Duolingo introduced plans this week to switch contractors with AI and change into an “AI-first” firm — a transfer that journalist Brian Merchant pointed to as an indication that the AI jobs disaster “is right here, now.”
In actual fact, Service provider spoke to a former Duolingo contractor who mentioned this isn’t even a brand new coverage. The corporate reduce round 10% of its contractor workforce on the finish of 2023, and Service provider mentioned there was one other spherical of cuts in October 2024. In each instances, contractors (first translators, then writers) have been changed with AI.
Service provider additionally famous reporting in The Atlantic round the unusually high unemployment rate for recent college graduates. One rationalization? Firms may be changing entry-level white collar jobs with AI, or their spending on AI is solely “crowding out” the spending for brand new hires.
This disaster, Service provider wrote, is actually “a collection of administration choices being made by executives looking for to chop labor prices and consolidate management of their organizations,” and it’s manifesting as “attrition in artistic industries, the declining revenue of freelance artists, writers, and illustrators, and in companies’ inclination to easily rent fewer human employees.”
“The AI jobs disaster isn’t any type of SkyNet-esque robotic jobs apocalypse — it’s DOGE firing tens of thousands of federal employees whereas waving the banner of ‘an AI-first strategy,’” he added.