People Need to Calm Down Over AI’s Disruptions

Go ahead, keep chugging the 'AI soda' from the straw the machine has handed you, while screaming about the aftertaste;

Nick Kossovan ——Bio and Archives--March 16, 2026

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CEOs have a fiduciary responsibility to use AI.

If that sentence makes your blood boil, that's a positive sign. It shows you're finally paying attention. However, before you grab your pitchfork and head to Silicon Valley, look at the device in your hand. 

You’re holding the very weapon that’s in the process of dismantling the middle-class workforce, which you're likely using to order a latte, text banter with [whomever] or scroll through feeds curated by the same algorithms you claim to despise.

We’ve entered an era where human labour is no longer the cornerstone of enterprise; it's a legacy cost, a line item to be aggressively optimized or erased entirely. CEOs aren't villains in a sci-fi thriller; they're the mechanics of an evolutionary engine that we—the consumers—have been fueling with every click, every "smart" shortcut, and every demand for instant gratification. The disruption isn't coming; it's here, it's logical, and frankly, it's exactly what we asked for.

For decades, companies relied on a thick, expensive layer of white-collar workers to act as human glue. These were the employees who coordinated information, tracked progress, and assembled reports. They were the logistical choreography of the office. Then came outsourcing—call centres moved, factories relocated, and admin tasks went wherever they could be done for the lowest price. Today, the "lowest price" isn't a worker in a different time zone; it's a line of code that doesn't sleep, doesn't ask for a raise, doesn't require a benefits package, coffee in the lunchroom and doesn't keep demanding more.

In the eyes of C-suite executives, AI isn't a "tech experiment"; it's a surgical tool for efficiency. When three marketers, working with generative tools, can now accomplish the work that previously required ten, or one analyst can outpace five using automated data extraction, a CEO would be bordering on professional negligence not to cut the surplus. Arvind Krishna, CEO of IBM, once said, "AI is first going to replace the back-office functions," and later added that for certain roles, "there is no doubt that the total number of........

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