Artificial Lawyer: “AI will create more jobs than it displaces by boosting economic growth, and in particular more legal jobs will be created than lost in the long run, says a major report by Big Four firm, PwC. The study was focused on the UK, which is a useful standard model to compare to other large, highly developed economies. The key finding was that over the next 20 years AI and automation will radically impact the economy ‘displacing’ 7 million roles nationally, but also creating 7.2 million new roles, i.e. a net boost to employment. The main area of losses will be manufacturing, which will see a quarter of jobs disappear in the next 20 years. But, for lawyers it’s an interesting picture (see table below for full details of different employment types). Artificial Lawyer spoke to PwC about the results and they stated that lawyers would be classed in the ‘Professional, scientific and technical’ segment of the economy. Though an amalgamated group, PwC therefore suggests that some legal roles will see a 33% increase, while other types of role decline by 18%, giving a net increase of 16% (when figures are rounded). The AI data, which is contained in the new edition of PwC’s regular UK Economic Outlook, does not get into granular reasons for why or how AI will change the legal jobs outlook. But here are some thoughts from Artificial Lawyer…”