AI job grief: A psychological crisis hitting tech workers

Work, Identity, and “Grief”

• Many resonate with the idea that AI threatens not just income but identity, especially for knowledge workers who built their sense of self around expertise.
• Others strongly reject the article’s framing that manual/manufacturing workers were less identified with their work, calling this elitist and out-of-touch; artisans, tradespeople, and farmers are cited as counterexamples.
• Some argue reactions are less “grief” and more anger and agency; framing it as grief is seen by some as demobilizing.

AIRD / Pathologizing Reactions

• The proposed term “Artificial Intelligence Replacement Dysfunction (AIRD)” is controversial.
• Critics say labeling a normal response to real economic threats as a “dysfunction” blames victims and creates new billable diagnoses.
• Others see value in naming the distress, planning to bring it to therapy.

Impact on Programming and Craft

• Several programmers describe deep sadness: work feels degraded from craft to “babysitting an unreliable text extruder” or a “microwave button pusher.”
• Some welcome LLMs as automating only the “typing” part, saying the real intellectual work remains; others argue that close contact with implementation is part of the craft and creativity itself.
• There’s fear of a future spent reviewing AI-generated slop and AI-summarized communication.

Class, Power, and Historical Context

• Commenters note tech workers showed little solidarity when earlier automation hit clerks, factory workers, and artists; now they face similar precarity.
• Several predict a “digital rust belt” and compare likely futures to neo-feudalism or “Elysium,” not Star Trek.

UBI, Automation, and Politics

• Some imagine AI-enabled abundance funding UBI and freeing people to pursue health, hobbies, and creativity.
• A large bloc is deeply skeptical: past automation gains didn’t reduce work hours or broadly share surplus; they expect owners to capture AI gains.
• UBI is widely judged politically impossible (especially in the US) or economically dubious; many fear dependence on the state and loss of bargaining power.

Quality of Discourse and “Slop”

• Multiple commenters accuse the article (and much AI writing) of being LLM-generated or “slop,” especially given heavy reliance on Reddit quotes and upvotes.
• Others find it helpful language for their own emotions despite these flaws.

Systemic Critique

• Many emphasize AI is not the root problem; management, profit-maximization, and existing inequality are.
• AI is seen as an excuse for layoffs and a force multiplier for already-dominant corporate and state power.