Two of the most closely watched AI leaders are pointing to the same pressure point in the labor market: the first rungs of the professional ladder. Demis Hassabis of Google Deepmind and Dario Amodei of Anthropic both say they are already seeing early signs that AI is changing how companies think about junior work.
The concern is not abstract. According to the source article, Hassabis said at the World Economic Forum that entry-level jobs and internships could be affected in 2026, while Amodei continues to warn that major parts of office work for young professionals may disappear within a short window.
Why Entry-Level Jobs Are in Focus
Entry-level jobs and internships matter because they are usually how young workers move into professional life. They are also the roles most exposed when employers believe software can handle more routine work, early drafting, analysis, coordination, or other tasks that once helped junior staff learn by doing.
Hassabis said he is already noticing the issue at Deepmind. His view, as summarized in the source, is that entry-level jobs and internships could take a hit this year. That makes 2026 a practical test of how quickly AI tools move from productivity aids to hiring constraints.
He also said the near term may not be only negative. New jobs could emerge, and some of them may be more meaningful. But his warning becomes sharper when he looks beyond the near term, because he says the arrival of AGI (artificial general intelligence) would put society in uncharted territory.
Amodei’s Warning Is Broader
Dario Amodei has been more specific about the scale of potential disruption. He is sticking with his prediction that half of office jobs for young professionals could vanish within one to five years.
The source says Amodei is also seeing this dynamic inside Anthropic. The company expects to need fewer junior and mid-level employees going forward. That point matters because it connects the public debate over AI jobs to internal planning at one of the companies building advanced AI systems.
Amodei’s timeline is also aggressive. He says AI could outperform humans at everything within one to two years, while the labor market remains slow to react. His central concern is a mismatch in speed: AI development is moving exponentially, while institutions, companies, and workers adapt more slowly.
The Labor Market May Not Move Smoothly
The clearest implication from both warnings is that the impact may arrive unevenly. Some new roles may appear, but that does not guarantee they will arrive in the same places, at the same speed, or for the same people whose opportunities shrink.
For young professionals, the challenge is especially direct. If companies need fewer junior and mid-level employees, the traditional path from internship to first office job to more experienced work becomes less certain. The source does not describe which roles would be most affected, so the safest conclusion is broader: the early-career labor market is where these AI leaders expect pressure to show first.
That pressure could create several practical questions for employers and policymakers:
- How do companies train future experienced workers if they hire fewer junior people?
- What kinds of new jobs are likely to be meaningful rather than temporary?
- How quickly can the labor market respond if AI capabilities improve faster than expected?
- What support is needed if internships and entry-level roles become harder to access?
Those questions follow from the warnings, but the source also shows that there is no settled answer. Hassabis points to the possibility of new work in the near term. Amodei emphasizes the risk that the pace of AI progress will outstrip society’s ability to adjust.
Governments and Economists Face a Timing Problem
Hassabis criticized governments and economists for failing to grasp the scale of the changes ahead. That criticism is important because labor market disruption is not only a company-level issue. If entry-level jobs and internships weaken, the effects can spread into education, hiring, wage growth, and career formation.
The difficulty is timing. Traditional labor market responses often depend on gradual change. But the concern from Amodei is that AI is developing at an exponential pace. If that view proves right, slow reaction may become part of the problem.
For now, the source article presents a narrow but significant signal: leaders at Google Deepmind and Anthropic are not only predicting disruption from AI. They say they are already seeing early signs of it inside their own organizations.
That does not mean every entry-level job disappears, or that every internship is immediately at risk. The source does not support that conclusion. It does mean that 2026 is being framed by major AI executives as a year when early-career work may become one of the first visible tests of how AI changes the office economy.