New Delhi: Doomsday predictions of artificial intelligence causing massive white-collar job losses haven’t come to pass. At least not yet. There is, however, evidence that AI tools, while helping experts become more productive, are hollowing out the skills that young people acquire early in their careers. This divergence may be showing up as a big jump in “quiet quitting” — a lack of meaningful workplace connection — even in an economy like India’s, where youth are starved of decent employment.
A wave of emotional detachment is sweeping corporations. According to Gallup’s State of the Global Workplace survey, employee engagement declined for a second year in 2025 to its lowest level since 2020. India is mimicking the trend, with barely 23% of staff feeling invested in their roles. A staggering 59% are doing just enough to survive. The rest have switched off entirely.
This disengagement carries a heavy price tag. China’s “lying flat” generation, which is opting out of the economic race to settle for mediocre workplace success and modest consumer fulfilment, has parental wealth to fall back on. India is a lot poorer, and its Gen Z population of 400 million is the country’s final shot at prosperity before it turns old.
Yet graduate unemployment rates are as high as 40%, and anger over educational quality and exam integrity is spilling into the streets as so-called “cockroach” protests. If the job waiting at the end of a long struggle becomes a further source of disappointment, trouble lies ahead for both the economy and society.
To what extent is AI driving this ennui? For a plausible answer, look at India’s biggest success story of the past quarter-century: software. The share of employers looking to recruit fresh IT talent was moving steadily higher before generative models arrived. It rose from 57% in the first half of 2022 to 67% a year later, according to the biannual career-outlook report by TeamLease EdTech, a Mumbai-based skilling firm.
Then ChatGPT arrived. Amid uncertainty over what automation meant for human labor, employers switched to wait-and-watch mode, with only 42% to 45% expressing interest in hiring through 2024. That figure recovered sharply to 81% earlier this year, before moderating to 76% in the most recent survey.
Recruitment intentions may have stabilized for now, but the content of jobs on offer continues to churn rapidly. TeamLease’s data show that in 2022, there was strong demand for software programmers, IT support analysts and junior blockchain developers.
By 2025, advertised positions were focused on AI. This year’s demand is centered on building AI applications, such as taking a Chinese open-weight large language model like Qwen and plugging it into existing workflows like marketing campaigns. The survey found that employers are increasingly expecting basic AI fluency even outside specialist roles.
Business leaders have a clear imperative: Staff who deploy these tools complete tasks faster, often delivering superior output. But while algorithms boost efficiency, do they allow fresh recruits to build lasting domain expertise? A field experiment by David Autor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and researchers from Google gives strong reason for doubt.
Autor’s team provided a drafting assistant to practicing US patent attorneys for three months. While using the software, document quality improved. But when researchers subsequently tested everyone on an unassisted, offline task to gauge internalized judgment, the learning gains went entirely to senior lawyers. Junior lawyers showed no net improvement. “Foundational expertise may be a prerequisite for extracting durable skill from AI-assisted practice,” the paper concluded.
Take all these data and findings together, and a troubling picture is emerging. Engineers with, say, seven to 10 years of pre-AI experience in software development have the basic expertise. Companies will expect them to manage swarms of AI agents that will be executing more sophisticated tasks. But while they do that, who will mentor the fresh recruits and help them build skills?
That isn’t all. As Gallup’s research shows, managers are the biggest drivers of employee engagement. Yet in India, the managers themselves are feeling lost, bored, or both. Their enthusiasm is still higher than that of individual contributors, but it’s fading faster.
In Gallup’s estimates, disillusion with work is already costing India $351 billion annually. By hollowing out skill formation, AI is bound to increase those productivity losses. India needs to be on watch. At its current level of development, the most-populous nation simply can’t afford a situation where unemployed Gen Z youths shout loudly for a middle-class life, while those on the career ladder quietly check out.
This column reflects the personal views of the author and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of the editorial board or Bloomberg LP and its owners.
Andy Mukherjee is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering industrial companies and financial services in Asia. Previously, he worked for Reuters, the Straits Times and Bloomberg News
This report is auto generated from the Bloomberg news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.
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