Zerodha said it would retain employees even if artificial intelligence eliminates some positions as the AI wave picks up steam. The remarks were made amid repeated warnings that new advancements could eliminate 300 million full-time employment. According to CEO Nithin Kamath, the new internal AI policy was developed to alleviate concerns about job loss/AI.
“We will not fire anyone on the team just because we have implemented a new piece of technology that makes an earlier job redundant,” he reiterated.
Highlighting predictions he had made two years ago, Kamath said that AI was finally in a position to “take away jobs and disrupt society”.
“AI on its own won’t wake up and kill us all (for a while, at least!). The current capitalistic and economic systems will rapidly adopt AI, accelerating inequality and loss of human agency. That’s the immediate risk,” he added, quoting Dr K – the company’s “man behind the scene”.
The CEO claimed many companies would probably “let go of employees and blame it on AI” soon. In turn, the organizations would earn more, and shareholders would become richer – worsening wealth inequality.
“In today’s capitalism, businesses prioritize shareholder value creation above stakeholders like employees, customers, vendors, the country, and the planet. Markets incentivize business leaders to prioritize profits over everything else; if not, shareholders vote them out,” he added.
In May, a study found that the Indian job market would likely experience a 22% turnover over the following five years, with the top rising opportunities coming from the data, AI, and machine learning areas. In the meantime, the most recent Future of Jobs report from the World Economic Forum stated that 69 million new jobs are expected to be generated and 83 million eliminated by 2027, with the global job market turnover projected at 23%.
