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Stuart Russell Warns AI Could Eliminate Most Jobs, Reaching 80% Unemployment

The UC Berkeley pioneer forecasts displacement reaching top executives through rapid advances into high-skill work.

Overview

  • Speaking on the Diary of a CEO podcast, Russell said political leaders are staring at the prospect of 80% unemployment as AI accelerates across the economy.
  • He argued that systems could rapidly outperform specialists, claiming a robot could learn to surpass any human surgeon in seconds and that boards might pressure CEOs to cede decisions to AI.
  • Geoffrey Hinton recently told Senator Bernie Sanders that massive unemployment from AI seems very likely, even as he acknowledged uncertainty about long‑term forecasts.
  • Other prominent figures, including Nvidia’s Jensen Huang and Meta’s Yann LeCun, maintain that AI will transform roles rather than erase most jobs.
  • Employers such as HP, IBM, Salesforce, and Klarna have linked recent workforce cuts to AI adoption, underscoring the stakes of the technology’s rollout.