Generative AI revolution could impact 200,000-plus jobs in US, survey suggests
Generative AI is likely to hit entry- and mid-level jobs (Photo: Adobe)
More than 200,000 jobs in the US entertainment industry will be lost or severely affected due to media companies adopting generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) technology, according to research by an LA-based consultancy.
CVL Economics has released the findings of a survey in which 300 senior executives were asked about the current and future roles of GenAI in their workplaces.
The conclusions make sobering reading for anyone working in the fields of TV, film, animation, print media, music and gaming.
Around 203,800 jobs are poised to undergo “significant disruption” over the next few years as a result of the implementation of GenAI programmes, it concluded.
Nearly every aspect of the entertainment workforce will be affected, with creatives working in the spaces of visual effects (VFX), dubbing and editing among the first to lose work due to GenAI applications such as ChatGPT, DALL-E, Midjourney and Stable Diffusion.
Many displaced jobs will likely be entry- and mid-level positions. This, in turn, will reduce career development opportunities and hurt economic mobility.
The CVL report said: “Aspiring workers from less affluent and underrepresented backgrounds have historically leveraged these entry-level roles as a pathway into the entertainment industries and to higher-paying positions.
“More broadly, the elimination of these types of positions means the loss of critical learning and networking opportunities.”
Seventy-five percent of respondents to the survey reported that GenAI tools and software had already supported the elimination, reduction or consolidation of jobs in their businesses.
Some 72% of US firms surveyed consider themselves early adopters of the technology, with 90% of business leaders believing that GenAI will play a larger role in the entertainment industry soon.
Focusing on the TV, animation and film sectors, almost half (47%) of executives polled felt that GenAI programmes will be effective in generating 3D assets and sound design.
Breaking down the results of the survey geographically, CVL believes 62,000 jobs will be affected in California, where the entertainment industry is a major contributor to the state’s economy.
Meanwhile, 26,000 jobs will be disrupted in New York, 7,000 in Washington and 7,800 in the state of Georgia.
However, the toll on creative positions could actually be much worse than those figures suggest.
The report stated: “This figure does not include the effect on gig workers and freelancers, who are not tracked as robustly by US administrative data and survey. So the actual number of displaced creative jobs is in fact likely to be much higher.”
The use of AI was at the heart of the Writers Guild of America and SAG-AFTRA strikes in the US last year.
Many companies are already using original content generated by writers to train GenAI programmes to create scripts and storyboards.
Elsewhere, AI tools are creating ‘deep-fake’ content by generating digital replicas of actors and historical figures. Without legal protection, many striking workers envisaged a world where their roles will be entirely replaced by GenAI.
Although those disputes were eventually resolved, the uncertainty about GenAI’s impact on the TV and film industry remains.
This year alone, many large media companies have announced layoffs, including Amazon MGM Studios, Pixar, Unity Software, Riot Games and Universal Music Group.
“The entertainment industries are in a period of significant uncertainty,” said the CVL report. “The nature of work is rapidly – and in many cases, profoundly – changing at an unexpected rate. The pace of change will only continue to accelerate in 2024.”
