The predicted replacement of labor by AI seems to have started in earnest.
Artificial intelligence (AI) has become a major source of concern for some Google employees as a result of its widespread use across almost every industry. The tech giant is reportedly replacing some staff members with AI amid a “reorganization” of its ad sales unit. Few other modern technologies have sparked concerns about the job market like AI has.
These kinds of tools have been available to search engine and YouTube advertisers for years, and according to one anonymous source in particular, they are “on pace to generate tens of billions of dollars annually in revenue for the company.” Not only are AI ad tools highly lucrative, but because they require very little overhead, their profit margins are larger than those found in other Google units. Sources who spoke with The Information say Google is increasingly leveraging machine learning to generate marketing ideas and copy for advertisers.
Google has historically paid about 13,500 human staff to monitor the outputs of the tools and create some ads from scratch, but it seems that this is not enough for the company. As a result, the staff has been made redundant as Google’s algorithms—like the “new era of AI-powered ads” it announced in May—have become more adept at automating their roles. Now, the report claims that Google plans to “consolidate staff, including through possible layoffs, by reassigning employees at its large customer sales unit who oversee relationships with major advertisers.”
It is unclear how many of Google’s 13,500 ad sales employees will be impacted by the company’s cost-cutting measures, whether through job reassignment or layoffs. However, it is evident that AI is beginning to replace human staff, a possibility that has been hanging over us since AI first entered the public consciousness a few years ago. As ChatGPT and other similar tools have become more user-friendly, businesses have been able to occasionally cut staff members, particularly customer service representatives. However, companies like Google have the ability to reshape the tech sector and the public perception, so even 100 of Google’s ad sales employees could be enough to convince money-hungry AI fence-sitters to let go of their own employees.
Though experts fear that integrating AI into short-term cost-cutting strategies could lead to a “AI gold rush” where more losers than winners, it is unclear whether such a move would pay off in the long run. Nearly half of surveyed companies indicated that they are likely to replace workers with AI in 2024. Generative AI tools have been known to spread misinformation and misguide users, which could mean disaster for companies that replace their customer-facing staff with AI.
In any case, The Information’s sources indicate that Google will probably start reorganizing next month, so we might find out more about the future of its staff then.