OpenAI, a cutting-edge artificial intelligence (AI) firm, provides a glimpse into the future of work. As the company strives for more accurate AI systems, the demand for data enrichment workers is increasing, and contractors are earning a minimum wage of $15 an hour training OpenAI’s ChatGPT.
Alexei Savreux, 34, of Kansas City is at the forefront of the AI advance and one of the behind-the-scenes workers of OpenAI’s ChatGPT training. After years of working in traditional jobs such as sandwich maker and janitor, Savreux now finds himself in demand working in the AI industry. He spends his time labeling images and predicting text that AI systems like ChatGPT will generate.
It can be an anonymous job. Credit for training the systems are attributed to tech start-up executives and researchers. But, it is a job that pays with a minimum wage and stays away from homelessness for Savreux. Moreover, the entry-level pay of $15 is above the Kansas minimum wage per hour.
The job is on-demand. It can be found under tech staffing firms and online job sites like Amazon Mechanical Turk. Benefits such as health insurance are rare or non-existent leading to cost savings for technology companies.
Other AI contractors and even Savreux have grown a sense of resentment over the lack of credit and respect they receive for their work. A recent rise in demand for AI work saw over 150 AI contractors in Nairobi, Kenya, showing their support to form a union. The workers, who have worked on AI projects for Facebook and TikTok, cited low wages and the mental strain of their work as part of their motivation.
The Partnership on AI, a San Francisco-based nonprofit organization, stated in its 2021 report that it would welcome the use of contract workers in the AI industry. However, most of the discussion revolves around the technology, rather than the people behind it. As such, the organization created guidelines for companies to follow to ensure fair compensation for AI contract workers. While DeepMind is the only company to commit to it publicly, the guidelines put pressure on other companies to do the same.
As AI advances, the people who are at the forefront supporting the development are the contract workers. They are the ones that provide the necessary data for training AI models, in addition to giving their feedback to fine-tune the system. The AI contractors have a crucial role in the AI growth and should be respected, appreciated and fairly compensated for their contributions.
