Even an econ degree does not insulate you from AI.

I'm David Brancaccio in Los Angeles.

A lot of money shifted on stock markets yesterday amid the realization that artificial intelligence could replace not just workers, but entire business models, especially business software.

The catalyst was in part a new release of Anthropics

co-work system that doesn't just answer questions put to it, but follows through on

entire tasks. For example, it might vet a legal contract or book a whole business trip

in one fell swoop or create a whole deck of slides for a sales pitch. Down went companies

that sell traditional software. Legal Zoom stock

fell nearly 20 percent. Salesforce was down about 7 percent. Expedia, the travel service, down

15 percent. The dread felt by human accountants, lawyers, and travel agents now extends to the

software firms that had digitized some of their work. This extends to entire

professions. Is it even worth getting a degree now in economics, long considered a solid route

to employability? Economics departments at colleges and universities are worried in working to adapt.

We're joined now by Wendy Carlin, a professor of economics at University College London,

and director of the core econ open source curriculum project. Professor, welcome.

Thank you. It's great to be with you.

Studying economics can pay off. We know this. But first, you've got to get a job when you get out of school.

How deep, professor, how deep is your concern that artificial intelligence

might be a cheaper alternative to hiring your econ majors? I am worried about this. The evidence

that people are referring to relates, for example, to the drop in the hiring of juniors

in firms that are adopting AI.

And we've got to really think about, you know,

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