‘Human is the master’: labour chief says AI is reshaping jobs, not ending them

Soft skills and deep domain knowledge will decide how far young workers go in the age of artificial intelligence, Hong Kong’s labour chief has said, predicting that demand for AI practitioners with both technical capability and professional expertise will grow three- to fourfold.

Rejecting fears that automation will replace the human workforce, Secretary for Labour and Welfare Chris Sun Yuk-han dismissed the claim as a “zero-sum game”, stressing that the future lay in close collaboration between humans and machines.

Speaking on the second day of the Global University Presidents and Leaders Summit on Wednesday, Sun said it was clear that AI was destroying some jobs while creating others and that demand for AI practitioners was rising.