AI may create, as well as take, jobs

A visitor interacts with an AI robot at a high-tech event on Nov 23, 2016, in Beijing. Zou Hong / China Daily

LIBRATUS, an artificial intelligence computer program created by Carnegie Mellon University, beat four top professional poker players in a 20-day poker tournament that ended on Tuesday in Philadelphia of the United States, marking the first victory of artificial intelligence against humans at poker. Beijing News commented on Monday:

Arguably the last remaining game in which humans still had the upper hand, poker has finally succumbed to artificial intelligence, which had already beaten human players in chess, checkers, and most recently Go.

And it is not just board games where artificial intelligence excels, it has potential to do a better job driving cars and diagnosing diseases. It could well replace humans in more occupations in the foreseeable future, fueling fears that billions of people might not only lose their jobs but also become "useless".

So is this worst-case scenario bound to happen? Not necessarily. In retrospect employment did not wane in the aftermath of other major technological breakthroughs, which in fact created more job opportunities than ever.

Take for example the United States. During the Great Depression in the early 1930s, the country had a population of only 120 million and the unemployment rate was as high as 20 percent; it now has a population of about 320 million and an unemployment rate of just 4.8 percent.

On the other hand, its rural population, less than 2 percent of the population, has managed to feed the whole country while continually exporting agricultural products to overseas markets. That would be unimaginable in the days when agriculture dominated the economy yet still struggled to keep famines at bay.

Technological advancements are often about enhancing productivity instead of making labor redundant. That farm work required less manual labor drove farmers to partake in manufacturing, and likewise, more workers are making their ways to the service sector because factory jobs rely more on machines.

In other words, there will be new job opportunities created, very likely in the fields of scientific innovation, education and art.