AI expert outlines the only jobs that will still exist in 2030 in worrying prediction

An AI expert has shared a grim forecast for humanity’s future, revealing the only jobs that he believes will still exist in 2030.

Latvian computer scientist Dr Roman Yampolskiy is a tenured Associate Professor in the Department of Computer Engineering and Computer Science at the Speed School of Engineering, University of Louisville.

He is also the founding and current director of the Cyber Security Lab and has authored over 100 publications, including Artificial Superintelligence: a Futuristic Approach.

An AI expert outlines the only jobs that will still exist in 2030. Credit: Yuichiro Chino / Getty

Dr Yampolskiy appeared on Steven Bartlett’s Diary of a CEO podcast and warned that Artificial Intelligence could wipe out 99 percent of job roles within the next five years.

Bartlett asked if his own work was at risk, questioning whether podcasting could survive the takeover. “You prepare, you ask questions, you ask follow-up questions, and you look good on camera,” Yampolskiy replied.

“A large language model today can easily read everything I write and have a better understanding,” he explained, adding that it would read every book behind Bartlett and learn his behaviours so it could mimic him.

He also noted that such systems could enhance their questions based on their data, while the visual aspect was “trivial”.

As for what might remain, Yampolskiy suggested that only a “tiny subset of a market” would still prefer human workers.

“There are jobs where you want a human, maybe you’re rich and you want a human accountant for whatever reason,” he said. “Old people like traditional ways of doing things. Warren Buffett would not switch to AI; he would use his human accountant.”

Drawing comparisons, he continued: “Today we have products which are man-made in the US as opposed to mass-produced in China, and some people pay more to have those, but it's a small subset. It's almost a fetish.”

He stressed that there was “no practical reason” for this preference.

Artificial Intelligence could wipe out 99 percent of job roles within the next five years, according to Yampolskiy. Credit: Miniseries / Getty

The professor went on to predict that Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) could be fully operational within just two years. That would mean businesses could rely on free physical and cognitive labour instead of humans.

He said it would "make no sense to hire humans for most jobs,” explaining that humanoid robots are only about “five years behind” in development.

“So we’re looking at a world where we have levels of unemployment we’ve never seen before, not just 10% unemployment, which is scary, but 99%," he added.

Still, he admitted that just because the technology exists doesn’t mean it will instantly be used, pointing out that phones existed in the 1970s, but they only became widespread with the release of the iPhone.

Featured image credit: MASTER / Getty