Bill Gates talks about ‘early retirement’ and future of AI with Nikhil Kamath amid reports of Microsoft layoffs

Tech billionaire and co-founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates, in a podcast with Zerodha's co-founder Nikhil Kamath, talked about the future of artificial intelligence (AI), which will free up people's time to retire early with the idea of not having to work.

Gates shared his thought process that in a world of AI, retiring at the age of 40 is not that radical in the form of an approach, but not having to work is something different than retiring early. 

“I don't have to work; I choose to work because it's fun. I take more vacations than when I was young, but it's still basically full-time work,” said Bill Gates, sharing his choice of working at the age of 69 years.

The billionaire also indicated his expectations for the future of AI for the world and how it will change things for human beings.

AI Layoffs

Bill Gates also talked about the future of the human race with artificial intelligence (AI) and robots, which will replace the need for workers shortage for jobs.

In a podcast, the billionaire highlighted how, 20 years from now, AI will have changed enough to cater to the world's white-collar and blue-collar job needs.

“Let's say 20 years from now, AI will have changed things enough that just this pure capitalistic framework probably won't explain much because AI both sort of white-collar type work and, as blue-collar workers, the robots will get some good hands and are able to do the physical things the humans do,” said Bill Gates in the podcast. 

When discussing AI, Bill Gates also noted that the world will not experience a shortage of doctors, teachers, or even factory workers after artificial intelligence makes its changes.

“Those shortages won't exist. And so it's a pretty profound change that will free up a lot of time,” Gates told Kamath.

Gates highlighted that people can retire early in their careers, and work for shorter weeks after AI changes things in the ecosystem. People might be required to rethink their choices of spending time in this world.

“You can retire early shorter work weeks, and it's going to require almost a philosophical rethink about, okay, how should time be spent? Because we don't need it to make enough food and make enough widgets and medical diagnosis, we will have created free intelligence,” said Gates. 

Microsoft Layoffs

Big Tech firm Microsoft is planning another layoff in the upcoming month for people working in middle manager roles along with low-performing employees, as the firm aims to increase the ratio of coders to non-coders on projects, reported the news portal Business Insider.

Microsoft's move aims to reduce the PM-to-engineer ratio and streamline teams, according to the report.

The report did not specify the number and other details of the potential layoffs, however the news portal indicated that it may be a significant portion of the crew.