Musk vs Jen-Hsun Huang: Will jobs disappear in the AI era? The answer might be very painful.

At the Saudi Investment Forum in November, two tech pros got into a fight.

Musk's Optimism: AI and robots will eliminate poverty, everyone can become wealthy, and work will become optional—if you want to work, you can, if you don't want to, you don't have to. He made an analogy, just like buying vegetables vs growing your own, some people love to grow, work is the same.

Jensen Huang's Realism: Stop dreaming, radiologists are not unemployed, but instead are hiring, because AI has improved efficiency, allowing doctors to see more patients and making them busier.

It seems contradictory, but actually, they are all right.

We can already see the signs now —

Lawyers use AI to handle documents → They have taken on more cases. Programmers use AI to write code → The features requested by the boss have doubled. The designer uses AI to generate images → the client wants 20 versions a week.

Efficiency has improved, but people have not become less busy. According to the U.S. Department of Labor, the number of unemployed in the tech industry has increased by 55% year-on-year. In a survey by ResumeBuilder, 37% of employers said AI has replaced employees, and 44% said they have directly laid off workers.

A More Heartbreaking Truth

On that day, the two also announced plans to build a 500 MW AI data center in the desert, and AI satellites in space… Who will benefit from these investments? It will flow to the very few who possess computing power, control the models, and own the platforms.

Elon Musk's premise that everyone will be wealthy is based on the extreme abundance of material resources, but the reality is that the earth is limited, computational power is limited, and power is also limited. Humanity has never competed solely for the sake of food and clothing.

Can everyone use AI to write papers, and will the admission rate of prestigious schools increase? No. Can everyone use AI to start a business, and will market competition only become more intense?

Work will not disappear, it has just changed its definition.

AI is not about making jobs disappear, but about —

The work of the upper class has turned into a hobby (because their money comes from capital and technological appreciation, not from selling labor).

Most people's jobs have become more unstable, more fragmented, and more like they are forced

Radiologists have not lost their jobs because the value lies not in reading films, but in diagnosis and doctor-patient communication—AI only takes over those parts that can be standardized. However, when all standardizable tasks can be performed by AI, those jobs that “require judgment, require empathy, and require accountability”… will also become increasingly scarce.

The IMF predicts that AI will affect nearly 40% of jobs globally, with developed countries possibly reaching 60%. Technology never automatically brings equality; it only amplifies existing power structures.

Conclusion: Musk draws the scenery of the pyramid's peak, while Huang Renxun talks about the reality of the tower's body. Both are correct, just from different positions.