Mo Gawdat warns AI will replace nearly all knowledge workers within a decade, including CEOs and podcasters.
The former Google X chief business officer went hard on AI’s impact during a Monday appearance on the Diary of a CEO podcast with Steven Bartlett. He said startups like his own, Emma.love, used to need hundreds of developers but now run with just three people, thanks to AI.
Gawdat dropped this: 
“That startup would have been 350 developers in the past.”
He bluntly predicted even podcasters won’t be safe.
“As a matter of fact, podcaster is going to be replaced.”
The AI threat extends beyond entry-level jobs.
“AGI is going to get better at everything than humans — at everything, including being a CEO,” he said. “The one thing they don’t think of is AI will replace them, too.”
Gawdat calls the current period the “era of augmented intelligence,” where humans and AI collaborate. But this will soon give way to “machine mastery,” with AI handling entire roles from assistants to architects.
He’s not against AI, though. He’s working on ethical systems grounded in human values like love and connection. Still, Gawdat warned others prioritize profit over ethics.
“Unless you’re in the top 0.1%, you’re a peasant,” Gawdat said. “There is no middle class.”
He forecast a “short-term dystopia” around 2027 caused by mass unemployment, social unrest, and economic upheaval.
“We were never made to wake up every morning and just occupy 20 hours of our day with work,” he said. “We defined our purpose as work — that’s a capitalist lie.”
But he offered a hopeful vision too:
“The truth is it could be the best world ever,” Gawdat said. “The society completely full of laughter and joy. Free healthcare, no jobs, spending more time with their loved ones. A world where all of us are equal.”
In a 2023 podcast, Gawdat called AI “beyond an emergency,” bigger than climate change. He even proposed a 98% tax on AI-powered businesses to slow demand and fund displaced workers.
Big tech isn’t buying the doomsday scenario. Microsoft’s study says AI helps with research and writing but doesn’t replace entire jobs. Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang sees AI as a “technology equalizer,” not a job killer. Meta’s Yann LeCun dismissed worst-case views, saying humans will stay “boss” of AI.
Anthropic’s CEO Dario Amodei expects half of entry-level white-collar jobs gone in five years. Geoffrey Hinton, AI’s godfather, agrees AI will replace “mundane intellectual labor.”
The AI job battle is just getting heated.
