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Further implications
The increasing expansion of automation and AI in virtually all areas of human occupation is both a boon and a threat. On the one hand it offers release from the boring and onerous jobs that many people still perform, as well as promising the far more rapid and accurate completion of tasks currently regarded as requiring skilled human input. A downside of this is the displacement of human employees. Different patterns of work, including the four-day working week, are one way of ensuring continuing occupations for what may well be hundreds of millions of people.
A 2017 study of 46 countries and 800 occupations by the McKinsey Global Institute estimated that up to 800 million global workers are likely to lose their jobs by 2030.
The study found that one-fifth of the global work force will be affected and suggested that a third of the workforce in richer nations like Germany and the United States may need to retrain for other jobs. Machine operators and food workers will be hit hardest; however, the study suggests tasks carried out by mortgage brokers, paralegals, accountants, and some back-office staff are especially vulnerable to automation. The authors forecast that in the United States 39 to 73 million jobs may be eliminated, while in the United Kingdom, 20 percent of jobs could be automated over the same period. However, some commentators have suggested that if AI is used in a people-centric manner, rather than as simply a means of improving efficiency and maximising profit, then human beings could enjoy vastly improved lives. Rather than operating in competition with human workers, AI could be integrated into workplaces where technology and human beings interact productively. Jonathan Sears, of EY Global People Advisory Services Global Technology, has argued, 'It's crucial to blend operational gains with a people-first mindset.'
Sears suggests that rather than AI superseding human employees, AI technology should be utilised where it performs best and be used to assist human workers in developing those skills that are unique to them. He suggests that AI built-for-purpose tools be used to automate the gathering and interpretation of data, summarising findings and offering recommendations from it. However, he notes, people would make adjustments and the final assessments of the work.
He also suggests that AI could play a part in helping people train for the functions they would perform. He suggests that generative AI's ability to identify training opportunities for employees could help to create a 'career development track' that will let employees gain the additional interpersonal and creative skills that are most needed by the companies for which they work. These workplaces where human employees and AI interact in the performance of sophisticated tasks may be difficult to imagine. However, one thing that does seem apparent is that even in future workplaces where human beings occupy central roles, the number of tasks they are required to perform will be far fewer than in current occupations. Reduced working hours is an obvious response to these changed circumstances. In research published in November 2023, it was forecast that AI-led productivity gains could enable 8.8 million United Kingdom workers to have a four-day workweek by 2033, while just under 28 million could have their working hours reduced by 10 percent at the same time.
Will Stronge, the research director of Autonomy, an international enterprise software company, has stated, 'A shorter working week is the most tangible way of ensuring that AI delivers benefits to workers as well as companies. If AI is to be implemented fairly across the economy, it should usher in a new era of four-day working weeks for all.' For this world of improved work and greater leisure to occur, employers will need to place their human workforces and the overall benefit of society ahead of increased profit. Stronge noted there is often a sense of pessimism around AI-driven productivity gains, with most conversations emphasising the potential for job losses and degraded working conditions; however, such gains could also deliver shorter working weeks for many while maintaining their pay and performance. He argues, 'Such a policy offers the possibility of avoiding mass unemployment (and all the social and political ill effects of this), reducing widespread mental health illnesses as well as physical ailments associated with overwork and creating significant additional free time for democracy, leisure consumption, and social cohesion in general.'
Governments and corporations at all levels must act for the good of the total society, rather than the very wealthiest elements within it. A thoughtfully implemented four-day workweek should be part of this action.