Jobs for Gen Z graduates are hard to come by. To stand out, however, Jad Tarifi, the creator of Google’s first generative-AI team, cautions that getting a PhD is not the solution. Students may wind up “throwing away” years of their lives due to the rapid advancement of technology. At the same time, Bill Gates acknowledges that AI is developing at a rate that even surprises him, and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman claims ChatGPT can already perform on par with academics with PhDs.
Since AI has reduced the value of undergraduate degrees, young people are turning to higher education in order to access positions paying over $200,000 (or, in certain situations, a $100 million signing bonus). Even PhD degrees may no longer be as valuable as they once were, according to a former Google executive, so Gen Z shouldn’t be too quick to hop on the bandwagon.
By the time you get your PhD, artificial intelligence will no longer exist. By then, even problems like using AI to robotics will be resolved, according to Jad Tarifi, the creator of Google’s first generative-AI team.
In 2012, Tarifi earned his PhD in artificial intelligence at a time when the field was far less popular. However, the millennial believes that pursuing a more specialized subject related to AI, such as AI for biology, or perhaps not a degree at all, would be a better use of time.
“The traditional model of higher education is about to become outdated,” Tarifi told. “Developing distinctive viewpoints, agency, emotional awareness, and strong human ties will be more important for success in the future than accumulating credentials.
“I advise young people to concentrate on two things: the practice of developing a close relationship with others and the internal process of developing a relationship with oneself.”
Tech’s caution about education in the face of the shifting AI tide
Even pursuing legal or medical education may no longer be worthwhile for ambitious Gen Zers. Due to the length of time those degrees take to finish compared to the speed at which AI is developing, students may end up “throwing away” years of their lives, Tarifi told.
He claimed that medical school curriculums are so antiquated and rely heavily on memorization in the current healthcare system.
Tarifi is not the only one who believes that higher education is failing to adapt to the rapidly changing AI landscape. Indeed, a number of tech executives have recently voiced worries that an unprepared workforce is being created by the exorbitant cost of education combined with an antiquated curriculum.
On Theo Von’s This Past Weekend podcast, Mark Zuckerberg stated, “I don’t think college is preparing people for the jobs that they need to have today.” “I believe that’s a major problem, and all of the student loan problems are … pretty enormous.
It’s kind of controversial to say, ‘Maybe not everyone needs to go to college,’ and since many jobs don’t require that, people are probably starting to accept that view a little more now than they might have ten years ago, Zuckerberg continued.
Additionally, according to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman, his company’s AI models are already capable of performing tasks that a PhD could.
According to Altman, GPT-5 is “like speaking with a PhD-level expert on any subject.” “In no other period of history would something like GPT-5 be practically unthinkable.”
There is still a strong pipeline from PhD to six-figure job offer—for the time being.
The employment pipeline in the private sector is still robust for current PhD candidates with an interest in AI. In fact, according to MIT, 70% of all AI PhD candidates found employment in the commercial sector after graduation in 2023, up from just 20% twenty years prior.
Some academic authorities, however, are concerned about a potential “brain drain” as a result of excessive expertise choosing to work for digital companies rather than remain in academia and serve as professors to instruct the next generation.
The chair of the computer science department at the University of Chicago, Henry Hoffmann, told that he has watched his PhD candidates being courted for decades, but the salary lures have only increased. A recent dropout who had no professional experience accepted a “high six-figure” offer from ByteDance.
Hoffmann stated, “There is no reason to force students to continue when they can get the kind of job they want [as students].”
