Commentary: What if AI retraining is just a comforting lie?

INVEST IN “RELATIONAL SECTOR” JOBS

Another hopeful case borrows from the University of Chicago economist Alex Imas’ influential essay asking “What will be scarce?” If AI makes cognitive tasks cheap, the idea goes, human relationships will become more valuable. Education, eldercare, social work and “relational sector” jobs requiring a human element should then command a premium.

Perhaps; but those are precisely the sectors that many societies undervalue. If policymakers want to turn them into the well-paid work of the future, they must invest now in more funding for care and education work, more apprenticeships, stronger career ladders and a broader effort to raise wages and dignity attached to these jobs.

It also assumes that many people will be laid off first. Wages are unlikely to magically rise because out-of-work coders or marketers enter the field.

Any serious retraining policy must also give labour a real seat at the table. It’s lazy to assume workers are anti-technology. Union leaders often say that if technology makes jobs safer and easier, workers will support it. What they want is a say in how it’s used.

Ultimately, the transition period needs more than the false comfort of reskilling. It needs real-time data tracking on where jobs are being augmented or destroyed. From there, policymakers can focus on transition insurance, targeted public investments in care work and education, or a plan for sharing the productivity gains if AI abundance ever arrives.

Workers can adapt; people are endlessly resourceful. The risk is that “reskilling” becomes the excuse that makes mass unemployment politically palatable and, basically, the victim’s fault. If it’s being touted as the bridge to an AI future, it must lead somewhere. Otherwise, it’s just a signpost at the edge of a cliff.