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LLMs & Generative A.I.’s Impact on Labor

Kelly Cunningham, Ruby Chu, & Michael Smith

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LLMs and Your Workplace

Search for your occupation on the O*NET Online Database to find a breakdown of skills and daily activities typical of your job. List tasks/skills you believe will or will not be impacted by LLMs / Generative A.I. Questions to consider:

In what ways do you anticipate your job, studies, or life being influenced by Large Language Models (LLMs)?�
Do you believe that Large Language Models (LLMs) will provide support or replace your role and/or other roles within your workplace?�
Which of the skills or tasks you engage in regularly could potentially be automated or enhanced by AI?

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Industry & Govt. Responsibility on LLMs Impact on Labor

The Partnership on A.I. is a consortium that brings together delegates from the technology industry, non-profit organizations with a focus on technology, and media entities. They have stated set of Guidelines for AI and Shared Prosperity that asks organizations to make ethical choices around labor and the future of automation and augmentation in a labor context. Within all these guidelines we ask you to consider the following:��“The Guidelines do not suggest for companies to stop seeking to make profit, but merely to do it responsibly. “

Named concerns:

Consolidating wealth in the hands of a select few companies and countries
Reducing wages and undermining worker agency as larger numbers of workers compete for deskilled, lower-wage jobs
Allocating the most fulfilling tasks in some jobs to algorithms, leaving humans with the remaining drudgery
Highly disruptive spikes in unemployment or underemployment as workers start at the bottom rung in new fields, even if permanent mass unemployment does not arise in the medium term

Guideline Examples for Organizations to Consider:

Job Impact Assessments: Perform Job Impact Assessments in collaboration with affected communities at various stages of AI system implementation. Solicit input from workers and independent experts, compensating them for their contributions.
Risk Mitigation Strategies: Develop mitigation strategies for identified risks prioritized by potential impact severity and likelihood. Engage workers and external experts to ensure thorough consideration.
Worker Agency: Create robust mechanisms for worker agency in identifying needs, selecting AI vendors, and implementing AI systems in the workplace. Workers should have decision-making power and knowledge of AI capabilities.
High Levels of Worker Protections: Ensure AI systems are used in environments with strong worker protections and decision-making power, reducing the risk of harm.