Bill Gates, the founder Microsoft, recently appeared on The Tonight Show with Jimmy Fallon. Gates had some thoughts on how artificial intelligence (AI) will influence us in the next 10 years. His comments were brief, but he brought up ideas that deserve some consideration. Let’s talk about some of his predictions, because I have questions.

Two-day Workweek

Bill Gates thinks we may only have a 2-3 day workweek as AI takes over more tasks that humans once did. Sounds good to me! Where do I sign up?

But, I also have questions.

If I’m only needed 2 days a week, am I really needed at all? What type of job will need a human to only come in 2 days a week? Or would it be more like a 5 day work week, but you only work a couple hours. And if I work that little, how much am I getting paid? And is that enough to cover my bills? Will I need 2 or 3 of these 2-day jobs?

Job Takeover

He sees jobs like doctors and teachers as potentially being taken over by AI. I do think some jobs, like in accounting, could be easily automated. Although I do still see a need to have CPAs to oversee some things and deal with specialized cases.

I work in a healthcare adjacent field, so I know that a lot of people often focus on a doctor’s intelligence. However, a critical part of their profession is their humanity. Can they understand their patients and have empathy for their condition? Is that something we expect AI to do just as well or even better than humans? If so, what does that say about humans?

Teaching as well is a job with a lot of human interaction. Do we expect computers to inspire younger generations? And what should they aspire to given the next topic.

Will Humans be Needed?

Gates doesn’t think we will need humans for most things. So what does that mean. Will we just have a bunch of leisure time? Will we all make up our own jobs to do?

Gates thinks there will be things that we decide we want humans to do, like play baseball.

I imagine we will still need humans to make more humans. But what will those humans do? We will certainly need to teach them how to be human and get along, but a lot of the things we normally taught each other will much more easily be done by AI at some point.

If we cede a lot of our tasks, our functions, our purpose, what will be left. It could be a wonderful opportunity to have day after day of leisure and self-directed activities. It could also be a meaningless existence filled with the monotony of nothing to do. I guess like anything in life, it will be up to each of us to make the most of the time we have.

Of course all of these comments were part of a much broader conversation that Gates was having in a fairly relaxed and fun forum. At some point though, we do need to have the conversation about what is coming next for all of us with AI. We will need to decide how humans and AI will exist and coexist.

Explore More

https://www.cnbc.com/2025/03/26/bill-gates-on-ai-humans-wont-be-needed-for-most-things.html

https://www.popularmechanics.com/science/a64317797/bill-gates-ai-dominance

https://fortune.com/2025/03/27/billionaire-bill-gates-two-day-workweek-ai-replacing-humans