While artificial intelligence has long been feared as a threat to entry-level jobs, Ireland now seems to be among the first countries to actually face the wrath of this machine-led automation. A new Economic Insights paper from the Department of Finance reveals that AI is already reshaping the country’s labour market, with junior roles and younger workers in finance and technology emerging as particularly exposed. The report warns that, given Ireland’s high concentration of knowledge-intensive sectors, it could be among the first in Europe to feel the impact of AI disruption.
The detailed analysis published by the Irish finance ministry earlier this week shows early signs that AI is already impacting jobs in highly digitised sectors such as information and communications technology (ICT), financial services and professional activities.
“Ireland’s labour market is particularly exposed to AI given the high concentration of employment in knowledge-intensive sectors such as ICT, financial services and professional activities,” notes the report.
The report adds AI may already be affecting hiring trends, with “at risk” sectors seeing much slower job growth since 2023. “These effects are particularly pronounced for younger workers in highly digitised sectors, consistent with the emerging international literature,” the study notes.
The warning from the Irish ministry about ongoing AI-led disruption comes at a time when global tech leaders heading major AI teams are increasingly vocal about how the technology could reshape the world of work. Recently, Microsoft’s AI chief Mustafa Suleyman warned that most white-collar work could be fully automated within the next 12 to 18 months. He told the Financial Times that tasks involving “sitting down at a computer”, including accounting and legal work, marketing and project management, are likely to be automated by AI sooner rather than later.
Earlier, Dario Amodei, CEO of Anthropic, also predicted that AI could eliminate up to half of entry-level white-collar jobs within the next one to five years, particularly in law, finance and technology, where routine tasks are easier to automate. Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates has similarly cautioned that simply knowing how to use AI tools will not guarantee long-term job security, even for those who are skilled with them. According to Gates, only a few fields including software development, energy and biology, may remain relatively resilient to AI.
xAI CEO Elon Musk meanwhile, has argued that AI and robotics could eventually replace almost all jobs. He has described AI led the shift as a “supersonic tsunami” that could make work optional in the future. For software engineers in particular, he has recently suggested that AI will take over coding by 2026, the very task that has traditionally defined the profession.
While some leaders sound the alarm, there are also some optimistic views floating. For instance, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman believes that although AI will take some jobs, it will also create many more, with AI agents acting as virtual co-workers rather than outright replacements. Meanwhile Nvidia chief Jensen Huang argues that people won’t lose jobs to AI itself, but to those who use AI better. He predicts strong demand in physical sciences and skilled trades needed to build and maintain AI infrastructure.
