HELLO FUTURE: AI Is Changing Work — But Not the Way You Think

Speaker 1 (00:07):
Everyone's talking about AI. It kind of feels a little
old at this point. Oh AI is gonna take all
of our jobs. AI is gonna put everyone out of work,
and blah blah blah blah blah.

Speaker 2 (00:19):
What's real?

Speaker 1 (00:19):
What's fake? Hello Future, It's me keV. This is a
dispatch from the Digital Frontier. The planet is Earth. The
year is twenty twenty six. My name is still Kevin Sarilli.
Remember you can listen to all of the latest Tello
Future episodes wherever you get your podcast and on the
iHeartMedia app. And sign up for my newsletter at MTF
dot News or MTF dot tv and check us out
for all of your latest go to guide of the future.
Mattie Douppler is returning to the program. Mattie, my good friend.
Thank you so much for showing out to Meet the Future.
She's the CEO and founder of Forward Strategy. She's worked
with iconic American brands like Amazon. She's Apolo let's see
nerd I say that, And if you ever need to
understand what's going on with fiscal policy and the economy,
check out her podcast. However you podcast it's called The
Trade Off with Maddie Duppler and Maddie, thank you so
much for showing up once again to meet the future.
What impact is AI really having on the economy and
just go riff Okay, I.

Speaker 3 (01:21):
Mean, listen, anecdote isn't data, but the way the economy
is evolving in real time, it's hard for our data
to pick it up in real time. Right we can
do it kind of retrospectively, but right now, AI and
what it's doing to the future of work is working
faster than our data can really calibrate. And I say
that because we've been in this environment for the last
several months that experts are calling low higher low fire. Basically,
there's no job turnover, which is showing up as a
relatively positive aspect of the economy. There's not big layoffs happening.
Even if you hear of a couple layups here and there,
on the whole economy looks positive when you just look
at the employment landscape.

Speaker 4 (02:05):
The issue is how people are experiencing.

Speaker 3 (02:07):
The economy right Inflation, the pressures driven by Iran war.
Right now, household budgets really feel like they're under stress,
and that's what people pay attention to. Right It's not
the macro picture of how many jobs were created in
the last month, which, of course it's about like how
much money do I have left in my budget after
I fill up both cars at the end of the week,
And why is that number getting smaller and smaller and smaller.
And one of the disconnects in the economy that's happening
right now is GDP seems relatively stable and increasing at
a moderate pace. The reason that is happening, though, is
because of five companies spending on AI. Last month during
during tech earning calls, we heard that the big five
hyperscalers are going to spend anywhere from seven hundred to
seven hundred and fifty billion dollars on AI this year alone.

Speaker 2 (03:01):
And I want to like, what does that mean?

Speaker 1 (03:03):
I hear these big numbers, and I read it in
CNBC or Fox Business or The Wall Street Journal, Financial Times,
Bloomberg to some extent, what does it mean when they're
throwing these big numbers, like we're.

Speaker 2 (03:18):
Spending all this money on AI?

Speaker 1 (03:19):
Well?

Speaker 2 (03:20):
How okay?

Speaker 3 (03:21):
So two things that I want your audience to keep
in mind for context.

Speaker 4 (03:25):
One I'm going to.

Speaker 3 (03:26):
Steal from a CNBC analyst I heard yesterday because it's
so genius. The US economy is thirty trillion, which again,
like that doesn't make sense, that number is too big,
But it's expected to grow at around two percent year
every year. Thirty trillion times two percent, that's six hundred billion.
That is less than the amount that these five companies
are spending in one.

Speaker 4 (03:45):
Year on AI.

Speaker 3 (03:47):
So what that means is if any of these companies
make changes to their plans for AI capex, that's going
to have a material impact on the whole US economy,
even and if someone who's living somewhere where they're not
building data centers or where they're not buying chips. I mean,
it's amazing how acute the inputs are, but how profound
the impact may be. Second thing I want to say
about this is just that when you're looking at the
AI spend, typically, especially in the US economy, you have
a boom bus cycle and a big cap X push,
a big push by private companies spending lots of money
to put shovels on the ground and invest in the
US That.

Speaker 4 (04:31):
Is usually preceding a big.

Speaker 3 (04:34):
Job boom that usually brings in tons of jobs. You know,
at Amazon, when we would build a fulfillment center that
would guarantee a thousand new jobs in the first year,
would guarantee an increase in economic income in the region.

Speaker 4 (04:47):
You don't have that with data centers.

Speaker 3 (04:49):
Data centers like Goldman Sack's estimates that you produce like
maybe one hundred hundred and fifty jobs with the data center, right.
And so the question is what comes after all of
this spending. Even if all these investments are made and
it fuels us economic growth, does that show up in
people's paychecks? Does that show up in better earnings and
more jobs? I'm not sure it does.

Speaker 2 (05:09):
So is it like.

Speaker 1 (05:10):
An infrastructure play? Like, how should we be thinking about it?
Is this just America transforming itself into an AI infrastructure?
Because it seems like we have a lot more Yeah,
I'm seeing you.

Speaker 2 (05:24):
Kind of shake your head.

Speaker 1 (05:25):
But it's confusing when you hear everyone's updating on AI.
Everyone's updating on AI, and it's like, well, at least
when the Internet came around, we were all learning how
to purchase on the internet, and we were all learning
how to create stores on the internet and how to
market ourselves, and communications were different. With this, it feels
less of I can understand what this thing is doing
as a job creator. But I'm an optimist with it
because I do see it as an eventual job creator
and I love what it's doing for health and science totally.
But yeah, it's just a weird moment.

Speaker 3 (06:02):
That's the lynchpin, right That investment boom that causes job
booms usually shows up in the form of productivity, and
we've seen a ton of productivity gains, but not with
any new job creation, which I guess like is kind
of the point. But the question is what happens after Now.
I am extremely bullish on the application of AI. And
as I said at the beginning of this segment, you know,
anecdote is not data. But you and I used to
go on radio and talk about all of this stuff
pre AI twenty sixteen when I started my first business.
Then I went in house to Amazon. Now I'm running
my second consulting business, and it boggles.

Speaker 4 (06:37):
My mind that I did this without AI.

Speaker 3 (06:39):
The number of things that's fair I can offload now
and you know this too as a solo operator. For us,
the trade off isn't like do I hire five people
to do this or do I use AI? It's do
I stay up all night to do this? And burn
the candle up both ends, or do I use AI?
And so I do think there's going to be an
adjustment period, and there's certainly not have attention being paid
to the economic and as we talked about earlier, kind
of like the ethical and philosophical underpinning of how AI
is applied to society, because that's going to fact how
people think about their jobs. But I'm super bullish on
what it's going to do for productivity, particularly for our cohort,
the millennials who've been hustling and grinding for twenty five years,
Like this is going to allow us to offload some
of that capacity that right now has to live in
our brains.

Speaker 4 (07:27):
That's going to permit us to use our humanity.

Speaker 1 (07:31):
It is really interesting. College graduate unemployment for ages twenty
three to twenty seven has risen what I don't necessarily
and again you're the expert, but I don't necessarily see
that as a reflection of AI and more is a
reflection of the like no one has to go into
an office. I mean, these people's networks are I think
they've been cheated culturally, not technologically. I think they've been
cheated culture truly of like understanding how work works.

Speaker 3 (08:03):
Yeah, you know, that is a great point, and you
know it's I don't know. I'm a mom of three
young kids, right, so, like right now, my oldest is
in grade school, so we're like doing the debate of
like do we put her in sports or do we
let her have like a childhood summer, you know, And
we have not done a good job of preparing our
institutions to be agile in the face of innovation, right.

Speaker 1 (08:30):
Because it's what I have to interrupt you, because our institutions,
our higher education institutions have failed. They are supposed to
be the hubs of innovation. They are supposed to be
where the trend gets set, and they've just totally dropped
the ball. I mean, it's psychotic to me. And I'm
very hard on higher education because I think they have
screwed up an enormous amount. They have given the millennials
and gen z a level of debt that if any
credit card company did, they would be dragged in for
Capitol Hill hearings and they would be said, you know,
you are not too big to fail. And it is
crazy the amount of degrees that they've sold on a
lie to the American people, and they should be called
out on it.

Speaker 2 (09:13):
I have zero respect. This is why I brought Maddie back.

Speaker 1 (09:16):
It's because I said, you know, sometimes I do have opinions,
and I typically side stuff them. But this is one
that is psychotic because you got all these kids who
are booing tech leaders for creating the technology that they
couldn't go a second without.

Speaker 2 (09:33):
I just have to bold.

Speaker 1 (09:34):
Highlight underline that point. I'm not talking about TikTok, by
the way. I'm actually talking about the way you get
your money, the way you order groceries, the way you
show up to get your health insurance or go to
a hospital.

Speaker 2 (09:47):
And you're gonna.

Speaker 1 (09:47):
Boo the people who have kept this country safe as
a matter of technology security. Come on, this was the
one time I can't believe you're getting me to admit this.
The one time I missed being on cable news was
not through anything that's happened, because I really I don't
have cable, by the way, and I don't have a
television in my apartment. Was when I saw that college
kids were booing tech leaders. I thought they look bad,
but their professors look worse.

Speaker 3 (10:14):
This whole generation has been raised in the idea that
everything has a has a prevailing dichotomy, right, Like if
you're not booing the tech leaders, you're lionizing them, when
in fact, there are things you can learn.

Speaker 4 (10:26):
From people who've been successful in business without agree with
everything that they do.

Speaker 3 (10:30):
And like this whole idea that there's no nuance left
in that conversation is certainly what I have seen, as
you know, someone who operates in.

Speaker 4 (10:39):
That world of red versus blue. It's really interesting. And
this is why you and I get going on.

Speaker 3 (10:44):
This is like we're from Midwest manufacturing towns, right, So it's.

Speaker 1 (10:49):
Like I'm not from the Midwest. I'm from Delco, which
is out.

Speaker 4 (10:52):
This is the debate. I would not consider del CoA
the Midwest either.

Speaker 1 (10:55):
But yes, we have a lot in common with how
we grew up. So yes, like refinery workers and engineers
and you know all of that is where I'm from.

Speaker 4 (11:04):
Yeah, yeah, And my point is that it took me.
You know, I went to public school. I had a
public school education.

Speaker 3 (11:10):
I did three I graduated early to try to reduce
the amount. Right, It's just like I did all of that,
and it probably took me at least six years still
to earn what my compatriots in high school were earning
who went and worked building fire trucks in my hometown.

Speaker 4 (11:27):
You know, it's like, these are good jobs and we've
looked down our noses at them for.

Speaker 2 (11:31):
A long time. Pa.

Speaker 3 (11:33):
You know what, like Pierce manufacturing, AI is not going
to build all those fire trucks. They want people with
the DO and the QC. And that will always be
the case.

Speaker 2 (11:43):
And I talked about it. I mean I've done like
three episodes now.

Speaker 1 (11:45):
I mean, space is a huge thing that I cover
for Meet the Future and Hello Future, and I call
them space collar jobs, and they're the best. They're manufacturing jobs.
I go build the telescope that's going to discover aliens
in another world. I mean, those are cool jobs. The
thing about the booing of the tech commencement speakers and everything, listen,
if they feel strongly about it and they've got their reasons.

Speaker 2 (12:05):
You know, who am I to judge. I'm not.

Speaker 1 (12:07):
I'm not here to, like, you know, be the old
man that says, don't boo, I'm on the side of innovation.

Speaker 3 (12:11):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (12:12):
And when I heard that, that's I'm not telling you
don't boo. You want to boom boo?

Speaker 1 (12:15):
If this was happening in China and the Communist Party
of China, they would not be able to boo.

Speaker 2 (12:21):
They would not be able to boo. It's called tim
and square.

Speaker 1 (12:24):
So I get really passionate about this because it's it's
not to me a left or right. But we've like
lost sight that it's okay to want America to win
and we have to want to win the future.

Speaker 4 (12:36):
Memories are very short.

Speaker 3 (12:37):
We forget that it has been the combination of private
enterprise and public leadership that has allowed America to win
the future. During World War Two, turning private manufacturing in
order to provide munition for an overseas war.

Speaker 4 (12:51):
Could we do that.

Speaker 3 (12:52):
Today or would these leaders be under so much pressure
for people to not be able to support our government?

Speaker 1 (12:59):
You know?

Speaker 3 (13:00):
Again, like I come from a libertarian point of view
in the world, I am skeptical of everything the government does.
But that doesn't mean that I'm not proud to be
an American and it doesn't mean that I don't want
American companies to win.

Speaker 2 (13:11):
Amen.

Speaker 1 (13:11):
All right, Maddie Dopler, how are you liking things with
forward Strategies and doing your podcast The Trade Off?

Speaker 2 (13:18):
I love it. It's awesome. How are things going.

Speaker 3 (13:21):
I mean, it's a lot of fun to be able
to kind of build your own platform.

Speaker 2 (13:25):
You know that, Kevin, It's hard work. Though, it's a
lot of hard work.

Speaker 3 (13:29):
Well talk about hustling, right, Like, I don't know how
I did any of this. I guess you know, I
was doing a lot of cable news prior. But like, yeah,
AI is like a huge help in producing my podcast.
But right now, you know, what I'm trying to do
is kind of bring the totality of my experience, having
gone in house at a Fortune five company, having run
my own business, having been a part of some of
the most pivotal policy campaigns of the last fifteen years.
I'm just hoping to bring that expertise to more companies
because I think if companies have like a clear you
of what it is that their policy objectives are, they
don't get like all wayed down with this conversation about like,
you know, should we be posturing this way or should
we be naval gazing this It's like you have a
job to do it and to deliver for your customers.
I'm just I'm helping firms navigate a very sticky kind
of public affairs environment which is a lot of fun
because I get to learn a lot of new industries amazing.

Speaker 1 (14:25):
Well, it's awesome to see you continue to kill it
and you are going to be a frequent guest on
our show. So thank you so much, and news.

Speaker 4 (14:32):
Better every day.

Speaker 3 (14:33):
You're my main source for the future I never know
about I know nothing about space otherwise.

Speaker 1 (14:39):
Okay, Maddie Doupler, have a great tomorrow today, and thank
you for showing up to meet the future.