Will robots take YOUR job? Most Americans say artificial intelligence will replace humans in the workforce (but think their own jobs are safe)
- A Gallup survey found that the majority of Americans believe AI will destroy jobs
- But only a fraction of those people believe their own job will be replaced by AI
- Respondents without a college education are more likely to fear AI and robots
People are terrified of the prospect of robots replacing humans in the workforce.
But apparently they're not so scared that they fear a robot may be coming for their own job.
That's according to a recent Gallup survey, which found that roughly 75% of U.S. adults think AI will 'eliminate more jobs than it creates.'
However, only 23% of American workers fear they will lose their own job to technology.
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A new Gallup survey finds that people believe robots are going to replace more and more human jobs, just not their own. That echoes similar findings from a 2017 survey by Quartz
There is no research that can definitively predict just how many or what kinds of jobs will be lost as a result of continued automation and advanced technologies like artificial intelligence.
That said, most experts suggest that the industries hit hardest as a result of automation and AI will be low-skilled jobs like customer support, food-preparation workers, dishwashers and general mechanics.
So it's no surprise, then, that Gallup respondents' answers differed based on their level of education.
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About 28% of respondents with less than a four-year college degree said they were worried they'd lose their job to new technology.
Meanwhile, for respondents with a bachelor's degree or more education, about 15% of them expressed concerns about automation and AI coming for their job.
The Gallup survey isn't the first study to reach these conclusions, as a Quartz survey in 2017 found that among 1,600 respondents, about 90% of them thought that half of jobs would be lost to automation in as little as five years.
A respondent's education level may also have some say over their beliefs. Those with less than a college education were more likely to believe that they'd lose their job to new technology
Still, 91% didn't think there was any risk to their job, while 94% didn't think they would be working for an AI boss.
What's more, the results also illustrated that respondents views differed based on education.
People with high salaries said they believed they may have AI employees, while people with low salaries thought they would have an AI boss, Quartz noted.
The studies shed a greater light into how average people feel about the rise of AI, but there is little conclusive data about how fast the AI apocalypse is expected to occur.
MIT Technology Review recently compiled the results of various studies on what automation will do to jobs.
They found that estimates for how many jobs will be eliminated by AI and robots varied wildly.
One study suggested that two billion jobs will be destroyed by 2030, while another concluded that 7.1 million jobs could be eliminated by 2020.
It comes as robots and AI are being introduced into more and more industries.
A burger-flipping robot is being piloted at a California restaurant chain, while, on the other end of the spectrum, artificial intelligence is being used in the form of a contract-reviewing algorithm for lawyers.
The Gallup study also discovered that while many people are afraid of the prospect that AI will one day steal their job, many have embraced AI in their daily lives.
'Whether they know it or not, AI has moved into a big percent of Americans' lives in one way or another already,' Frank Newport, the editor in chief of Gallup, told the New York Times.
The study found that nearly nine in 10 Americans, or 85%, say they use products with AI elements.
While people are afraid that AI will take their job, many are using AI in their daily lives. The Gallup study found that about 85% of Americans have embraced AI via new technologies
These include navigation apps, video or music streaming devices, a digital assistant on a smartphone or home personal assistants, among other things.
The most commonly used form of AI-infused technology was navigation apps like Google Maps, Waze or Apple Maps.
Among those using these technologies, they were most commonly utilized by younger people and those with at least a bachelor's degree.
Leaders in Silicon Valley have also butted heads over the broad effects of AI and robots.
Tesla CEO Elon Musk has described AI as our 'biggest existential threat' and likened its development as 'summoning the demon.'
But others, such as Alphabet chairman Eric Schmidt, said he's an 'AI denier,' describing himself as having the position of 'job elimination denier.'
Schmidt argues that while some jobs will be lost as a result of of artificial intelligence, many will be created at the same time, as a result of shifting trends in certain industries.
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