Microsoft CEO:18 months before white collar jobs automated.

I don’t really believe this to be the case. I think in 18 months, many white collar jobs are capable of being automated, I just don’t think that this will be how it plays out.

Just because many jobs can be automated doesn’t necessarily mean they will be, never mind within 18 months. Migrating to new systems takes time, and who wants to migrate to a system that is based on a technology that is changing all the time?

I also have my doubts about other sensationalist claims regarding AI. It seems that ‘vibe coding’, for instance, will not be as useful as first thought. The AI agents used to create the code are trained on large datasets and feedback from users. This means it generally tends to give the changes that it finds are most common amongst its data, making true innovation hard unless you are working directly with code.

However, a part of me is aware how breakthroughs, like the initial breakthrough with LLMs by OpenAI, have happened and can happen again. Who knows what breakthroughs are to come that will work toward enhancing what the AI does and how it works.

I remember when all I had to worry about was the fact that I had ham sandwiches in my school lunch box for the third day running. It really is a strange time to be alive.