Finance and insurance are most vulnerable to AI

The finance and insurance industry is the most exposed sector to workplace changes prompted by artificial intelligence (AI), according to a government study.

The Department for Education’s Unit for Future Skills analysis, The impact of AI on UK jobs and training, is one of the first studies to measure AI’s impact on the UK jobs market. It considered the abilities needed to perform different roles and the extent to which these can be aided by 10 common AI applications.

The study found that finance and insurance are the most exposed sector, followed by information and communication, professional, scientific and technical, property, public administration and defence, and education.

Professional occupations are more exposed to AI, particularly those associated with clerical work, finance, law and business management, with employees including consultants, business analysts, accountants and psychologists. Employees with accounting and finance qualifications through further education or apprenticeships, as well economics and mathematics qualifications through higher education, are typically in more exposed jobs.

Workers in London and the South East of England have the highest exposure, reflecting the greater concentration of professional occupations in those regions, while people in the North East of England have the least exposure.

The study says that AI advances are widely expected to have “a profound and widespread effect on the UK economy and society, though the precise nature and speed of this effect is uncertain”.