AI Civilization and the Transformation of Work
Dongsoo Han (School of Computing, KAIST)

TL;DR
This paper argues that AI will fundamentally reshape employment by enabling a decentralized ecosystem where individuals create their own economic opportunities, emphasizing human-AI collaboration and new economic domains.
Contribution
It introduces a forward-looking framework highlighting AI's potential to decentralize labor markets and foster individual-driven economic activity, contrasting traditional displacement views.
Findings
AI-driven productivity lowers barriers to economic value creation.
Historical analysis suggests innovation expands employment in the long run.
Decentralized ecosystems can empower individuals to generate employment.
Abstract
The emergence of artificial intelligence and robotics is catalyzing a profound transformation in the nature of human labor, fueling a contentious debate about the future of employment. While prominent studies predict substantial job displacement due to automation, historical precedents from past technological revolutions suggest that innovation tends to expand, rather than shrink, the scope of economic activity and employment in the long run. This paper advances the thesis that the transition to an AI-civilization will fundamentally restructure the mechanisms of employment creation. We argue for a paradigm shift from a centralized model, where a limited number of organizations create jobs for the mass to a decentralized ecosystem where individuals are empowered to generate their own employment opportunities. This shift is enabled by AI-driven productivity augmentation, which…
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