Exact balance of AI-driven substitution versus augmentation of labor is still unclear

Determine the precise manner in which artificial intelligence technologies substitute for versus augment human labor across job tasks, and characterize the associated impacts on employment transitions and wage growth.

Background

The literature agrees that technology can both replace workers in some tasks and complement them in others. The authors state that, for AI specifically, the concrete way this trade-off manifests remains unclear, motivating their empirical analysis linking AI exposure to wage growth and employment transitions.

Their findings suggest AI susceptibility is positively related to wage growth and only slightly to job exit, hinting at augmentation effects but without resolving the broader mechanism definitively. The explicit uncertainty concerns how exactly substitution and augmentation balance out across tasks.