Here's a very short story about Artificial Intelligence I wrote a couple years ago, published in Aphelion webzine.
http://www.aphelion-webzine.com/shorts/2018/07/AEIOU.html
A discussion on Twitter reminded me of it, so I looked to see if it was still available.
This is great! I like the "first, kill all the lawyers" bit that we can all agree on. Except then we're horrified that we also will be replaced, whoever we are.
Good story. I like how they are all happy to replace all of the workers with automation and are then shocked when they are replaced.
Right. We're all happy until it's us. At least until we get replicators and holodecks.
Since re-posting this, I've been thinking of writing a follow-up where the regular employees finally notice all the corporate vice presidents have quit coming to work and they start to wonder who's in charge.
Would workers' lives be improved?
@G.L. McDorman Not sure. There's an argument that a company bigger than a sole owner or small partnership is already a form of artificial intelligence, in that it draws on the knowledge and experience of multiple people for decision-making by someone who doesn't necessarily have all of those experiences personally. The person who runs the large corporation I work for probably doesn't know what I do there day-to-day, but his inquiries could eventually come to me. When I worked for the Army, I never briefed the President, SECDEF, or Secretary of the Army, but I briefed more than one general who was only a couple layers away from those people.
If the AI is the majority shareholder, it might conclude it doesn't really need to pay itself. AIs don't really need boats or big houses, so it might pay very low dividends and re-invest or increase wages instead.
@ktvician Haha, indeed. An easy way to save the company 100 million dollars every year.