Elon Musk Predicts AI, Robots Will Make Humans Run Out Of Jobs, Says Governments May Simply Pay People

Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk believes the rapid advancement of artificial intelligence and humanoid robots could transform the global economy to the point where people may no longer need to work because machines will be able to produce almost everything society requires.

Speaking during a conversation with XPRIZE founder Peter Diamandis at the Abundance Summit, Musk said AI-driven technology would eventually become so efficient that it would generate an overwhelming supply of goods and services, far beyond what humans could consume.

According to him, the challenge in the future may not be unemployment alone but the fact that there simply will not be enough meaningful work left for people to do.

“Yeah, it’s basically AI and robots are going to make so much stuff and provide so many services that they will actually run out of things to do for the humans.

“They’ll just run out of things to do for the humans. There’s only so much that humans can even express that they want.”

Musk suggested that if economic output grows hundreds or even thousands of times beyond its current size, human demand would eventually reach its limit while AI-powered systems continued producing at an extraordinary pace.

He argued that such a future would reshape how governments support citizens, saying he expects a shift from the idea of a universal basic income to what he described as a “universal high income.”

“I do think we’ll have universal high income. We’re basically just issuing money to people.”

Musk also dismissed fears that such an approach would automatically fuel inflation. Instead, he argued that if the production of goods and services expands much faster than the money supply, prices could actually fall.