OpenAI chief Sam Altman says AI will reshape jobs — but society will adapt

In an interview with The Indian Express, Altman dismissed fears of mass job loss, drawing parallels with the Industrial Revolution.

“I love to read the history of technology. People panicked about jobs during the Industrial Revolution, and they were shockingly wrong,” he said.

Altman acknowledged that significant disruption is inevitable but argued that change may unfold more gradually than many predict.

“The change won’t be as fast as some people in society predict. But eventually people will find new things to do,” he said.

Highlighting the difficulty of forecasting future careers, Altman added: “None of them (at the time) thought I’m going to be CEO of an AI company, certainly none of them thought they would be YouTube influencers."

He emphasised that certain skills will remain valuable regardless of technological shifts — including fluency with AI tools, resilience, adaptability, understanding what people need, being useful to others, and the ability to collaborate effectively.

At the same time, Altman cautioned against underestimating the scale of transformation ahead.

“I think it’s useless to pretend there won’t be a big change. The change won’t be as fast as some people in the AI industry predict, because societies always have more inertia. It always takes longer, but eventually the change will be huge. And we’ll find all sorts of things too," he said.

Altman was in India to attend the India–AI Impact Summit 2026, where he also met Prime Minister Narendra Modi to discuss the country’s growing AI ecosystem.

After the meeting, Altman wrote on X: “Great meeting with PM @narendramodi today to talk about the incredible energy around AI in India.”

He also noted that India is OpenAI’s fastest-growing market for Codex globally.

“India is our fastest growing market for Codex globally, up 4x in weekly users in the past two weeks alone,” Altman posted.

Modi described the interaction as “a very good meeting indeed,” adding on X: “India is making immense strides in the world of AI. We invite the world to invest in our talented youth and add vigour to this sector.”