In 2015 McKinsey&Company found in their research that it was still unfeasible in the near future to see AI taking over many jobs in the workplace. Instead they have put heavy emphasis on the idea of certain work activities being taken over by machines, which in turn, would require restructuring of organisations. Even in 2015 their research found that up to 45% of activities individuals are paid to perform could already be carried out by technologies that exist (In America this represents about $2 trillion US in wages). They write about how there are already machines that exhibit “tacit knowledge or experience” where people previously though machines would do little more than carry out the most basic of tasks (this tacit knowledge and experience would take the form of being able to write a story book that is part of a series in mere seconds which would fit the style of the human author perfectly and without being told most people couldn’t work out the difference).

 

The 2015 also talks about the impact of automation on high-income occupations. Originally it was thought that automation of the workforce would mostly affect low-skill, low-wage activities, however this is not true. Even in 2015 technology existed that allowed for the automation of many job activities in even the highest paid brackets of work including, financial planners, physicians and even senior executives. Although there are still many activities in high-income occupations that could not be automised there are also many activities in low-income occupations that can’t either such as landscapers or care workers.

 

The final section of the late 2015 report talks about the “Future of Creativity”, specifically any kind of creative work or any kind of work were sensing and/or empathising with human emotions as being very hard to emulate using AI or any other kind of technology. It also states that between these two types of work a maximum of 33% of jobs in the US would be unaffected by widespread automation of the workforce. The lack of ability to automate these activities shows the potential for a restructuring of work as more opportunities and jobs would be created as people become more focused on the creative and emotional side of life and business as they no longer have to spend time doing other kinds of work which would have already been automated (generating meaningful work). One example the report uses to describe this meaningful work would be a financial advisor who could spend less time analysing the clients’ financial situation (since there would be a machine to do that) and instead spend more time understanding their needs and explaining creative financing options.