Will AI Make Work Obsolete?

Open to Debate

Education, News, Society & Culture

4.6 • 2.2K Ratings

🗓️ 6 March 2026

⏱️ 51 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

AI can write code, diagnose diseases, design buildings, and create art. Tools like ChatGPT, Claude and autonomous robots are transforming industries once seen as automation-proof, fueling fears of mass job loss. Some argue that machines will become so efficient that they will one day replace most human labor. Others say AI will augment work, not erase it, and historically, people have feared innovation killing jobs, which arguably hasn't come to pass. Now we debate: Will AI Make Work Obsolete? Arguing Yes: Andrew Yang, Founder of the Forward Party, Former Presidential Candidate Simon Johnson, Nobel Prize-winning Economist; Professor of Entrepreneurship and Head of the Global Economics and Management Group at MIT Arguing No: Chris Hughes, Co-Founder of Facebook; Chair of the Economic Security Project; Author of "Marketcrafters" Rumman Chowdhury, CEO of Humane Intelligence PBC; Former U.S. Science Envoy for Artificial Intelligence Emmy award-winning journalist John Donvan moderates Join the conversation on Substack—share your perspective on this episode and subscribe to our weekly newsletter for curated insights from our debaters, moderators, and staff. Follow us on YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn, X, Facebook, and TikTok to stay connected with our mission and ongoing debates. The Hopkins Forum is a partnership between Open to Debate and Johns Hopkins University’s SNF Agora Institute. This flagship series consists of live debates in Washington, D.C. and Baltimore, bringing together diverse perspectives to tackle today’s most pressing issues. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Transcript

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0:32.7	This is open to debate. I'm John Donvan. Well, we just taped a really hot debate, a really intense
0:38.7	one. And the timing, well, if your social media feed is anything like mine, has it not been
0:44.2	filling up recently with all kinds of alarm about AI taking jobs? We even have CEOs announcing
0:50.5	layoffs explaining that AI will take up the slack. But there is also excitement about what AI can do for work.
0:58.1	So a lot of energy around this question,
1:00.3	and we just brought it all to a stage in Washington, D.C.,
1:03.3	partnering with the Stavros-Niarkos S&F Agora Institute at Johns Hopkins University.
1:08.0	It's the fifth time we've worked with the Hopkins Forum.
1:11.5	As I say,
1:16.3	there was fire and there was light in this one because we're all thinking about it.
1:19.7	So let's go over to the stage of the Hopkins Bloomberg Center.
1:25.1	Let's meet our debaters. First, I want to welcome to the stage and arguing that the answer to the question will AI make work obsolete is yes. I want to
1:28.3	welcome economist Simon Johnson. Simon, welcome to the program. In 2024, you and two others won
1:34.2	the Nobel Prize for your work, studying how institutions are formed and affect prosperity.
1:39.5	You're currently teaching entrepreneurship at the MIT Sloan School of Management, where you head
1:43.9	up Global Economics and Management Group. Welcome to the program, Simon. Thank you very much.
1:48.6	We hear that you actually have produced a kind of comic book style book on this very topic.
	...

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