I always get downvoted when I suggest that (1) if you have short timelines and (2) you decide to work at a Lab then (3) people might hate you soon and your employment prospects could be damaged.
What is something obvious I’m missing here?
One thing I won’t find convincing is someone pointing at the Finance industry post GFC as a comparison.
I believe the scale of unemployment could be much higher. E.g. 5% ->15% unemployment in 3 years.
If you have short timelines, I feel like your employment prospects in a fairly specific hypothetical should be fairly low on your priority list compared to ensuring AI goes well? Further, if you have short timelines, knowing about AI seems likely to be highly employable and lab experience will be really useful (until AI can do it better than us...)
I can buy “you’ll be really unpopular by affiliation and this will be bad for your personal life” as a more plausible argument
“If you have short timelines, I feel like your employment prospects in a fairly specific hypothetical should be fairly low on your priority list compared to ensuring AI goes well?”
- Possibly! I’m mostly suggesting that people should be aware of this possibility. What they do with that info is obvs up to them
”if you have short timelines, knowing about AI seems likely to be highly employable and lab experience will be really useful”
- The people I’m pointing to here (e.g. you) will be employable and useful. Maybe we’re talking passed each other a bit?
The people I’m pointing to here (e.g. you) will be unemployable or unuseful. Maybe we’re talking passed each other a bit?
Why do you believe this? Being an expert in AI is currently very employable, and seems all the more so if AI is automating substantial parts of the economy
I’m very confused. Your top level post says “your employment prospects could be damaged.” I am explaining why I think that the skillset of lab employees will be way more employable. Is your argument that the PR will outweigh that, even though it’s a major factor?
Financial workers’ careers are not directly affected very much by populist prejudice because 1) they provide a useful service and ultimately people pay for services and 2) they are employed by financial firms who do not share that prejudice. Likewise in short timeline worlds AI companies are probably providing a lot of services to the world, allowing them to pay high compensation, and AI engineers would have little reason to want to work elsewhere. So even if they are broadly disliked (which I doubt) they could still have very lucrative careers.
Obviously its a different story if antipathy towards the financial sector gets large enough to lead to a communist takeover.
I believe the scale of unemployment could be much higher. E.g. 5% ->15% unemployment in 3 years.
During the financial crisis U-3 rose from 5% to 10% over about 2 years, suggesting on this metric at least you should think it is at least comparable (2.5%/year vs 3.3%/year).
Just on that last prediction—that’s an extraordinary claim given that the U.S. unemployment rate has only increased 0.7% since ChatGPT was released nearly 2 years ago (harder to compare again GPT-3, which was released in 2020, but you could say the same about the economic impacts of recent LLMs more broadly). If you believe we’re on the precipice of some extraordinary increase, why stop at 15%? Or if we’re not on that precipice, what’s the mechanism for that 10% jump?
I always get downvoted when I suggest that (1) if you have short timelines and (2) you decide to work at a Lab then (3) people might hate you soon and your employment prospects could be damaged.
What is something obvious I’m missing here?
One thing I won’t find convincing is someone pointing at the Finance industry post GFC as a comparison.
I believe the scale of unemployment could be much higher. E.g. 5% ->15% unemployment in 3 years.
If you have short timelines, I feel like your employment prospects in a fairly specific hypothetical should be fairly low on your priority list compared to ensuring AI goes well? Further, if you have short timelines, knowing about AI seems likely to be highly employable and lab experience will be really useful (until AI can do it better than us...)
I can buy “you’ll be really unpopular by affiliation and this will be bad for your personal life” as a more plausible argument
Hi! Some thoughts:
“If you have short timelines, I feel like your employment prospects in a fairly specific hypothetical should be fairly low on your priority list compared to ensuring AI goes well?”
- Possibly! I’m mostly suggesting that people should be aware of this possibility. What they do with that info is obvs up to them
”if you have short timelines, knowing about AI seems likely to be highly employable and lab experience will be really useful”
- The people I’m pointing to here (e.g. you) will be employable and useful. Maybe we’re talking passed each other a bit?
Why do you believe this? Being an expert in AI is currently very employable, and seems all the more so if AI is automating substantial parts of the economy
Ugh I wrote the wrong thing here, my bad (will update comment).
Should have said
“—The people I’m pointing to here (e.g. you) will be employable and useful. Maybe we’re talking passed each other a bit?”
I’m very confused. Your top level post says “your employment prospects could be damaged.” I am explaining why I think that the skillset of lab employees will be way more employable. Is your argument that the PR will outweigh that, even though it’s a major factor?
Financial workers’ careers are not directly affected very much by populist prejudice because 1) they provide a useful service and ultimately people pay for services and 2) they are employed by financial firms who do not share that prejudice. Likewise in short timeline worlds AI companies are probably providing a lot of services to the world, allowing them to pay high compensation, and AI engineers would have little reason to want to work elsewhere. So even if they are broadly disliked (which I doubt) they could still have very lucrative careers.
Obviously its a different story if antipathy towards the financial sector gets large enough to lead to a communist takeover.
During the financial crisis U-3 rose from 5% to 10% over about 2 years, suggesting on this metric at least you should think it is at least comparable (2.5%/year vs 3.3%/year).
Just on that last prediction—that’s an extraordinary claim given that the U.S. unemployment rate has only increased 0.7% since ChatGPT was released nearly 2 years ago (harder to compare again GPT-3, which was released in 2020, but you could say the same about the economic impacts of recent LLMs more broadly). If you believe we’re on the precipice of some extraordinary increase, why stop at 15%? Or if we’re not on that precipice, what’s the mechanism for that 10% jump?
Heya mate, it is an extraordinary claim, depending on how powerful you expect the models to be and in what timeframe!
“U.S. unemployment rate has only increased 0.7% since ChatGPT was released nearly 2 years ago”
“what’s the mechanism for that 10% jump?”