By
August 26, 2026 / 4:35 PM EDT
/ CBS News
Add CBS News on Google
Bill Gates is sounding the alarm about artificial intelligence, warning in a new essay that the technology will rapidly transform the U.S. labor market and put millions of jobs at risk.AI is changing the economy much faster than previous technological revolutions, advancing at what the Microsoft co-founder called a "mind-blowing rate" and leaving less time to prepare for employment disruptions."AI will take on work in law, customer service, medicine, software, and manufacturing. It will hit these industries rapidly, over the course of a decade rather than a few generations," Gates wrote in an article posted on his personal website published on Wednesday. "There will be some new jobs, but without the right policies, there will be far fewer than exist today."While Gates outlines what he describes as a number of risks posed by AI in his nearly 6,000-word essay, he focuses particularly on how the technology could affect American workers. As AI's reasoning skills improve, it's becoming a more direct competitor to human cognitive abilities, he said."The biggest shift for workers will happen when AI provides nearly error-free work," he wrote. "At that point, it will be able to function on its own without a human checking in on it, and companies will have every economic incentive to let it."AI is already changing white-collar professions as companies offload tasks such as data analysis to AI, reducing the need for human labor, Gates noted. He also expressed concern for young people entering the workforce amid fewer job openings.But desk jobs aren't the only ones at risk, Gates warned. AI will soon be able to do physical work just as well as humans, he argued, which could weigh on blue-collar jobs like construction.
