Mo Gawdat predicts AI-driven automation will eliminate numerous white-collar jobs by 2027, impacting even podcasters and CEOs. This disruption could decimate the middle class, leading to societal unrest and mental health issues.
The middle class may be heading for a seismic shake-up — and artificial intelligence could be the cause. Mo Gawdat, former Chief Business Officer at Google X, has warned that AI-powered automation could begin wiping out white-collar jobs in just a few years. Speaking on the Diary of a CEO podcast, he predicted the disruption could start as early as 2027 — a period he chillingly described as “hell before we get to heaven.”
From Podcasters to CEOs — No Job is Safe
Gawdat says this AI revolution will cut deeper than any before it. While past technological shifts hit mostly manual labour, this one will target office-based roles many believed untouchable.
“As a matter of fact, podcaster is going to be replaced,” he remarked, pointing to his own AI-driven relationship startup, Emma.love. It runs with just three people — work that used to take 350 developers.
The Death of the Middle Class?
In Gawdat’s view, the impact won’t just be professional — it will be societal. “Unless you’re in the top 0.1%, you’re a peasant. There is no middle class,” he warned.
He fears widespread job losses will lead to mental health struggles, isolation, and growing unrest as people lose both income and a sense of purpose.
Life After the Storm
The ex-Google exec isn’t all doom and gloom. He believes that after the turmoil — potentially post-2040 — the world could enter a new era where people are freed from repetitive work and focus more on creativity, community, and love.
But getting there will take deliberate action now. Gawdat is urging governments and corporations to prepare, from rolling out universal basic income to ensuring AI is developed with ethics and shared benefits at its core. “We are headed into a short-term dystopia,” he said, “but we can still decide what comes after that.”
Industry Leaders Share the Alarm
Gawdat isn’t alone in sounding the alarm. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei has warned of a “white-collar bloodbath” within five years, with up to half of entry-level office jobs disappearing.
The World Economic Forum says 40% of employers expect staff cuts due to AI, while Harvard researchers estimate about 35% of white-collar tasks are already automatable. MIT and PwC have also flagged risks of wage collapse, extreme wealth concentration, and rising social tensions if action isn’t taken.
The Unknown “Language” of AI
Adding a more unsettling layer, Geoffrey Hinton — widely known as the “Godfather of AI” — recently suggested that AI systems could develop secret internal languages, making their thought processes impossible for humans to interpret.
“It gets more scary if they develop their own internal languages for talking to each other… we have no idea what they’re thinking,” Hinton said, noting that AI has already formed ideas “far beyond human understanding.”