'Forget Coders. The Real AI Threat Is In the Back Office' (thestar.com.my)
- Reference: 0184430664
- News link: https://it.slashdot.org/story/26/07/12/2224249/forget-coders-the-real-ai-threat-is-in-the-back-office
- Source link: https://www.thestar.com.my/tech/tech-news/2026/06/15/forget-coders-the-real-ai-threat-is-in-the-back-office
"But many economists are more concerned about a different, larger group of white-collar workers," [1]reports the New York Times : customer service reps, bookkeepers, payroll clerks and HR specialists, "who fly under the radar but collectively account for tens of millions of jobs..."
> They are spread across the country and throughout the economy, working in every industry, in big cities and small towns, at major corporations and mom-and-pop businesses... These jobs typically offer a middle-class salary or a pathway to achieving one — much as manufacturing jobs did for men before decades of globalisation and automation wiped many of them away... For now, such an outcome is a fear, not a forecast. Despite high-profile layoffs in tech and finance, there is little firm evidence that AI has hurt the labour market as a whole.
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> Economists have become increasingly convinced that disruptions are likely, but they say it is too early to know where or how widespread they will be. They remain broadly sceptical of claims that the technology will lead to mass unemployment in the near future. Some AI industry leaders have walked back such predictions in recent weeks. But given the extraordinary pace at which companies are adopting AI — and at which the technology is improving — economists say policymakers need to consider the potential effects on the labour market. And they say they are concerned that the public debate has focused too much on software engineers and a relative handful of other high-status careers — lawyers, consultants, economists — rather than the workers who could be most vulnerable...
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> Economists at Northwestern University recently recalculated measures of AI exposure based on the makeup of the total workforce, not just the people using the technology. Administrative and front-line roles, such as customer service representatives, rose to the top of the list. "The most affected jobs are secretaries, are routine clerks," said Michelle Yin, one of the working paper's authors. "They're not computer scientists or data scientists at all."
The article also includes this counterpoint from an economist at the University of Illinois who has studied earlier waves of white-collar automation: that like other disruptive technologies, AI likely will also create new jobs. So the possibility exists AI will make workers more productive and allow them to earn more. "I would be cautious about just focusing on what are we losing as opposed to what are we going to gain on the other side."
[1] https://www.thestar.com.my/tech/tech-news/2026/06/15/forget-coders-the-real-ai-threat-is-in-the-back-office
Who are they? Penguins! (Score:2)
These unseen minions are penguins! And they fly under the radar because they don't need to fly at all.
Here's the article's actual answer to the question (not in the summary): "âoeThe most affected jobs are secretaries, are routine clerks,â said Michelle Yin, one of the working paperâ(TM)s authors. âoeTheyâ(TM)re not computer scientists or data scientists at all.â
Who are they? Secretaries (Score:4, Insightful)
> Here's the article's actual answer to the question (not in the summary): "The most affected jobs are secretaries, are routine clerks," said Michelle Yin, one of the working paper's authors...
Secretarial jobs were already cataclysmically wiped out by the word processing/computer revolution. It's hard to remember anymore how ubiquitous secretaries were to businesses.
However, turns out that this previous revolution didn't reduce the workforce, because the number of IT support personnel required increased directly as the number of secretaries decreased.
AI customer service gets it wrong at times (Score:2)
AI customer service gets it wrong at times and then someone needs to fix it.
Re: (Score:2)
Hello, people get it w7 sometimes and other people have to figure it out.
These jobs aren't ALL going away (Score:3)
But many of them are. However, the efforts to streamline every business will be high, lower than having employees but still high in the short term, and your smarter employees will have to fix the issues. I'm just trying to automate my billing, and the logic of turning a complex real world operation into reliable software is painful. I'm taking a break and making an app instead.
Really? (Score:2)
> Which jobs are most threatened by AI? "Programmers, software engineers and other tech industry employees,"
I never assumed that at all. I always figured it would be the "customer service reps, bookkeepers, payroll clerks and HR specialists" mentioned in TFS who would lose their jobs first.
Realistically, only construction workers, skilled tradespeople, doctors, scientists, and some tech workers are unlikely to be replaced by AI in the near term. And as robotics and AI improve, even those "safe" fields may start to shed human workers in favour of automation. But of course, by that time there will be little to buil
Re: Really? (Score:2)
I think youre outlook is too doomy. Youre forgetting about engineers, teachers, first responders, maintenance workers, therapists, social workers, most retail workers, and probably dozens of other worker groups if I wanted to think about it a bit longer. None of these jobs can easily be done by AI, in the short term, in any plausible scenario. Once we get true AGI and our robotics tech advances by several technological generations, it might be a different story. Thats the narrative the AI companies want us
Re: (Score:2)
On the one hand, humans are still much more adaptive, creative, flexible than programming or machines.
On the other hand, we may yet become a Philip K. Dick story.
AI will remove all the clerks (Score:4, Insightful)
If your job is filling out forms or collating information to produce reports, if it's taking notes, if it's taking inventory, if it's managing schedules, if it's producing documentation...
All those jobs are going to fall to IT. Not entirely, but it'll be human oversight and an AI replacing a team of white collar workers.
At the same time, it'll be embodied in robots and unskilled manual labor jobs will evaporate (this is already happening).
Good luck adjusting when the disruption is broad, deep, and rapid throughout the economy and workers can't retrain as quickly as jobs are eliminated. This isn't the automobile, this is "cheap obedient slaves with almost no support cost for those who can afford the upfront price tag".
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I'm not sure where you get the "almost no support cost". The article I read about the Chinese factory said that the robots were just about all being replaces (by newer models) after only a year.
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Well at least my job down at the robot factory should be safe...
Accounting oddly is resilient (Score:3)
My old company tried workday to simplify time tracking and accounting. It was a miserable failure despite a huge committment and time investment. The bulk of accounting is significantly more shades of gray than black and white which makes it terrible for AI/automation. You can make it easier to automate by designing your systems and processes around automation, but that can force you to lose some of the benefits of the original system.
My guess is that HR will be much more gutted, as the whole point of HR today is to make everything a repeatable process and eliminate subjective bias. Customer service automation is miserable so far, but the decision tree/script does lend itself to automation, at least for first tier support (if you don't care about actually providing service to your customers).
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Accounting is a more rational and regulated industry than many. It's ripe for AI maximization.
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Pure accounting and auditing are, as is tax preparation. But most business/cost accounting is much more complex which makes it more difficult.
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Do you mean 'creative'? As in using the rules in interesting ways...? Pure AI application. The prompt starts with, for instance, "how do...".
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No it isn't. Accounting isn't going to be improved using a glorified autocomplete. I think you're confusing "AI" with "computerization in general", and you're also failing to learn the lesson of the last 30-40 years that shows that, actually, no you can't automate away all of accounting. You can reduce the number of people involved, sure, but someone has to understand the logic.
AI isn't about logic, it isn't about reason, therefore it cannot replace people whose jobs are 100% logic and reasoning. And it's n
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I had some outside look into accounting as an IT/IT security auditor (side, job, now in the past). My impression was that these people need to make quite a lot of judgment calls and if they get it wrong, they may be in criminal territory very fast. They are also critical for fraud detection and deliver a lot of the data needed for decision making and long-term planning. Hence not glamorous, not flashy and definitely only a job for people that enjoy this type of work, but it is quite critical this work is do
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> As to HR, a critical function of HR is resolving conflicts.
No it's not? HR's only role is to protect the company from their employees.
HR is not your friend. Raise any concerns with HR and you will be flagged as problematic. They are not there to resolve conflicts. They're there to AVOID conflicts. And the best way to avoid conflict is not having "conflictive" people in the first place.
HR does not work in your interest. HR works in the interest of the company.
HR is there to document your mistakes so the comp
Economics is pipe dreams (Score:2)
> ... more productive and allow them to earn more.
Their own data reveals that hasn't happened for 40 years: Why would it change when there are fewer paying jobs available?
We will see (Score:2)
The threat to coders is slowly collapsing and it is more a threat to pretty bad coders (whose work is of negative worth anyways) and we do not have enough good coders to do all the review needed. It also looks like LLM-coding done right is more expensive than competent human coding, and they are not yet charging for the "tokens" what they need to charge to become profitable.
The problem I see with the back-office is that while the work is conceptually simpler, errors are even more costly. Hence I think the b
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> and they are not yet charging for the "tokens" what they need to charge to become profitable
We recently got access to Claude Enterprise and found how expensive it is. We were given $45 a month of budget. Everyone in the team blew through that in 2 days. And considering this is still being "subsidized" I honestly don't see what's the future for "AI Coding".
Lol (Score:5, Insightful)
"AI will make workers more productive and allow them to earn more" yeah sure that'll happen. Best I can give you is more work for the same pay and it's your fault when the AI fucks up.
Some statistics on who works those jobs (Score:5, Informative)
[1]https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat... [bls.gov]
Human resources managers - 314,000 workers - 79% women - 80% are white
Human resources workers - 897,000 workers - 78% women - 78% are white
Human resources assistants, except payroll and timekeeping 124,000 workers - 79% women - 73% are white
Bookkeeping, accounting, and auditing clerks - 1,254,000 workers - 82% women - 81% are white
Payroll and timekeeping clerks 166,000 workers -82% women - 81% are white
Customer service representatives 2,600, workers - 64% women - 71% are white
[1] https://www.bls.gov/cps/cpsaat11.htm
Re: (Score:3)
I have no what your racist angle is supposed to show here. Let me just add one data point:
US population: 332 million people, 75% are white.
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> and it's your fault when the AI fucks up.
No, I can't ever believe that! ;p
And when they don't pay enough for AI it is your fault for not using it 'efficiently' enough.
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If AI makes human workers more productive, it becomes more profitable to hire human workers and the demand for them increases.
If AI makes human workers unnecessary, it becomes less profitable to hire human workers and the demand for them decreases.
The balance is subtle and hard to predict. If you still need humans but they can do more, that leads to more jobs. If you no longer need the humans at all, that leads to fewer jobs. In the near term, we're probably going to see a lot of both cases. Some jobs w
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Probably. And do that long enough and you find nobody wants to work for you. Nice way to kill an enterprise slowly.
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Nobody wants to work for you anyway. They do it because otherwise their family doesn't eat.
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AI is today already scanning the receipts at my workspace and it sucks because it is a hit and miss if it scans the sums correctly or not and I always have to double-check the sums that were correctly scanned and it's an 80% risk that it's not properly done.