What just happened? Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei’s recent warning that AI could wipe out about half of all entry-level white-collar jobs in the next five years has been disputed by Nvidia boss Jensen Huang. It’s not the first time the two companies have clashed, and Anthropic has hit back with claims that Huang is putting words into Amodei’s mouth.
Amodei made his ominous prediction about AI’s impact on entry-level, white-collar jobs in May, warning that the eradication of these positions will lead to unemployment spikes of 20%.
Speaking at VivaTech in Paris (via Fortune), Huang said he “pretty much disagree[d] with almost everything” the Anthropic CEO says.
“One, he believes that AI is so scary that only they should do it,” Huang said of Amodei at a press briefing at Viva Technology in Paris. “Two, [he believes] that AI is so expensive, nobody else should do it … And three, AI is so incredibly powerful that everyone will lose their jobs, which explains why they should be the only company building it,” Haung continued.
Dario Amodei, who both builds and fears AI systems
“I think AI is a very important technology; we should build it and advance it safely and responsibly,” he continued. “If you want things to be done safely and responsibly, you do it in the open … Don’t do it in a dark room and tell me it’s safe.”
Since Amodei founded the company in 2021, Anthropic has portrayed itself as one of the few ethical, safety-first AI companies – several original employees came from OpenAI, having left over concerns about its direction and the safety culture at the company. That reputation was called into question earlier this month after reddit sued the company over allegations that it scraped content generated by forum users to train its Claude chatbot without consent. The fact its Claude 4 Opus AI blackmailed engineers in a testing scenario isn’t exactly reassuring either.
Responding to Haung’s comments, an Anthropic spokesperson told Fortune in a statement: “Dario has never claimed that ‘only Anthropic’ can build safe and powerful AI. As the public record will show, Dario has advocated for a national transparency standard for AI developers (including Anthropic) so the public and policymakers are aware of the models’ capabilities and risks and can prepare accordingly. He has also raised concerns about the economic impact of AI – particularly on entry-level jobs. Dario stands by these positions and will continue to do so.”
This isn’t the first time that Nvidia and Anthropic have clashed. The pair butted heads over the AI Diffusion Rules that restrict the export of advanced AI technologies to countries such as China. Anthropic has argued for tighter controls and enforcement, and highlighted some of the unusual cases of people smuggling chips into the Asian nation. Nvidia hit back, stating its chips have never been smuggled into China via the likes of fake pregnant bellies or alongside live lobsters, despite Chinese customs documenting these cases.
Being CEO of the company that powers the AI revolution means Huang is always going to portray its impact on jobs in a more optimistic light. He claims that it will lead to new positions such as prompt engineers and AI experts – though their numbers will likely pale in comparison to the number of jobs being lost to AI.
Huang said on more than one occasion in 2024 that learning skills such as programming will be less important due to generative AI, and that people, children in particular, should instead focus on more important skills such as biology, education, manufacturing, or farming.
Amodei has spoken out about the dangers of AI job losses before. He previously said that the proposed Universal Basic Income solution to mass unemployment was “kind of dystopian” and, while better than nothing, is “not really the world we want to aim for.”
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