AI’s existential slap

People are starting to wake up to the imminent disruption of their careers, lives and societies. If you’re one of them, you may find news from the frontline of interest

"You're not a wartime consigliere, Tom. Things could get rough with the move we're making."
Mario Puzo and Francis Ford Coppola via Michael Corleone, The Godfather, 1972

Silicon Valley is selling human augmentation with AI, but CEOs and CFOs are buying human replacement. Replacing humans with AI = much better margins for the business… Layoffs ARE going to happen. They’ll happen first to people who define their worth in terms of their outputs, instead of the outcomes they create or contribute to. I won’t lie to you and say there’s a guaranteed way to protect yourself – there isn’t.
Personal Math, 17/4/25

“There’s a special kind of irony to the way large language models make studying easier for students who then arrive in the workforce and find those same models have taken the bulk of entry-level jobs. I am often asked by parents how their children can develop skills in the world of AI. I don’t really have an answer for them.”
Shaun Davies, AFR, 2/5/25

When the first iteration of ChatGPT dropped 2.5 years ago, it was the done thing in content-creation circles to lavishly disparage its deficiencies and then insist it would “never replace humans”.

In early 2023, in a much-shared Red Hand Files post, Nick Cave confidently proclaimed:

Algorithms don’t feel. Data doesn’t suffer. ChatGPT has no inner being, it has been nowhere, it has endured nothing, it has not had the audacity to reach beyond its limitations, and hence it doesn’t have the capacity for a shared transcendent experience, as it has no limitations from which to transcend.

This is what we humble humans can offer, that AI can only mimic, the transcendent journey of the artist that forever grapples with his or her own shortcomings. This is where human genius resides, deeply embedded within, yet reaching beyond, those limitations.

After playing around with Suno in early 2025, a despairing Cave sighed:

I went on the app and wrote, ‘Dark, slow, gothic song about a banana,’ right? And within 15 seconds, it spat this song out, called The Dying Peel. It was good; it had a good chorus… I’m an enormously optimistic person about the world, in general, but I just think the demoralising effect, or the humiliating effect that AI will have on us as a species will stop us caring about something like the artistic struggle.

Years ago, Australian psychologist Dr Russ Harris popularised the concept of the existential slap. The existential slap eventually arrives for all of us when we realise that, despite our secret hopes, we won’t magically be able to cheat death.

The good news is – as far as I’m aware, at least – you’re not about to die, dear reader.

The bad news is your career almost certainly is. In the eminently foreseeable future, if you’re a member of the laptop class. It’ll take longer if you work with your hands, but I wouldn’t get too comfortable. A growing number of experts predict humanoid robots will soon be mass produced at minimal cost.

Admitting you’ve got a problem is the first step
Many content creators have experienced AI’s existential slap over the last year.

The original use case for Gen AI was content creation. Nowadays, humans are more interested in befriending, romancing or worshipping AI, but it was put to a more businesslike use back in that antediluvian era. It’s therefore hardly surprising content creators have proven to be the canaries in the AI-automation coalmine.

I fear many other workers will soon experience the evaporation of revenue-generating opportunities now so familiar to so many animators, composers, copywriters, graphic designers, illustrators, journalists, photographers, research assistants, scriptwriters, social media managers, technical writers, videographers and voiceover artists.

Perhaps the most chillingly concise account of AI’s existential slap this content creator has thus far seen comes from scriptwriter Paul Schrader:

I've just come to realize AI is smarter than I am. Has better ideas, has more efficient ways to execute them. This is an existential moment, akin to what Kasparov felt in 1997 when he realized Deep Blue was going to beat him at chess… I just sent chatgpt a script I'd written some years ago and asked for improvements. In five seconds it responded with notes as good or better than I've ever received from a film executive.

Godlike intelligence
We are still in the foothills of the Singularity and humanity is still struggling to comprehend the implications of having abundant intelligence on tap. So let’s leave the longer-term wish-casting and doom-mongering to one side and just focus on the question on everybody’s mind.

Will AI take my job?

To misquote Keynes, the short answer is: yes, in the long run we’re all destined to be rendered obsolescent by AI. Indeed, there’s a very non-zero possibility Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) will arrive within the next few years and remove any remaining advantages humans have over AIs before 2030.

The longer answer is: just like any other technology, AI will take time to diffuse and have disparate impacts. For instance, it will impact lawyers differently to plumbers. Furthermore, it will impact early-career lawyers differently to mid-career and senior ones. It will probably even impact plumbers and lawyers who are natural-born hustlers differently to ones who are not.

But, hey, what do I know? I’m just a dumb human. That’s why I prompted ChatGPT Pro to review 1000 “recent and reputable” articles* about AI-driven automation and recognise the important patterns.

If you’ve got the stomach for it, you can read the bad news below.

(1) Those entering the job market are especially screwed
Unimpeachable machine wisdom: Generative AI is already automating a large share of entry-level tasks such as summarising documents, generating reports, basic coding, and handling first-tier customer service. This is disrupting the traditional career ladder… Entry-level job volume is falling in sectors like programming, legal research, consulting, and journalism. The consensus is that this trend is not theoretical—it’s already underway, especially in firms aggressively adopting AI tools.
[Industries most affected are:] finance, marketing, journalism, law, admin and customer support.
Human commentary: AI sceptics point to low unemployment rates as evidence AI-driven automation isn’t negatively impacting job creation. But I’ve seen plenty of complaints from the young’uns about how impossible it now is to land an entry-level role. And the winnowing of these jobs seems to be starting to show up in the youth unemployment data.

I’d strongly suggest looking into self-employment options if you're a high school or uni graduate in this situation.

(2) The outlook is mixed for mid-career and senior professionals
Unimpeachable machine wisdom: Most AI use cases to date have involved augmenting human professionals—speeding up research, data analysis, and communication. Professionals who are AI-literate are becoming more valuable, not less. They’re able to get more done in less time. There’s no sign yet of a “mass layoff” event among high-skill white-collar professionals; rather, productivity per head is rising.
[Industries most affected are:] healthcare, design, management consulting, engineering, education
Human commentary: Again, there’s not yet much solid data showing a noticeable contraction in the number of white-collar roles, but there is an abundance of anecdotal data. Also, there’s presumably a reason the term white-collar recession is starting to be bandied about. I imagine unemployment rates for professionals will rise in the second half of 2025, and that 2026 could be a bloodbath.

(3) The job market is bifurcating between AI-haves and AI-have-nots
Unimpeachable machine wisdom: Early adopters—large firms, tech-forward cities, highly educated workers—are benefiting disproportionately from AI tools. Small firms and lower-education workers are lagging behind, often due to cost, lack of expertise, or resistance. This is amplifying inequality—both within countries (e.g., New York vs Appalachia) and across socioeconomic classes. The labour market is becoming increasingly “winner takes most.”
Human commentary: Didn’t think the labour market, and broader society, could become any more “winner take most” than it already is after four-plus decades of devil-take-the-hindmost neoliberalism?
Me neither. But it seems we’re both wrong, dear reader.

(4) There’s a growing mismatch between worker skills and employer demand
Unimpeachable machine wisdom: Businesses want employees to have skills in prompt engineering, AI oversight, data literacy, and human soft skills (e.g. decision-making, empathy). But most education systems and training programs are not yet aligned to these needs. In Australia, the UK, and U.S., there are widespread government and think tank calls for large-scale adult retraining programs. So far, this skilling gap remains one of the biggest systemic threats to economic resilience.
Human commentary: If you squint hard enough, this is vaguely encouraging news. At least in the short to medium term.

Given the tech behemoths are spending hundreds of billions to develop AI agents that don’t require human oversight, I wouldn’t be too optimistic over the longer term.

All that noted, if your workplace is turning Hunger Gamesy, ask yourself who will be the last person to get laid off. Then answer yourself: “The one who has figured out how to leverage AI effectively enough to outperform all their colleagues.”

Please note it’s possible to use your AI super-creator skills to your own advantage, rather than just an employer’s. There’s a growing trend of job stacking – one tech-savvy individual leveraging AI to hold down multiple full-time roles.

I just quizzed the Chatmeister about all the new jobs AI will supposedly create. It told me that by early 2026:

Labour shortages will intensify in AI-adjacent roles (AI auditors, prompt engineers, human-AI team managers). Traditional, repetitive roles will significantly contract as AI automation continues accelerating. Countries or businesses that fail to rapidly scale reskilling efforts risk severe economic competitiveness losses.

To mitigate looming economic and labour market crises, governments, educational institutions, and employers must urgently scale reskilling and training programs. Workers should proactively gain proficiency in prompt engineering, AI oversight, data literacy, and strong human soft skills to remain competitive and employable.

(5) Public anxiety about AI’s impact on jobs is growing—despite limited real-world displacement (so far).
Unimpeachable machine wisdom: There is a massive perception gap between expert forecasts (which expect gradual evolution) and public sentiment (which fears sudden disruption). Many workers aren’t using AI yet—and feel it’s being imposed “from above” without their input or benefit. There’s a risk of a self-fulfilling fear spiral, where anxiety stifles innovation or creates political backlash.
Human commentary: Hmmmmmmm. Let me ask you this, dear reader. A tech company sales rep walks into your boss’s office and tells them they can pay an annual fee of US$2400 for an AI capable of replacing you.

Remember, the AI will work 24/7, never take a sick day or a holiday, never join a union, never talk back to a manager, never be rude to a customer, never get involved in a dispute with a colleague and never sexually harass the work-experience kid.

How long does your boss agonise over signing on the dotted line?

Do you imagine it will be a “gradual evolution”? Or a “sudden disruption”?

If you’re unsure, you might care to ask some former manufacturing workers stranded in a rustbelt hellhole if their bosses ever evidenced much hesitation about automating away or outsourcing their livelihoods. And if the political class gave a rat’s arse about their social status and self-respect being abruptly – and often permanently – wrenched away.

If that tech company sales rep hasn’t already booked an appointment with your boss, rest assured that they will be getting around to it over the next year or two.

The voters have chosen their wartime consiglieres
Whether they were conscious of it or not, voters across the democratic world have now chosen the leaders who will need to respond to profound labour market – and hence economic and societal – disruption.

We should all pray Albo, Carney, Da Silva, Erdogan, Ishiba, Lee, Macron, Meloni, Merz, Modi, Netanyahu, Putin, Prabowo, Sheinbaum, Starmer, Subianto, Trump and Wong, not to mention Xi and Kim Jong Un, can ‘meet the moment’, as American pundits like to say.

My (unrevised) take on Albo
Having insisted I’d never been less emotionally invested in a federal election campaign last week, I must now shamefully confess I got caught up in the feel-good, triumph-over-adversity drama of Albo’s unexpectedly decisive victory on Saturday night.

I interviewed Albo a couple of times, back in the day. Afterwards, I always came away liking him, as people who interact with him generally do. After his gracious concession speech, I also belatedly warmed to Dutton. If he’d shown more of that side of himself over the years, perhaps his political life wouldn’t have ended in quite such failure.

You would’ve needed a heart of stone, especially as an Aussie bloke of a certain age, not to be uplifted at the sight of a long-disparaged, much-dismissed ‘plodder’ proving the doubters wrong after a lifetime of chowing down on shit sandwiches of one sort or another.

But my hot take is the Australian election played out like Britain’s rather than America’s. Faced with two uninspiring choices, the voters unenthusiastically but clearly preferred the centre-left option, despite their weariness with the cultural hyperleftism of the last decade. And let’s not get forget that, for all the talk of a landslide, only a third of the voters gave their first preference to the ALP.

As was the case in the UK, it was more the vagaries of the electoral system than an epochal ‘vibe shift’ that resulted in the Greens being wiped out, the Nationals holding steady, the Libs getting smashed and the Labour Party capturing an unusually large number of seats.

If Albo comes to believe he won because Australian voters want more land acknowledgements rather than fewer, he’ll be inviting a Keatinglike comeuppance after the sweetest victory of all.

*ChatGPT was cagey when I asked if it had actually reviewed 1000 articles/reports/whitepapers, but assured me:

My response was a general synthesis of widely recognized themes and trends from existing publicly available knowledge—such as broad reports and known expert commentary from institutions like the OECD, WEF, Brookings Institution, and others. I provided analysis reflecting widely accepted expert consensus.

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