Uber’s CEO warns that driverless cars will one day replace human drivers

Uber’s chief executive Dara Khosrowshahi has warned that driverless cars will one day push aside human drivers, leaving society with a difficult problem to solve.

Speaking at a recent “All-In” podcast summit, Khosrowshahi said the rise of robotaxis is not a matter of “if” but “when.” He suggested the tipping point could arrive within 10 to 15 years. He told the audience that this is “going to be a real issue, it is a big, big societal question that we’re going to have to struggle with.”

Uber boss thinks drivers are only employed for now

Khosrowshahi however stressed that drivers will not be vanishing any time soon. He said that Uber’s network is expanding so fast that human workers remain essential.

“For the next five to seven years, we are going to have more human drivers and delivery people, just because we’re going so quickly,” he said.

Even so, he admitted there is no neat answer for what happens after that period as millions of gig workers worldwide rely on Uber, Lyft and similar platforms for income. Many drivers could find themselves unemployed as self-driving technology matures.

Uber is already running driverless rides in partnership with Waymo, the Google-linked autonomous vehicle firm. The company recently revealed it was in talks with banks and private equity firms to raise funds to expand its robotaxi business.

As previously reported by Cryptopolitan, the firm entered a $300 million deal with EV maker Lucid and autonomous tech startup Nuro to deploy 20,000 self-driving vehicles over a period of six years.

Already, robotaxis are now picking up passengers in Atlanta and Austin, where early trials show that the cars are often more efficient than people.

The technology, however, has yet to win over every doubt as some drivers told Business Insider over the summer they doubted robotaxis could cope with the chaos of real roads. Potholes, unpredictable pedestrians and impatient drivers still test the limits of artificial intelligence.

Some section of the world fears full automation

Khosrowshahi’s comments come at a time when fears over AI takeover are growing. Already, automation is creeping into several industries: from media to logistics raising concerns that machines could steadily replace sections of the workforce. For taxi services, this means that the power behind its rise – drivers, could one day possibly wake up unemployed.

The Uber boss acknowledged the irony around this as gig workers have significantly contributed to the company’s success, yet that does not spare their jobs from the threat that technology is bringing.

“Lots of others are going to struggle with this too,” he said.

Despite not offering any concrete clues to solutions to the possibility, he said there are other jobs that are rising in the organization that will compensate for some of the job losses. Through its AI solutions arm, the company has created work for contractors to label and process data as well as tasks used to train machine learning models.

“We are expanding into other kinds of on-demand work as well to be able to adjust the kind of work available to people who want to earn on our platform,” he said.

That could mean fewer people behind the wheel, but more involved in digital or support roles. Still, the scale of disruption from self-driving cars may be far greater than anything Uber can absorb alone.

For now, Uber drivers still dominate city streets, and demand for human couriers and ride-hailing remains strong. But Khosrowshahi’s warning underlines a looming shift. What begins as a handful of robotaxis in two American cities could spread widely in the next decade.

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