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Artificial intelligence will affect about 60% of all jobs in the US — and worsen income and wealth inequality, the International Monetary Fund warned.

Advanced economies such as the US are at the greatest risk due to the prevalence of cognitive task-oriented jobs, the IMF said, cautioning that the disruptive technology could replace more than half the jobs available in regions that also include Canada, the UK, Japan, Germany, France and Italy.

Comparatively, AI exposure was estimated to impact 40% of jobs in emerging economies and 26% of positions in low-income countries.

“Automation…had the strongest effect on middle-skilled workers, [but] AI displacement risks extend to higher-wage earners,” the new analysis said.

IMF chief Kristalina Georgieva wrote in a blog post following the release of Sunday’s report that the rapidly-advancing technology provides opportunities to “help less experienced workers enhance their productivity more quickly.”

However, as AI is brought into the workplace, “we may see polarization within income brackets, with workers who can harness AI seeing an increase in their productivity and wages — and those who cannot falling behind,” Georgieva said.

Older workers are most at risk of losing their place to AI as they “may struggle with reemployment, adapting to technology, mobility and training for new job skills.”

In contrast, “younger workers who are adaptable and familiar with new technologies may also be better able to leverage the new opportunities.”

Georgieva called the findings “a troubling trend” that she urged policymakers to “proactively address to prevent the technology from further stoking social tensions.”

The IMF report was released as the world’s business and political leaders flew Monday to the Swiss resort town of Davos for the annual World Economic Forum.

AI is expected to be the hot topic, as The Post reported, at this year’s confab, which runs through Friday with the theme of “Rebuilding Trust.”

Global executives are increasingly worried about the long term viability of their businesses, a PricewaterhouseCoopers pre-Davos survey released Monday showed, with pressures mounting from generative artificial intelligence and climate disruption.

Some 45% of more than 4,700 global CEOs surveyed do not believe their businesses will survive, barring significant changes, in the next 10 years, the “Big Four” auditor said.

“There’s the 55% who think they don’t have to change radically, and I would argue that’s a little naive because the world is changing so fast around them,” PwC Global Chairman Bob Moritz told the Reuters Global Markets Forum ahead of the meetings.

Advancements in generative AI were top of the concerns for most survey respondents, with almost 75% predicting it would significantly change their business in the next three years.

The US continues to weigh federal regulation of the burgeoning technology after a much-hyped summit in Washington, DC, last September. TheEuropean Union, meanwhile,reached a tentative dealin December thatdrew up some guardrails.

Last April, Goldman Sachs warned generative AI — which is trained on different sets of data to learn pattern recognition — could impact as many as 300 million full-time jobs globally.

A month later, AI was blamed for nearly 4,000 Americans losing their jobs, according to the analytics firm Challenger, Gray, and Christmas, which cited market and economic conditions as well as mergers and acquisitions as key factors.

On the positive side, Goldman Sachs said that generative AI — which is seen in OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Bard and Microsoft’s Copilot — could boost GDP by as much as 7% thanks to an increase in productivity.

JPMorgan CEO Jamie Dimon also touted AI’s “tremendous” impact on the world in an interview with Fox Business last week, calling the technology “crucial.”

“It’s going to change a tremendous amount of stuff in health care alone. It may come up with new compounds. It could do a better job diagnosing diseases, preventing diseases,” Dimon told Fox.

“God knows what it’s going to do for people. It may have some downsides. It’s very hard to figure out how you should regulate it, but it might eventually have to be some regulations around it,” he added.

One of the latest breakthroughs in AI has seen the medical industry rolling out “the world’s first AI doctor’s office,” which is slated to open this year in New York and other major US metros.

Called CarePod, the doctor’s office is actually a self-service cube where patients can be screened for issues relevant to diabetes, hypertension, and depression and anxiety, according to its maker, Forward.

The high-tech health stops will reportedly be installed in malls, gyms and offices for members who pay its $99-per-month fee.

With Post wires

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Sports

Veteran pitcher Lynn retiring after 13-year career

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Veteran pitcher Lynn retiring after 13-year career

Longtime St. Louis Cardinals right-hander Lance Lynn announced Tuesday that he has retired from Major League Baseball after 13 seasons.

“Baseball season is upon us and I’m right here on the couch and that is where I’m gonna stay,” Lynn said on his wife’s podcast, “Dymin in the Rough.”

“I am officially retiring from baseball right here, right now.”

Lynn, 37, spent much of his career with the Cardinals (2011-17, 2024) but also has pitched for the Minnesota Twins (2018), New York Yankees (2018), Texas Rangers (2019-20), Chicago White Sox (2021-23) and Los Angeles Dodgers (2023).

Last season with the Cardinals, he started 23 games and had a 7-4 record with a 3.84 ERA, throwing 117⅓ innings and striking out 109.

The two-time All-Star has a career record of 143-99 with a 3.74 ERA in 364 games (340 starts), tossing 2,006⅓ innings. He ranks sixth in that category, as well as in wins, among active pitchers. Ahead of him in each category are three sure Hall of Famers — Justin Verlander, Max Scherzer and Clayton Kershaw.

Lynn, on Tuesday, made it clear that he may be spotted on the baseball field … just not in a major league game.

“There might be something a little fun around the corner upcoming weekend, so stayed tuned,” Lynn said. “But from Major League Baseball, I am done pitching.”

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Sports

Yanks bring back reliever Ottavino on 1-yr. deal

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Yanks bring back reliever Ottavino on 1-yr. deal

NEW YORK — Right-hander reliever Adam Ottavino is returning to the New York Yankees, agreeing Tuesday to a one-year contract.

A 39-year-old sidearmer, Ottavino agreed to a minor league contract with Boston on Feb. 18 and exercised his right to be released on March 23 after compiling a 10.80 ERA in five spring training appearances.

He was 2-2 with one save and a 4.34 ERA in 60 relief appearances for the New York Mets last year, stranding 15 of 20 inherited runners.

Ottavino pitched for the Yankees in 2019 and ’20, going 8-8 with a 2.76 ERA in 97 relief appearances. He is 41-43 with 46 saves and a 3.49 ERA in 14 big league seasons with St. Louis, Colorado (2012-18), the Yankees (2019-20), Boston (2021) and the Mets (2022-24).

The Yankees transferred right-hander JT Brubaker to the 60-day injured list and placed closer Devin Williams on the paternity list.

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Politics

Payouts for departing civil servants capped at £95,000 under voluntary exit scheme

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Payouts for departing civil servants capped at £95,000 under voluntary exit scheme

The most senior and long-serving civil servants could be offered a maximum of £95,000 to quit their jobs as part of a government efficiency drive.

Sky News reported last week that several government departments had started voluntary exit schemes for staff in a bid to make savings, including the Department for Environment and Rural Affairs, the Foreign Office and the Cabinet Office.

The Department for Health and Social Care and the Ministry of Housing and Local Government have yet to start schemes but it is expected they will, with the former already set to lose staff following the abolition of NHS England that was announced earlier this month.

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Rachel Reeves, the chancellor, confirmed in last week’s spring statement that the government was setting aside £150m to fund the voluntary exit schemes, which differ from voluntary redundancy in that they offer departments more flexibility around the terms offered to departing staff.

Ms Reeves said the funding would enable departments to reduce staffing numbers over the next two years, creating “significant savings” on staff employment costs.

A maximum limit for departing staff is usually set at one month per year of service capped at 21 months of pay or £95,000.

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Whitehall sources stressed the figure was “very much the maximum that could be offered” given that the average civil service salary is just over £30,000 per year.

Whitehall departments will need to bid for the money provided at the spring statement and match the £150m from their own budgets, bringing the total funding to £300m.

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The Cabinet Office is understood to be targeting 400 employees in a scheme that was announced last year and will continue to run over this year.

A spokesman said each application to the scheme would be examined on a case-by-case basis to ensure “we retain critical skills and experience”.

It is up to each government department to decide how they operate their scheme.

The voluntary exit schemes form part of the government’s ambition to reduce bureaucracy and make the state more efficient amid a gloomy economic backdrop.

Ahead of the spring statement, Ms Reeves announced plans to cut civil service running costs by 15% by 2030, which ministers have said will save £2.2bn.

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The move could result in 10,000 civil service jobs being axed after numbers ballooned during the pandemic.

Ms Reeves hopes the cuts, which she said will be to “back office jobs” rather than frontline services, but civil service unions have raised concerns that government departments will inevitably lose skilled and experienced staff.

The cuts form part of a wider government agenda to streamline the civil service and the size of the British state, which Sir Keir Starmer criticised as “weaker than it has ever been”.

During the same speech, he announced that NHS England, the administrative body that runs the NHS, would also be scrapped to eliminate duplication and cut costs.

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