Kara Swisher On Jack Ma's Warnings: Even High Paying Jobs Aren't Immune To Robotics

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd BABA's chairman Jack Ma came out with a dire warning to society. During a speech to entrepreneurs, he said the rise of robotics and artificial intelligence technologies will create "much more pain than happiness" over the next three decades.

Speaking as a guest on CNBC's "Squawk Alley" segment Monday, Recode's Kara Swisher reinforced the importance of keeping the conversation ongoing surrounding artificial intelligence and automation. Meanwhile, the conversation isn't being discussed — at least not at the federal level.

Keeping The Conversation Open

Swisher noted that the Trump administration is busy focusing on restoring American jobs in sectors like coal, but behind the scenes, automation improvements and artificial intelligence technologies are killing jobs.

In fact, even retailer giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc WMT set up an incubator lab that focuses on investments in robotics, virtual reality, augmented reality and artificial intelligence to better compete against its rivals.

"How many more [jobs] could be lost through AI and what do we do about it," Swisher hypothetically asked. "It's not just going to be the coal miners who are in trouble."

Swisher even took Ma's comments one step further and suggested that high paying jobs like CEOs, accountants, journalists and lawyers could be impacted by the rise of artificial intelligence systems.

Bottom line, Swisher highlighted Y Combinator's president Sam Altman who recently said in an interview that any repetitive job, which doesn't require any form of emotional connection to the product or customer will be eliminated.

"That's a lot of jobs," she concluded. "So, you have to start thinking hard and who has the responsibility to deal with this."

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BlackRock's Fink: Robots Will Supplement Humans In Stock Picking ________ Image Credit: World Economic Forum [CC BY 3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

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Posted In: CNBCTopicsEconomicsTechMediaGeneralartificial intelligenceJack MaKara SwisherReCode
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