John Maynard Keynes predicted a 15-hour workweek, but we’ve instead created millions of pointless jobs. It’s like how we have 100x more powerful machines and storage, yet our calculator apps have bloated to use 99x of that improvement.

In 2013, anthropologist David Graeber coined the term ‘bullshit jobs’ - roles so meaningless that even those doing them struggle to justify their existence. Fast forward to 2024, and AI is poised to automate many of these jobs.

As AI threatens to displace 300 million full-time jobs globally, we’re at a crossroads. Could AI finally deliver on Keynes’ vision by eliminating ‘bullshit jobs’? Or will it simply create new forms of meaningless work, like ‘AI babysitters’?

I’m a tech optimist, but an incentive pessimist. People make money doing jobs, even if they’re meaningless. So I predict a Cambrian explosion of bullshit AI jobs. What do you think?