Musk’s Latest Prediction: AI to Surpass Humans in Five Years, Enter No-Work Era in Ten Years

TradingKey - Where exactly is artificial intelligence leading the world? In the latest interview with The Economist, Elon Musk has once again put forward a highly controversial judgment.

The entrepreneur, who simultaneously helms Tesla ( TSLA ), SpaceX ( SPCX) and xAI, believes that the development of artificial intelligence is far outstripping external expectations. Within the next five years, AI's overall level of intelligence is expected to surpass that of humans, and in another ten years, humans may not even be the most dominant intelligent species on Earth.

As AI and robots continue to take over mental and physical labor, the global economy may move toward a new era of extreme abundance in production capacity, and both the meaning of work and the monetary system could undergo fundamental changes as a result.

This is also the first time he has accepted a long-form interview with major international media since SpaceX went public, drawing particular attention from the market.

AI May Surpass Humans Within Five Years

When discussing the development speed of artificial intelligence, Musk provided a clear timeline.

He projects that in about five years, overall AI capabilities will surpass human intelligence, and in around ten years, humans will likely fail to maintain absolute dominance over AI systems. However, he emphasized that this does not imply a movie-style robot takeover, but rather that AI will possess learning, analytical, and decision-making capabilities far exceeding those of humans in almost all cognitive domains.

In Musk's view, once this intelligence is integrated with robotics, a vast amount of repetitive cognitive and physical labor will be performed by machines, leading to profound transformations in manufacturing, logistics, healthcare, and even domestic services. By then, the purpose of human work will shift toward interest and creativity, rather than earning a living.

He further depicted an economic model of near-infinite supply. As robots continuously produce goods and services, society's overall productive capacity will far exceed human consumption demands, leading to an abundance of goods and a significant decline in traditional scarcity.

Based on this assessment, Musk even believes that by the mid-2030s, the importance of money could gradually diminish, as the reliance on wealth accumulation will decline when the vast majority of goods can be produced at an extremely low cost.

When pressed by the editor-in-chief of The Economist on how the economic system would be sustained if people no longer relied on work, Musk stated that governments in the future could completely distribute income to residents through fiscal transfers, while the productivity gains brought by AI might even drive down overall prices, leaving society to face deflationary rather than inflationary pressures.

AI’s Greatest Risk Is Humans Losing the Ability to Understand

While he has long warned about the existential risks of artificial intelligence, Musk’s stance this time is more complex than in the past.

He admitted that there is indeed a certain probability that advanced AI could bring catastrophic consequences, and this risk has not disappeared. However, against the backdrop of accelerating global technological competition, the development of AI is almost irreversible, making it difficult for any country or enterprise to voluntarily press the pause button.

Therefore, rather than attempting to halt AI, the focus should be on maximizing safety safeguards as much as possible.

Musk believes that what truly warrants vigilance is not the robot rebellions depicted in movies, but rather that once AI capabilities far exceed those of humans, people will no longer be able to accurately understand its reasoning process or judge whether its decisions are reliable.

In the future, whether in financial trading, scientific innovation, medical diagnosis, or public governance, we may increasingly rely on AI. If society becomes highly dependent on these systems, even if humans retain the ability to shut them down, they may gradually lose real control because they cannot afford the costs of a shutdown.

Because of this, he believes the most important question for the future is not 'whether AI is smarter than humans,' but how to ensure that the ultimate decision-making power remains in human hands.