Are entry level jobs dead thanks to AI?

For this week’s No More Ls column, we’re looking at the jobs and industries that artificial intelligence (AI) may come after.

It can feel like artificial intelligence isn’t a good thing, especially for young working Canadians, recent grads or those new to the workforce—the people who probably felt they were promised great careers if they got the right training. How do you get a job or choose a career path when it feels like all of the entry-level positions are being blocked off by executives hellbent on discovering how large language models can cut costs and headcount?

It’s a complicated question. The answer, as always with labour data, is convoluted. Those who spoke to The Get for this story say we first need to zoom out to see the bigger picture.

What does the data say?

When you compare AI’s disruption of the job market to previous shifts, like the rise of personal computers in knowledge work or the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, it doesn’t look all that different, says Ken Chatoor, the director of research and strategic foresight for the Labour Market Information Council, an organization that works with provincial and federal partners to gather and make sense of labour data and conditions in Canada. After all, did video truly kill the radio star? (Search this ’80s pop song, if you want to relate to your grandparents.)   

“The displacement of workers by AI that we have been seeing so far is no different than what we've seen from any of those previous disruptions of the past 40 years,” says Chatoor. “I think we need to be really cautious about saying jobs are disappearing, because right now we’re just not seeing that.” 

And he has the stats to back that up. He points to studies, including a 2024 analysis by Statistics Canada researchers that looks at the extent of AI impacts on various occupations in Canada. Labour-market research often groups jobs into three distinct categories: 

1. Jobs with low exposure to AI—for example, cooks or firefighters. 
2. AI-complementary jobs, where the technology is useful, but the human is still integral to the work existing. Jobs in this category include those in healthcare and engineering.
3. Jobs deemed high exposure and low complementary, where AI could automate large swathes of the job. This category includes web designers and various types of administrators. 

People are losing their jobs, but the how and the why is much murkier than some headlines suggest. AI is complicating how people train for work and how jobs are being advertised, but it’s unclear how those shifts will play out long term.

The assumption that jobs that rely on practical skills and jobs in the trades are automatically more insulated from AI is at least partially correct, but experts say job fluctuations caused by AI are hard to separate from other market factors, including an aging population in the trades. 

How policy will be part of the picture

Young and newer workers are facing a multi-faceted challenge in the age of generative AI expansion but these problems aren’t new, they’ve just been repackaged as AI expands, says Rachel Pettigrew, a researcher with the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. “The barriers to entry level work include lack of networks, lack of early experience, credential inflation and precarious contracts. Those aren’t new problems. They’re structural features of a labour market that was already failing young people.”

She adds that the combination of many challenges, which include market pressures, like recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic and more recent tariff uncertainty, creates this catastrophe narrative around entry level jobs and AI. Those with the most to lose who are often at the most risk, despite AI’s usefulness for some upper-level execs. In many industries, the last one in the door is the first one out and this impact can be compounded for marginalized workers. 

“The sky isn’t always falling at the same time and in the same place. There are groups that are more vulnerable, and there are groups that are more insulated,” says Pettigrew. “But for young workers, for racialized workers, women in admin roles, there are larger structural issues of them not being protected and their work not being valued.”.

Pettigrew adds that it’s important for Canadian workers, employers, politicians and decision makers to understand that there’s only so far retraining can go. “We have to be honest also about the limits of the retraining rhetoric. Because people choose their careers for reasons of income, autonomy and identity. So, any policy that treats workers as interchangeable with AI will fail. We need retraining programs that work because the destination jobs are actually good jobs.”

What to do next

If you’re feeling the weight of these workforce conversations around AI, and the possible impact on your present or future career path, both Chatoor and Pettigrew recommend leaning into personal connections and career training resources in the age of AI expansion, in order to have a better shot at landing the job you want. 

Chatoor suggests engaging with the career services department at your school, if you’re a post-secondary student or a recent graduate, and gathering as much information as you can about the places you want to work. “Any kind of work experience will help you. And do informational interviews—a coffee chat with someone who’s working at a place that seems interesting to you. Those interpersonal connections can be really important when people are going through resumes,” Chatoor says. And if you want AI on your resume, list any courses or part-time jobs you’ve used it as a tool.

For Pettigrew, when it comes to finding a job that is better insulated from AI, their advice is to look at those that require person-to-person skills and experiences. “Prioritize roles where human judgment is irreplaceable. Jobs with physical presence, if that’s possible, and with focus on relationship building. These are less likely to be substituted by AI. So, healthcare trades, community services and education. And get experience any way you can.”

So, is the sky falling on entry level jobs? Maybe for some, but not everywhere and not all at once. 

Read more from this issue of The Get:

1. Why gas prices are only part of what’s pushing grocery prices
2. MVP: Karia Samaroo on why you’ve got cryptocurrency all wrong
3. With issues like the war in Iran and tariffs, how screwed is our generation?
4. True or False: You can’t say no to a wedding