
She told TechNewsWorld that she had not replaced anyone. “I have been able to accelerate projects and accelerate work.”
Ida Byrd Hill, founder and CEO of Automated Workz in Detroit and a firm that specializes in reskilling, diversity, and reskilling, also expressed her satisfaction with the productivity improvements she achieved by using ChatGPT. She told TechNewsWorld that she wrote a proposal which normally took 100 hours, and did it in just 11 hours.
However, the stories of AI-driven productivity gains are overshadowed by the dire and somewhat distorted predictions about its impact on the workplace.
The news cycle is full of claims that are constantly changing about the impact of generative AI on the job market, according to Hodan Omaar. He is a senior AI analyst at the Center for Data Innovation in Washington, D.C., which studies the intersection between data, technology, and public policy.
She told TechNewsWorld that “the purported impact of AI varies widely from outlet to outlet. But the central message is clear – AI is here to steal almost all jobs, and not just blue-collar, but also white-collar.”
Claims of ‘Hokum
Omaar called a lot of these claims “hokum.” In a recent article, she cited the headline: “OpenAI Research says 80% of U.S. workers’ jobs will be affected by GPT.”
She argued that the headline was eye-catching and emotionally resonant but also misleading. The statistic is from an OpenAI research paper, but it doesn’t say that 80% of the jobs will be affected. It states that ‘around 80% of the U.S. workforce could be affected by at least 10%.”
She continued, “That’s why the real statistic would be that large language models could impact at least 8 percent of the work in the U.S. Economy.” The research results are presented less dramatically, but they are more accurate.
Omaar explains that the concerns that AI will take jobs are based upon the “lump labor fallacy.” This is the idea that productivity growth, such as that from automation, will reduce the number of jobs. She continued, “But the data tell a different tale.” Labor productivity has increased steadily over the last century, although it has slowed down recently. Unemployment is at an all-time high.
She warned that it is getting harder to sort through all the hype and unfounded claims made about AI. If readers, or policymakers in particular, don’t exercise caution, they may make decisions based solely on unfounded fears.