Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei says AI could wipe out roughly 50% of all entry-level white-collar jobs. The cuts could come within five years, he says, causing unemployment to spike as high as 20%. He’s urging consumers and lawmakers to prepare now to protect the nation.
The CEO of artificial intelligence company Anthropic is warning that your fears about AI taking people’s jobs are absolutely correct.
Dario Amodei told Axios that he believed AI could eliminate half of all entry-level white-collar jobs within five years, a move he said could cause unemployment to spike to between 10% and 20%.
It’s an alarming statistic—and Amodei said he was highlighting it to warn both the general public and government of what’s coming, in hopes that lawmakers and AI leaders can start preparing now to protect the nation.
“Most of them are unaware that this is about to happen,” Amodei said. “It sounds crazy, and people just don’t believe it… We, as the producers of this technology, have a duty and an obligation to be honest about what is coming.”
Amodei isn’t turning away from AI, it should be noted. Anthropic has just released its latest chatbot, Claude 4, and is bullish on the advances the technology can bring. He also said there is still time to mitigate the doomsday scenario by increasing public awareness and helping workers better understand how to utilize AI and navigate the transition. Policy solutions can also still be put into place, but education has to take place on the congressional side as well.
“You can’t just step in front of the train and stop it,” Amodei said. “The only move that’s going to work is steering the train—steer it 10 degrees in a different direction from where it was going. That can be done. That’s possible, but we have to do it now.”
Amodei is hardly the first person to warn about AI’s impact on the job market. LinkedIn’s chief economic opportunity officer, Aneesh Raman, earlier this month said artificial intelligence is increasingly threatening the types of jobs that historically have served as stepping stones for young workers. And there are a growing number of stories from workers who saw their six-figure jobs disappear without warning, bringing chaos to their lives.
And venture capitalist Kai-Fu Lee has called predictions that AI will displace 50% of jobs by 2027 “uncannily accurate.”
This story was originally featured on Fortune.com