This Is Why You’re Drowning in Busywork

By Carl Benedikt Frey

Dr. Frey is an economist at the University of Oxford and the author of the book “How Progress Ends: Technology, Innovation and the Fate of Nations.”

My wife and I recently found a rat in our garden. Normally I would have called an exterminator, but instead, I turned to ChatGPT, which suggested that I set up a cage trap baited with meat. I did and felt a small surge of satisfaction — the satisfaction of handling something yourself, without paying a professional and without waiting for one to show up. (It didn’t work; the rat ignored the trap.)

The lived experience of an Oxford academic does not usually generalize well, but I know I’m not the only one who has recently become my own exterminator,........

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