How Anxiety Over AI Could Spark a New Workers’ Movement

What Happened

Rising anxiety over artificial intelligence in the workplace is reshaping how workers across income levels view their job security — and labor experts say that fear could fuel a resurgence in collective organizing.

Throughout 2026, concerns about AI-driven automation have intensified alongside economic instability and affordability pressures. A 2025 survey by the Pew Research Center found that 64% of Americans believe AI will reduce the number of jobs over the next 20 years, while only 17% think it will have a positive overall impact on the United States.

Technology executives have publicly predicted that AI could soon perform tasks traditionally done by software engineers and even corporate executives. At the same time, many workers — from warehouse employees to white-collar professionals — worry about how automation will change their roles.

Blue-collar workers have already experienced algorithmic management systems that track productivity and optimize workflows. Labor researchers say these systems often increase surveillance and reduce worker autonomy. Now, white-collar employees are beginning to express similar concerns, as AI tools are introduced into knowledge-based professions.

Sarita Gupta of the Ford Foundation argues that this shared anxiety is dissolving long-standing class divisions between professional and manual labor. When tech workers experience algorithmic oversight similar to warehouse employees, she says, the commonality of experience could strengthen cross-industry solidarity.

Union membership in the United States remains historically low. In 2025, 9.9% of US workers were union members, reflecting decades of declining collective bargaining power. However, experts note that past crises — including the Covid-19 pandemic — triggered waves of labor organizing, including union drives at companies such as Amazon and Starbucks.

Some labor researchers believe AI may create a similar moment of mobilization. As workers question how technology is deployed and who benefits from productivity gains, they may push for stronger workplace protections, regulatory safeguards, and profit-sharing mechanisms.

Why It Matters

AI is not just a technological development; it is a power question.

For decades, productivity in advanced economies has risen while wages for many workers have stagnated. The introduction of AI intensifies that imbalance by raising the possibility that automation could replace or restructure entire categories of work.

However, experts argue that the outcome is not predetermined.

1. Shared Vulnerability Across Classes

Historically, white-collar professionals often viewed automation as a risk primarily for manual labor. AI disrupts that assumption. Generative tools now draft reports, analyze data, write code, and perform tasks once considered insulated from automation.

This shift may create solidarity between workers who previously perceived themselves as distinct. If both warehouse employees and software engineers face algorithmic management systems, the basis for collective action broadens.

2. Surveillance and Control

AI does not only replace jobs; it can intensify monitoring.

Algorithmic performance tracking systems may optimize output but also increase pressure, reduce discretion, and blur boundaries between work and personal time. Labor advocates warn that without regulation, AI could entrench surveillance capitalism within workplaces.

Conversely, AI could be deployed to reduce workloads, improve safety, and distribute gains more equitably — but only if workers have influence over how systems are implemented.

3. The Narrative Battle

Some labor researchers argue that tech leaders’ messaging about AI inevitability serves a strategic purpose. If automation is framed as unstoppable, workers and policymakers may feel powerless to intervene.

But AI systems are built, trained, funded, and governed by human institutions. Decisions about regulation, union protections, retraining programs, and profit allocation remain political and economic choices.

4. Crisis as Catalyst

The Covid-19 pandemic demonstrated that periods of economic disruption can generate labor momentum. Frontline workers gained leverage when demand for their labor surged, leading to organizing efforts and wage negotiations.

AI-related anxiety may not create the same immediate leverage, but it does create a sense of urgency. Workers across industries are questioning long-term stability and seeking mechanisms to protect their economic security.

The Bigger Picture

The relationship between technology and labor has always been contested.

From the industrial revolution to the rise of computers, new tools have displaced certain roles while creating others. The difference with AI is the speed and scope of its potential reach, including into cognitive and creative professions.

Whether AI leads to widespread job loss, productivity-driven prosperity, or intensified inequality depends largely on governance and power distribution.

If productivity gains accrue primarily to shareholders and executives, worker insecurity will likely deepen. If workers secure stronger collective bargaining rights or regulatory protections tied to AI deployment, the technology could be integrated more equitably.

The debate unfolding in 2026 suggests that AI is not only reshaping workplaces — it is reshaping how workers perceive their agency.

Anxiety, while destabilizing, can also be mobilizing.

As labor advocates note, the direction of AI is not technologically inevitable. It is socially determined. And in that uncertainty lies both risk and possibility for a new chapter in worker power.