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Will the AI backlash spill into the streets?
The answer hinges on how severe and prolonged the economic disruption becomes—particularly for jobs.
An April 2025 Pew Research report found widespread AI concern across various topics—jobs, privacy, inaccurate information, loss of human connection, the environment, and bias—but I think jobs can potentially lead to a categorically different societal reaction. Yet, each mirrors existing debates—data protection, misinformation, social-media outrage, and climate change—that have stirred headlines for years without sustained street action or sweeping federal reforms (our still-missing U.S. privacy law, for example). Two historical moments that resemble this pattern: When automated textile frames wiped out skilled jobs in the U.K. in the early 1800s, the Luddite riots turned violent enough (including killing a factory owner) that Parliament dispatched roughly 12,000 troops to restore order, which concluded with over a dozen executions.
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