Hacker News with Generative AI: Labor

After Firing 700 Humans for AI, Klarna Now Wants Them Back (yahoo.com)
Klarna is backpedaling after cutting hundreds of human jobs and replacing them with artificial intelligence. The Swedish buy-now-pay-later company now says real people are essential to customer service and plans to bring them back—but in a gig-style setup.
Artificial Intelligence, Labor, Gig Economy, Business
6 points by gpi 2 days ago | 1 comments
AI labor displacement and the limits of worker retraining (brookings.edu)
Worker retraining programs are often proposed as a policy response to AI-driven labor displacement, but it’s not clear that they have previously worked very well.
Artificial Intelligence, Labor, Workforce Development, Policy
5 points by hn_acker 5 days ago | 0 comments
The Enshittification of Tech Jobs (medium.com)
Tech workers are a weird choice for “princes of labor,” but for decades they’ve enjoyed unparalleled labor power, expressed in high wages, lavish stock grants, and whimsical campuses with free laundry and dry-cleaning, gourmet cafeterias, and kombucha on tap:
Tech Industry, Labor, Economics, Employment
9 points by laurex 7 days ago | 0 comments
Robot chefs take over at South Korea's highway restaurants, to mixed reviews (restofworld.org)
Robot chefs are replacing humans at some South Korean highway restaurants.Tech companies say robots can help solve labor shortage in an aging nation.Workers say their roles have been downgraded from chefs to cleaning staff.
Robotics, South Korea, Labor, Food Service, Technology
35 points by NDAjam 9 days ago | 15 comments
Brewhaha: Turns out machines can't replace people, Starbucks finds (theregister.com)
Starbucks, smarting from disappointing second-quarter earnings, says that trying to replace staff with machines was a mistake.
Starbucks, Automation, Labor, Business, Technology
8 points by PaulHoule 10 days ago | 1 comments
The great displacement is already well underway? (shawnfromportland.substack.com)
As I climb into my little twin sized bed in my small RV trailer on a patch of undeveloped deep rural land in the Central New York highlands, exhausted from my 6 hours of doordash driving to make less than 200$ that day, I check my emails one last time for the night: no responses from the 745th through 756th job applications that i put in over the last week for engineering roles i’m qualified or over-qualified for.
Economy, Labor, Technology, Housing
517 points by JSLegendDev 11 days ago | 500 comments
IBM Replaced HR Workers with AI (entrepreneur.com)
Former employees at IBM were replaced with AI, the company's CEO confirmed earlier this week.
Artificial Intelligence, Business, Technology, Labor, Automation
10 points by geox 12 days ago | 3 comments
Spain to reduce the standard 40-hour work week for 12.5 million employees (independent.co.uk)
The Spanish government approved a bill Tuesday reducing the workweek from 40 to 37.5 hours (Associated Press)
Spain, Labor, Work-Life Balance, Politics, Economy
19 points by giuliomagnifico 16 days ago | 4 comments
The Enshittification of Tech Jobs (medium.com)
Tech workers are a weird choice for “princes of labor,” but for decades they’ve enjoyed unparalleled labor power, expressed in high wages, lavish stock grants, and whimsical campuses with free laundry and dry-cleaning, gourmet cafeterias, and kombucha on tap:
Technology, Labor, Work Culture, Economics
9 points by getdoneist 18 days ago | 0 comments
Professors Staffed a Fake Company with AI Agents, Guess What Happened? (futurism.com)
If you've been worried about the AI singularity taking over every job and leaving you out on street, you can now breathe a sigh of relief, because AI isn't coming for your career anytime soon. Not because it doesn't want to — but because it literally can't.
Artificial Intelligence, Education, Labor
27 points by Capstanlqc 18 days ago | 18 comments
The Enshittification of Tech Jobs (pluralistic.net)
Tech workers are a weird choice for "princes of labor," but for decades they've enjoyed unparalleled labor power, expressed in high wages, lavish stock grants, and whimsical campuses with free laundry and dry-cleaning, gourmet cafeterias, and kombucha on tap:
Tech Industry, Labor, Employment, Technology, Economics
41 points by namanyayg 19 days ago | 10 comments
Duolingo will replace contract workers with AI (theverge.com)
Duolingo will “gradually stop using contractors to do work that AI can handle,” according to an all-hands email sent by co-founder and CEO Luis von Ahn announcing that the company will be “AI-first.”
Artificial Intelligence, Business, Language Learning, Labor
181 points by donohoe 24 days ago | 117 comments
The Enshittification of Tech Jobs (pluralistic.net)
Tech workers are a weird choice for "princes of labor," but for decades they've enjoyed unparalleled labor power, expressed in high wages, lavish stock grants, and whimsical campuses with free laundry and dry-cleaning, gourmet cafeterias, and kombucha on tap:
Tech Industry, Labor, Economics, Social Commentary
13 points by NotInOurNames 25 days ago | 0 comments
The Enshittification of Tech Jobs (pluralistic.net)
Tech workers are a weird choice for "princes of labor," but for decades they've enjoyed unparalleled labor power, expressed in high wages, lavish stock grants, and whimsical campuses with free laundry and dry-cleaning, gourmet cafeterias, and kombucha on tap:
Tech, Labor, Employment, Work Culture, Economy
31 points by 3np 25 days ago | 10 comments
The Enshittification of Tech Jobs (pluralistic.net)
Tech workers are a weird choice for "princes of labor," but for decades they've enjoyed unparalleled labor power, expressed in high wages, lavish stock grants, and whimsical campuses with free laundry and dry-cleaning, gourmet cafeterias, and kombucha on tap:
Tech Industry, Labor, Economics, Social Commentary
15 points by NotInOurNames 25 days ago | 0 comments
To 'Reclaim Future-Making', Amazon Workers Published Collection of SciFi Stories (afteramazon.world)
In 2023, the Worker as Futurist Project supported 13 rank-and-file Amazon workers to write short, speculative fiction about The World After Amazon. The result is the book featured on this website.
Amazon, Science Fiction, Labor, Speculative Fiction
91 points by m463 25 days ago | 81 comments
Wanted: Manly jobs for manly men (vpostrel.substack.com)
Behind much of the MAGA economic agenda lies a concern with restoring manly jobs. Coal miners want to mine! says Donald Trump. “They’re good strong guys,” he says. “That’s what they want to do. They love to dig coal, that's what they want to do. They don't want to do gidgets and widgets and wadgets. They don’t want to build cell phones with their hands, their big, strong hands.”
Politics, Labor, Masculinity
16 points by HR01 26 days ago | 3 comments
Why the Chip Industry Is Struggling to Attract the Next Generation (viksnewsletter.com)
There is a worldwide shortage of semiconductor talent.
Semiconductors, Industry, Labor, Education
18 points by kayson 31 days ago | 3 comments
Whistleblower statement on anomalies at time of DOGE work at NLRB [pdf] (whistlebloweraid.org)
Whistleblower, Labor, Law, Government, Cryptocurrency
123 points by 0xWTF 31 days ago | 13 comments
AI researcher launches startup to replace all human workers everywhere (techcrunch.com)
Famed AI researcher launches controversial startup to replace all human workers everywhere
Artificial Intelligence, Startups, Labor, Automation, Controversy
20 points by dxs 33 days ago | 18 comments
Colorado passes bill punting to local governments on restaurant server pay (coloradosun.com)
A contentious bill pitting many restaurant owners against workers over how much tipped employees should earn was approved by the Colorado legislature Tuesday, with the restaurant industry feeling like it had achieved a small victory.
Politics, Labor, Restaurants, Colorado
5 points by mooreds 33 days ago | 0 comments
Thousands of federal workers would be easier to fire under Trump rule change (npr.org)
The Trump administration is moving forward with efforts to make it easier to fire some federal workers from their jobs, as part of its push to both shrink the federal government and exert more control over it.
Politics, Government, Labor, Employment
14 points by rbanffy 34 days ago | 0 comments
The Games Industry Is Deprofessionalizing (pushtotalk.gg)
There’s this word I’ve started using to describe what’s happening to the games industry: deprofessionalizing.
Games Industry, Labor, Trends
5 points by 8f2ab37a-ed6c 34 days ago | 0 comments
NOAA Scientists Are Cleaning Bathrooms After Contracts for Basic Services Expire (propublica.org)
Federal scientists responsible for monitoring the health of West Coast fisheries are cleaning office bathrooms and reconsidering critical experiments after the Department of Commerce failed to renew their lab’s contracts for hazardous waste disposal, janitorial services, IT and building maintenance.
Government, Science, Environmental Issues, Labor, Politics
9 points by petethomas 35 days ago | 1 comments
Government IT whistleblower calls out DOGE, says he was threatened at home (arstechnica.com)
A government whistleblower told lawmakers that DOGE's access to National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) systems went far beyond what was needed to analyze agency operations and apparently led to a data breach.
Government, Cybersecurity, Cryptocurrency, Labor, Data Breaches
26 points by sciurus 36 days ago | 6 comments
General Strike (wagingnonviolence.org)
Something is in the air: A perception that American democracy and livable conditions for working people may only be saved by the kind of large-scale nonviolent direct action variously called “general strikes,” “political strikes,” or, as I will refer to all of them, “social strikes.”
Social Movements, Politics, Labor, Nonviolent Action
17 points by hypertexthero 37 days ago | 0 comments
NOAA Scientists Clean Bathrooms, Reconsider Lab Experiments as Contracts Expire (propublica.org)
Federal scientists responsible for monitoring the health of West Coast fisheries are cleaning office bathrooms and reconsidering critical experiments after the Department of Commerce failed to renew their lab’s contracts for hazardous waste disposal, janitorial services, IT and building maintenance.
Science, Government, Environmental Issues, Labor
16 points by impish9208 41 days ago | 1 comments
Fatal Accident at Universal Stainless Leads Steelworkers to Flag Safety Failures (hntrbrk.com)
A worker died this week while operating a crane at a steel mill in Dunkirk, New York, according to former and current employees.
Industrial Accidents, Safety, Labor, Steel Industry, New York
6 points by impish9208 45 days ago | 0 comments
An Overwhelmingly Negative and Demoralizing Force (aftermath.site)
We’re a few years into a supposed artificial intelligence revolution, which could and should have been about reducing mundane tasks and freeing everyone up to do more interesting things with their time. Instead, thanks to the bloodthirsty nature of modern capitalism and an ideological crusade being waged by the tech industry, we’re now facing a world where many people’s livelihoods–like video game developers–are under direct threat.
Artificial Intelligence, Labor, Capitalism, Technology
443 points by Doches 45 days ago | 409 comments
ICE Air: What It's Like to Be a Deportation Flight Attendant (propublica.org)
Current and former flight attendants for GlobalX, the private charter airline at the center of Trump’s immigration crackdown, expressed concern about their inability to treat passengers humanely and to keep them safe.
Immigration, Aviation, Labor, Human Rights
10 points by Anon84 50 days ago | 0 comments