Jim Cramer says AI might be ‘the most important force’ for jobs

CNBC’s Jim Cramer on Wednesday said artificial intelligence will be a major factor in jobs across industries in the future, as the new technology shapes the workforce.

“If you want to know what’s going to happen in the future — not the near future, like next week or tomorrow, but next year and beyond — then I think you must factor in artificial intelligence,” he said. “When it comes to employment, both public and private, it might be the most important force out there.”

Cramer referenced a recent Axios interview with Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei, who warned that AI could increase unemployment by 10 to 20% in the next one to five years, as well as wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs. While Cramer said he’s not a “doomsayer” like Amodei, he urged that it’s important to quantify who will be replaced if agentic AI gains prominence and what will change when there is widespread adoption of Nvidia‘s most advanced chips.

Cramer admitted he’s largely focused on how AI could take over more undesirable jobs, ones that may be uninteresting or dangerous. It’s hard to fathom what AI can accomplish, he continued, because few in the industry want to attract adverse publicity by discussing how many jobs could be eliminated. He pointed out that Salesforce‘s Marc Benioff alleged AI agents aren’t meant to replace humans — they’re meant to make them more productive.

Cramer countered that many CEOs are hyper-cognizant that human workers are expensive. C-suite leaders don’t want to adopt agentic AI to make employees more productive — they want to fire people and save money, Cramer said. Few will pitch such an “unpalatable” notion to the general public, he continued.

Cramer again referenced Amodei’s recent comments to Axios, where the AI developer suggested the new technology could bring about a future where “cancer is cured, the economy grows at 10% a year, the budget is balanced, and 20% of people don’t have jobs.” To Cramer, that’s “a lot of positives very much balanced out by one huge negative.”

“Now, obviously, nobody really knows what’s going to happen,” he said. “But we can talk to the people who matter, including Benioff and Jensen Huang, the CEO of Nvidia, to see what they have to say.”

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Disclaimer The CNBC Investing Club Charitable Trust owns share of Nvidia and Salesforce.