Silicon Valley is madly building AI agents to augment human labor. If such agents work as intended, a whole swath of jobs could become extinct – or close to it. AI agents are poised to displace customer service reps, sales associates, executive assistants, IT admins, junior developers, journalists. AI startup Boardy even replaces the so-called “helpful VC” by automating introductions to people.
When founders or investors are asked about the potential job displacement their tech will cause, the answer is always the same: Yes, AI will eliminate some jobs. But it will also create others.
Ensuring that it does has become VC Mike Ghaffary’s obsession. Ghaffary is best known for his time as a general partner at Canvas Ventures and previously at Social Capital. His investments include Superhuman, Strava, Faire, Optimizely, and CloudKitchens.
On Friday, Ghaffary announced exclusively to TechCrunch that he left Canvas to join Burst Capital, a VC firm founded in 2017 by a group of former Yelp execs. Burst is led by former Yelp COO Geoff Donaker. (Ghaffary and Donaker also worked together at Yelp years ago.)
At Burst, Ghaffary is looking to back companies that don’t just create jobs but create good-paying middle-class jobs for the millions of people that don’t have advanced degrees in AI and machine learning.
“As we’re seeing this job displacement, we’re actually doing something about it,” he tells TechCrunch. “I feel like there’s a lot of ‘Don’t worry. Don’t look here. AI will destroy a lot of jobs, but it will create jobs, too!’ As tech companies, we need to go create those new jobs we’re promising.”
He sees a few companies doing so by offering tech to small business owners, like Owner.com which helps mom and pop restaurant owners with marketing; or GlossGenius, which makes all-in-one booking and payments software for hairdressers.
Among his own portfolio is ResQ, which helps restaurants and hospitality businesses manage their equipment repair needs, including matching them with repair tradesmen.
But Ghaffary says the biggest gap he sees is startups using AI to create high-paying jobs. “’I’ll tell you one company I’m looking for, too, that I haven’t found: vocational training.”
He wants to see founders building startups that use AI to help people learn high-paying trades like industrial electricians or commercial plumbers, or to level up their skills in other such industries.
“That’s where AI could come in,” he says. He’d like to see an affordable plan that would offer virtual or otherwise AI-enhanced training, “almost like flight simulation” but for the “millions of people” at risk of being left behind.
“I think there’s a big opportunity,” he says. “And it’s for the sake of our country and our world. Otherwise we have this big underemployed society and it’s not good for anybody.”
