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AI Dependency Leading to 'Intellectual Atrophy' Among Workforce, Says Sol Rashidi - Bloomberg Radio
Apr 13, 2026 Latest Videos from Bloomberg Radio
Sol Rashidi, Chief Strategy Officer at Cyera and Senior Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School, discusses the labor market impact of widespread AI adoption.
Businesses are increasingly using artificial intelligence as models improve, yet performance can falter at even basic tasks, according to an annual index.
About 88% of organizations used AI for at least one business use last year, Stanford University’s HAI’s 2026 Ai Index, which is being released Monday, found. That’s 10 percentage points more than 2024.
“Of those that used AI, 79% of respondents reported that their organizations regularly use generative AI in at least one business function, compared to 71% in 2024,” according to the study. Stanford tracks and collates data from various surveys and studies for its index.
The largest use of AI is in “knowledge management” among business, legal and professional services and software engineering at 58%. “Functions tied to information processing, software, customer engagement, and internal knowledge work reported higher adoption than areas such as strategy and corporate finance and risk and compliance, where uptake remains low across most sectors,” the report said.
The most sophisticated AI models now can do as well or better than human performance on Ph.D. level science questions, complex reasoning and in math competitions, the report said. “But telling time reliably, or for example, performance we see on finance tax and legal benchmarks are not as high,” said Sha Sajadieh, AI Index Manager at Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence.
Unreliable Agent
AI agents, sophisticated models that can work autonomously, are still catching on among businesses.
“The opportunity around agents still remains for them to do a lot of multi-step tasks and really support organizations in several different functions,” Sajadieh said. “Yet adoption is low because of the fact that the performance of agents has not yet measured up to the level of accuracy and reliability.”
The study found early signs AI use is affecting the job market “showing up in hiring pipelines, among younger workers, and within specific business functions.”
About a third of organizations surveyed expect AI to reduce their workforce in the coming year. Reductions are likely in service operations, supply chain and software engineering.
“We still need some more time to see the full effects on the labor markets,” Sajadieh said.
Sol Rashidi, Chief Strategy Officer at Cyera and Senior Fellow at Harvard Kennedy School, discusses the labor market impact of widespread AI adoption.
Businesses are increasingly using artificial intelligence as models improve, yet performance can falter at even basic tasks, according to an annual index.
About 88% of organizations used AI for at least one business use last year, Stanford University’s HAI’s 2026 Ai Index, which is being released Monday, found. That’s 10 percentage points more than 2024.
“Of those that used AI, 79% of respondents reported that their organizations regularly use generative AI in at least one business function, compared to 71% in 2024,” according to the study. Stanford tracks and collates data from various surveys and studies for its index.
The largest use of AI is in “knowledge management” among business, legal and professional services and software engineering at 58%. “Functions tied to information processing, software, customer engagement, and internal knowledge work reported higher adoption than areas such as strategy and corporate finance and risk and compliance, where uptake remains low across most sectors,” the report said.
The most sophisticated AI models now can do as well or better than human performance on Ph.D. level science questions, complex reasoning and in math competitions, the report said. “But telling time reliably, or for example, performance we see on finance tax and legal benchmarks are not as high,” said Sha Sajadieh, AI Index Manager at Stanford’s Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence.
Unreliable Agent
AI agents, sophisticated models that can work autonomously, are still catching on among businesses.
“The opportunity around agents still remains for them to do a lot of multi-step tasks and really support organizations in several different functions,” Sajadieh said. “Yet adoption is low because of the fact that the performance of agents has not yet measured up to the level of accuracy and reliability.”
The study found early signs AI use is affecting the job market “showing up in hiring pipelines, among younger workers, and within specific business functions.”
About a third of organizations surveyed expect AI to reduce their workforce in the coming year. Reductions are likely in service operations, supply chain and software engineering.
“We still need some more time to see the full effects on the labor markets,” Sajadieh said.