William Gould, one of the nation’s leading experts on employment, sees artificial intelligence as a “locomotive coming down the tracks” with countless jobs in its path. He offers one major takeaway: “We’re not ready.”

The Stanford University law school emeritus professor, who headed the U.S. National Labor Relations Board from 1994 to 1998 and the California Agricultural Labor Relations Board from 2014 to 2017, has spent his lengthy career studying labor and anti-discrimination law.

His work has taken him to Washington, D.C., Detroit, London and South Africa. This news organization met with Gould at Stanford Law, where in 1972 he became the first Black professor, after working as a visiting professor at Harvard University. Gould shed light on the looming threat to employment from artificial intelligence, possible social upheaval from massive job losses, and how topping up income through “wage insurance” for workers pushed by AI into lower-paying jobs may provide a partial solution.

Gould, author of the recently published memoir "Those Who Travail and Are Heavy Laden," also discussed pushback against diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, along with the state of the labor movement, and White South Africans coming to the U.S. as refugees under the administration of President Donald Trump. His remarks have been edited for length and clarity.

Q: Every major industrial revolution has eliminated some jobs and created new ones. With AI, is it different this time?

A: The breadth and depth of it are different. It is going to affect so many traditional tasks. Some have already been affected. Thus far we really haven’t seen much in the way of loss of jobs. But it’s coming. What’s going to become of young people who are just coming out of school and who are looking for work and who don’t have a college education? What frightens me is, as a society, we seem to be focused on how big is it and what kind of jobs will be affected, rather than preparing the adequate safety net we’re going to need to confront whatever change takes place.

Q: What do you expect would be the effects of large-scale job losses?

A: Obviously, divisiveness, maybe racial and religious divisiveness. Looking at this morning’s newspapers … a number of political people are saying that the United States is not for Muslims, and the Republican leadership refuses to rebuke that. You just have to multiply that. Look what happened in the 1930s at the time of the Great Depression. This is what created the New Deal, this is what created the labor movement, this is what created the concept of shared prosperity. But don’t forget, coming with that agenda were the most wild and hateful type of movements … the Ku Klux Klan.

Q: What’s standing in the way of ensuring people displaced by AI will be reasonably supported and retrained?

A: The lack of political will and the increased inequality that exists in our society, and the influence that is reflected in that increased inequality: We’re in a period where the billionaire class has obtained control over the workings of government, and perhaps ultimately much of our avenues of communication. Thus far we haven’t had very much that can really be characterized as … AI dislocation, but it does appear to be coming and we’re not ready for it. We’re the only industrialized country in the world which does not provide for substantial wage insurance going for years, and providing for retraining and relocation.

Q: What would wage insurance for people whose jobs are replaced by AI involve?

A: We’ve had legislation … purporting to provide pay to workers who are dislocated as a result of trade issues, competition from foreign companies. The Republicans fought it, and it’s died. What wage insurance does is to take the kind of concept which was enacted by Congress in the early ’70s and apply it to a different cause for layoffs, the technological innovation which eliminates work. The European countries, particularly the Scandinavian countries, have led the way in providing wage protection for workers who are laid off because of technological innovation.

Q: It sounds very expensive — how would the U.S. pay for that?

A: It will be expensive. Surely a country that can spend a billion dollars a day on a war of choice can afford a modest commitment for a safety net to protect workers whose jobs are lost as a result of AI.

Q: You’ve been working for fair workplaces for decades. What’s changed for organized labor?

A: The primary reason we have union decline is the ossification of the movement. The movement has become bureaucratic. You don’t have unions committed to bringing in new young people. The other problem is this AI locomotive coming down the tracks, which is going to wreak havoc for workers. I don’t see any kind of sustained national effort along the lines of providing for protection for workers from the consequences.

Q: You were the first Black professor at Stanford law school, and you wrote in your memoir about being referred to, in today’s language, as a “diversity hire.” What do you see happening now, with DEI programs being described as discrimination against White people?

A: We heard these kinds of arguments at the time when civil rights legislation was first considered in the 50s and 60s. Anyone who doesn’t get the advance in life that they thought they would’ve had or are entitled to will be induced to blame it on the advance of Blacks who are being helped by anti-discrimination legislation. The great strength of this country was presumed to be that we could bring together people of different races and religions and national origins that could function with one another as human beings. We have made some measure of progress but the danger is that this pushback against it now, this attempt to reverse it … is designed to do the exact opposite, to exacerbate tensions, to exacerbate divisions because some politicians have seen great ability to gain influence and power for themselves as a result of it. We’re certainly right now going backwards in a hurry.

Q: You met Nelson Mandala in South Africa: What do you make of white South Africans being allowed to enter the U.S. as refugees?

A: It brings to mind most readily George Orwell’s "1984" — just the world is upside down. There is no discrimination against Whites in South America. There’s a big crime problem in South Africa, and whites as well as blacks are victimized by that. South Africa has more than its share of problems. I think that anyone who’s read and been alive and functioned during this period of time knows this, and this is political grandstanding by the Trump administration.

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