Artificial Intelligence and the Labor Market: Expected Development and Ethical Concerns in the German and European Context

Abstract

AbstractThe chapter examines the question of whether people must fear for their jobs due to artificial intelligence (AI). A “competitive scenario” with a design to test for this appeared in the Delphi survey. The chapter shows how realistic this scenario is and its sociological implications, with a basis in expert opinions. In addition, the chapter sheds light on how much people see AI affecting themselves in their jobs, their future standard of living, and quality of life. The results in these respects paint a much more positive picture than the public discussion of AI leads us to expect. The chapter deals with ethical concerns that AI could lead to discrimination in the labor market and the perceived need for public policy interventions to ensure that AI develops ethically. An aggregate data analysis reveals substantial variations across EU countries and significant correlations with a country’s prosperity, risk of poverty, multi-ethnicity, and inherent trust in institutions and fellow men. We examine the odds of such concerns in Germany, as a function of socio-structural variables.