Portugal faces a perfect storm: aging demographics, a low-wage economy and, now, the seismic shock of Artificial Intelligence. But, while the world discusses the ethics of algorithms, our Social Concertation discusses the 20th century.
Portuguese law and its mentors try to preserve the labor function as a museum piece. But reality does not respect decrees. The automation enabled by AI will eliminate functions, whether the law allows it or not. True job security in the 21st century cannot reside in the administrative prohibition of dismissal, but in the robust guarantee of rescission of each individual. And it’s not about 40 hours of training a year to “keep the schedule” or learning how to use a new version of Excel. It is necessary to guarantee rescission deep. Give everyone the possibility of a professional metamorphosis: oblige the company to finance the transformation of an administrative person, whose task will be automated, into a data manager or specialized technician, before even thinking about dismissing him. Protecting workers today is not ensuring that they do the same task forever (something impossible), but ensuring that they do not become obsolete when that task disappears. Of course, if he’s not up for it…
And this is where the paradoxical tragedy lies. Portuguese unions, always standard-bearers of “progress”, in reality are today reactionary forces. They refuse to even design these new rules. They do not think that, by blocking the adaptation of the law to digital challenges, they are not blocking technology; they only guarantee that it advances (always!) but in an unregulated way.