When AI Takes Your Job

Has artificial intelligence taken your job?

AI, for the most part, has taken my blogging job as I mentioned last week. It wasn’t just AI, but also some changes at Google. Overall, blogging has been a house of cards waiting to crumble for some time. I knew that relying on Google for traffic was never safe. That’s why I diversified into dog boarding and some other freelance work.

Since we’re in a great financial situation, I’m more focused on the next generation of people – specifically, my kids. That’s why I built Kid Wealth. I want them to have the security that we have. Also, I’ve never heard anyone say, “I wish I learned about compound interest LATER in life.”

For the last couple of hundred years, the path to success seemed pretty clear. It might not always be attainable, but if you studied hard, you could get into college, graduate, and move up the corporate ladder. There have always been a bunch of other ways to be successful, too, but they seemed to rely on having talent or luck. Working hard has always been part of the equation, but in the last thirty years or so, it’s been more “work smarter, not harder.” That’s one of the main premises behind this blog.

I grew up loving coding in BASIC and PASCAL on an old IBM PCjr. I would go to the library to read books on Smalltalk and Forth. It led to a software engineering degree and career. I hoped that my kids would see what I loved, pick it up, and always have a valuable skill for any employer. I have probably mentioned it in at least a dozen different blog posts over the years. Unfortunately, there are almost no places near me in Rhode Island that teach computer programming. They’ve gotten old enough that they don’t want to be taught by me.

In the last couple of years, everything has changed. In that time, AI has gone from coding nothing to 30-50% of the coding at Salesforce. Salesforce isn’t alone. At Microsoft, up to 30% is done by AI. Banking giant Goldman Sachs has hired a full-time AI software engineer> from a company called Cognition. That’s not a person who knows how to code AI – it is an AI coder doing a software engineer’s job.

Recently, AI became the second-best coder in the world>. At least there is one human left, but he has to sleep sometime.

There’s no future in coding. Entire college computer science departments are changing their programs to adapt. Of course, computer science and jobs will continue to exist, but far fewer humans will be necessary.

What About AI and Other Careers?

It’s okay that my kids may never be software engineers. However, what career choices will they have? Let’s look at a few:

• Teaching

  We found out how much we needed human teachers during the pandemic. However, we also found out that a lot of learning can be done online. Artificial intelligence is just starting to get integrated into classes. In another ten years, it’s reasonable to assume that most kids will have customized lesson plans. These lesson plans will adapt to reinforce areas where a student needs more focus. They may use a variety of modalities, such as movies, to teach kids who learn in different ways.

  There are probably hundreds of articles out there speculating about how teaching will change with AI. So my kids could be teachers, but does anyone know what that profession will look like when they start that career in ten years? How about thirty years when they would be mid-career?

• Translators

  This is an easy one because translation is so very good on mobile devices now anyway.

• Writers

  This is similar to how blogging has gone away.

• Artists/Graphic Design

  It’s kind of easy to see how graphic design and logos can be replaced. I bought the logo for Kid Wealth on Fiverr, but nowadays, I would make it on ChatGPT. In fact, I did just that for the new application that I’m working on. It may not be the final product, but it would sure be good enough to launch with.

  It’s harder to replace artists. I haven’t seen AI create original styles, but maybe it is being done. Nonetheless, why couldn’t AI replace the vast majority of art that people want in their homes? After all, three years ago, AI won an art competition.

  Three years ago, AI was like a toddler. Nowadays, it is like an expert with a Ph.D. Competing against it in 10-30 years doesn’t seem wise.

• Music

  Back in 2017, I wrote The World Has Turned and Left Us Here. I had the realization that stores were closing everywhere and self-driving cars were on the horizon. My kids were only 3 and 4 years old. I had the thought that they should learn how to play the steel drum, because that would be a career that wouldn’t go away. I was at a restaurant with live music. Even though they could have cued up some MP3s, it wouldn’t have been the same experience.

  Here we are eight years later, and an AI band, The Velvet Sundown, has gone viral. It’s making more money than real musicians who are trying to survive.

  I’ve been playing with the free version of Suno, which allows you to make music with AI. I asked it to make a song about lighthouses in the style of Jack Johnson. That was my simple prompt. It wrote two songs, and they were both great in my opinion. I only spent about 30 minutes on the site. If I had more time, I’d get the paid version and dig into more advanced features.

  Sorry kids, I don’t see much future as a musician outside of local gigs. Maybe if you are extremely attractive and have a perfect voice, you have a chance. Now that I think of it, music has been way for a long time. It just seems like the competition got infinitely tougher.

My Kids’ Top Two Career Choices Right Now?

• Acting

  My 12-year-old seems to have found his thing, and it’s acting. Every parent dreams their kid will go into acting, right? That’s a solid career choice that no one has ever regretted. If you can’t tell, I’m being super sarcastic.

  A year ago, when AI started to replace coders, acting started to look better than programming. A couple of months ago, Google almost destroyed the future of acting by releasing its Veo product. Before that, AI video was something that my kids and I laughed at. Who didn’t enjoy Will Smith eating spaghetti:

  Well, here’s AI’s fake version of Will Smith eating spaghetti at the beginning of the year:

  I think this was made with a Google Veo 2. When I saw what Google Veo 3 could do, I immediately showed it to everyone in the family:

  My wife argued that AI can’t replace live acting. That’s fair, but are we now hoping he makes it big on Broadway? I’m not sure how much they make, but the lifestyle of touring with different productions sounds difficult. I know I’m overthinking it – it’s what I do.

• Architect

  My 11-year-old can build anything. Since he was about four years old, I had him putting together some simple Ikea furniture. He’s also very good with art and math. I put all of them together and came up with architecture as a solid career option.

  There are a ton of AI tools for architecture out there. I did a little research and found some architects that really like Architechtures as one tool. I don’t know enough about the industry, but it seems like you could get a lot more done a lot more quickly. Maybe that allows you to build with fewer architects?

  What does all that look like in ten years or thirty years? The aspect of physically building seems to be safe until you consider advances in robotics and 3D printing. 3D printed houses exist now, so I can imagine you just need someone making sure that the “printer” has enough raw material to build with.

Final Thoughts

Microsoft recently came up with a report of 40 jobs most and least vulnerable to AI, which was timely because I’ve been working on this article for at least a month. A lot of the most vulnerable ones were mentioned above.

I talked to an electrician friend of mine, and he has no fear of his job being replaced with AI. He realizes that by the time the robots get nimble enough to do the physical work he does, he’ll be retired. He also owns his own company with a bunch of electricians under him. He’ll probably be able to sell it for a good amount of cash.

It’s interesting because he knows me more for my local dog boarding business than my blog or my past software career. Maybe I accidentally AI-proofed my income with dog boarding? That’s one skill my kids have. They’ve grown up living with seven hundred different dogs (and counting). It’s thousands of nights if you count that most of my customers are repeat clients.

That’s something to build on, right?

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