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Remember when Anthropic's AI jobs report suggested gardeners were among the safest workers because AI couldn't pull weeds or tell a rose from a dandelion? I joked about that in AI Insider earlier this year.
Well, Anthropic updated the research to freak us all out a bit more.
This time it asks a bigger question: What happens when you combine AI with robots? That change pushes many hands-on jobs much higher on the disruption scale. On paper, it makes sense. In practice, I'm skeptical.
For instance, anyone who's spent time working in a garden knows how hard it is to identify the right plant, kneel in awkward spots, and pull a weed out properly by the roots without damaging everything around it.
Robots are improving. But if you've ever watched one tackle a messy real-world task, you'll know there's a long road between a research chart and reality.
The chart below illustrates how adding robots could change job-task exposure across selected job categories. Cleaning & maintenance includes gardeners along with janitors and similar roles.
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Alistair Barr is the driving force behind Business Insider's AI Insider franchise, including the AI Insider newsletter. Sign up here. Before that, he was Business Insider's Global Tech Editor and the Big Tech team leader at Bloomberg, following a reporting career at The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, Reuters, and MarketWatch. Alistair covers all things Big Tech, along with startups and venture capital. He writes analysis and columns about topics including AI, cloud computing, data centers, semiconductors, online search, e-commerce, EVs, robotics, and autonomous vehicles.
