McKinsey: AI automated 12% of job tasks. Net employment is flat.
New AI-related job categories are growing almost as fast as old ones shrink — but the distribution is deeply uneven.
McKinsey's March 2026 report found 12% of job tasks have been automated by AI in two years. In the same period, 8% of new job categories were AI-related. Net employment is approximately flat — with enormous variation by occupation and income.
The jobs being eliminated are not the same as the jobs being created. The people losing roles are not the people filling new ones.
Flat employment is not a comfort when your specific job is in the 12%.
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SO WHAT?
Map which tasks in your team are in the 12% that AI has already automated elsewhere — then decide whether to automate them or differentiate them. The jobs that survive become more human, not more efficient.
Map which tasks in your team are in the 12% that AI has already automated elsewhere — then decide whether to automate them or differentiate them. The jobs that survive become more human, not more efficient.
Source: McKinsey Global Institute