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Davos 2026: Andrew Ng says fears of AI-driven job losses are exaggerated
The AI researcher says layoffs blamed on artificial intelligence are largely a result of pandemic-era overhiring, not automation.
Concerns that artificial intelligence will lead to widespread job losses have been overstated, AI researcher and entrepreneur Andrew Ng said, arguing that the technology is still far from replacing most human roles in their entirety.
Speaking to Moneycontrol on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum in Davos on January 19, Ng said recent layoffs across the technology sector are often incorrectly blamed on AI adoption.
“Job loss related to AI to date has been overhyped,” Ng said, adding that many companies are still correcting for aggressive hiring during the pandemic years rather than cutting roles because of automation.
Ng, the founder of DeepLearning.AI, managing general partner at AI Fund and co-founder of Coursera, said the real impact of AI becomes clearer when jobs are broken down into individual tasks rather than viewed as single, replaceable roles.
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“For many jobs, AI can only do 30–40 percent of the work now and for the foreseeable future,” he said. “That means we still need people to do the remaining 60–70 percent.”
According to Ng, this dynamic points to a shift in productivity rather than mass unemployment. Workers who learn to use AI tools effectively will become significantly more productive and increasingly indispensable, while those who fail to adapt risk being left behind.
“A person that uses AI will be so much more productive, they will replace someone that doesn’t use AI,” he said.
Ng acknowledged that certain professions face greater disruption, particularly roles such as contact centre workers, translators and voice actors, where automation is advancing more rapidly. However, he stressed that these roles account for a relatively small share of the overall workforce.
Overall, Ng said the labour impact of artificial intelligence will be more nuanced than current headlines suggest. The bigger challenge, he added, lies in helping workers adapt quickly and build skills that allow them to work alongside AI rather than compete against it.
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