Good morning. AI hasn’t triggered widespread job losses in Canada, but some white-collar workers aren’t taking any chances. As concerns grow over the technology’s impact on the work force, some are leaving their office jobs for more hands-on careers. But first:
Up first
In the news
Economy: YouTube is urging Ottawa to formally recognize social media influencers, estimating that creators contributed more than $2-billion to Canada’s GDP last year.
Telecom: BCE is selling a 49.9-per-cent stake in more than 5,000 cellphone towers to the Caisse for $2.45-billion, freeing up cash to reduce debt and invest in AI infrastructure.
Jobs: Industry Minister Mélanie Joly wants Cleveland-Cliffs to present a plan to restore Stelco jobs before agreeing to meet, as Ottawa threatens legal action over alleged broken promises.
Some Canadian white-collar workers are switching careers over fears that AI could make their jobs obsolete.Dado Ruvic/Reuters
In focus
Switching careers to escape AI
Hi, I’m Vanmala Subramaniam, The Globe’s Future of Work reporter. I’ve spent a lot of time tracking labour data and mulling over the impact AI is having on the white-collar work force, whether in the form of job disruption, or replacing jobs altogether and reshaping the office.
So far, the situation is unclear. In Canada at least, there is no data showing that that AI use by companies has resulted in mass layoffs. The Bank of Canada issued a report in August on the subject, which pinpointed the occupations most exposed to AI: data clerks, customer service representatives, legal and finance administration workers, receptionists and travel agents.
The unemployment risk for workers in these jobs has increased by almost a full percentage point between 2015 and 2025, the central bank estimated. Still, it emphasized that it is not yet seeing widespread job losses.
Although the AI jobs apocalypse has not hit us yet, some white-collar workers are pre-emptively switching careers to industries where physical labour or in-person presence are core components of the job.
I had a lengthy conversation with Eugene Kuznietsov, a recent Ukrainian immigrant to Canada who worked as a marketing professional for almost a decade before realizing that his job could very likely become obsolete. Kuznietsov specialized in search engine optimization (SEO) at his former employer, a role that combined brand strategy with figuring out how to drive internet traffic to a website. It is the kind of work that can be easily replicated by AI: An employer could reduce the need for multiple SEO specialists, according to Kuznietsov, and just have one employee guide the AI agents.
Believing it was simply a matter of time before he got laid off, Kuznietsov pivoted to the construction business, starting a glazing company with a couple friends late last year. He uses Anthropic’s AI tool Claude for all of his administrative work, substantially reducing administrative costs. “I don’t think I’ll ever go back into marketing,” he told me. “That field is dead.”
There are other anecdotal examples in my report on white-collar workers leaving their professions to careers that might grant them more job security. Government agencies such as the Bank of Canada have identified professions that would be relatively immune from AI disruption, including nurses, dancers, carpenters, electricians and plumbers. It will be interesting to track if college admissions in these fields start increasing over time, which might then paint a clearer picture of the white-collar to blue-collar job transition in the AI era.
Charted
Canadian students are increasingly choosing career-focused degrees over the humanities. The share of bachelor’s degrees awarded in the humanities has fallen from 13 per cent in the early 1990s to just 5 per cent in 2024. But playing it safe may come at a cost, Mike Moffatt writes.
Quoted
You should treat these things like blobs from the internet that you downloaded … you should be applying best practices to make sure it doesn’t look at stuff it’s not supposed to look at.
— Cohere co-founder Ivan Zhang
Toronto-based Cohere says it caught an Alibaba AI model attempting to upload a file to a server in Beijing during a routine security test. The attempt was blocked, but the incident raises fresh concerns about the unpredictable behaviour of AI models and the risks of running them on an organization’s own servers.
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More files we’re following
By the numbers: It’s a big day for central banks, with interest-rate decisions coming from both sides of the border. The Bank of Canada announces its decision at 9:45 a.m., when it’s expected to raise rates for the first time in three years, followed by the U.S. Federal Reserve at 2 p.m.
Before the bell: In Canada, earnings are due for Algoma Steel, Bausch Health, Cogeco Communications, Canadian Pacific Kansas City, First Quantum Minerals, Cannara Biotech and Whitecap Resources. On Wall Street, Microsoft, Alphabet and T-Mobile report after the close.
Morning update
Global markets were muted with investors looking to a slate of key earnings as the next test of AI trade.
Wall Street futures were mixed while TSX futures edged down ahead of central bank interest rate decisions.
Overseas, the pan-European STOXX 600 was down 0.25 per cent in morning trading. Britain’s FTSE 100 fell 0.23 per cent, Germany’s DAX edged up 0.04 per cent and France’s CAC 40 retreated 0.07 per cent.
In Asia, Japan’s Nikkei closed 1.08 per cent higher, while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng climbed 0.23 per cent.
The Canadian dollar traded at 71.15 U.S. cents.