{
  "id": "F-24",
  "url": "https://evy.so/facts/tasks-workers-want-ai-to-do/",
  "chapter": "What Teams Trust",
  "question": "Which work tasks do people want AI to do on its own, and which do they want to keep?",
  "answer": "Very few want AI working fully on its own: about 2 percent, in two independent studies. People welcome AI help on many tasks, mostly repetitive ones, and most prefer an equal partnership with AI, while keeping decisions about people, communication and creative control.",
  "range": {
    "low": 2,
    "high": 12,
    "unit": "% of workers or occupations whose preferred setup gives AI the sole role (about 2%) or the leading role (12%)",
    "display": "2–12% want AI to work alone (about 2%) or to lead (up to 12%)"
  },
  "confidence": "medium",
  "confidence_reason": "Two independent academic studies with different methods agree that only about 2% want AI acting fully alone. Beyond that the measures differ: one covers everyday tasks, the other only decisions about people, and both are stated preferences.",
  "last_checked": "2026-10-14",
  "how_to_read": "The Stanford study rates everyday tasks across the US workforce; the KPMG question covers only decisions about people. Stanford's 46% is a share of listed tasks, not of work time, and only 7.1% of tasks got a strong vote for automation. All of these are stated preferences, which can differ from what people actually hand to AI. The pattern across sources: people want AI to take repetitive, checkable work and to leave decisions about people, communication and creative control with them.",
  "sources": [
    {
      "creator": "Yijia Shao, Erik Brynjolfsson, Diyi Yang and colleagues (Stanford University)",
      "title": "Future of Work with AI Agents: Auditing Automation and Augmentation Potential across the U.S. Workforce (WORKBank)",
      "year": 2026,
      "sample": "1,500 US workers in 104 occupations rating 844 tasks, January to May 2025",
      "method": "Online survey with audio interviews; preferred level of human involvement per task. Preprint.",
      "figure": "AI handles it entirely is the preferred level in 1.9% of occupations; equal partnership in 45.2%; workers favor automation for 46.1% of tasks",
      "url": "https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.06576",
      "quote": "For 46.1% of tasks, workers express positive attitudes toward AI agent automation"
    },
    {
      "creator": "University of Melbourne and KPMG International",
      "title": "Trust, attitudes and use of artificial intelligence: A global study 2025",
      "year": 2025,
      "sample": "32,352 employed people in 47 countries, November 2024 to January 2025",
      "method": "Most acceptable human-AI split for managerial decisions on hiring, pay, promotion and allocating work",
      "figure": "AI 100%: 2%; AI 75%: 10%; equal: 29%; humans 75%: 45%; humans 100%: 14%",
      "url": "https://mbs.edu/-/media/PDF/Research/Trust_in_AI_Report.pdf",
      "quote": "Only ten percent believe AI should dominate managerial decision-making"
    },
    {
      "creator": "Stack Overflow",
      "title": "2026 Developer Survey: AI data",
      "year": 2026,
      "sample": "12,547 developers answering this question, June to August 2026",
      "method": "Opt-in survey; tasks developers do not use AI for and do not plan to",
      "figure": "Writing communications 45.9%; running production systems 36.0%; writing tickets and plans 30.5%; writing tests 8.5%",
      "url": "https://survey.stackoverflow.co/2026/ai/data",
      "quote": "46% do not use AI there and do not plan to"
    }
  ],
  "related_findings": [
    {
      "question": "Which tasks do people most want to keep for themselves?",
      "answer": "Tasks involving people, judgment and creative control. Arts, design and media workers favored automation for only 17.1% of their tasks (Stanford). 71% of Americans opposed AI making final hiring decisions (Pew, December 2022). 46% of developers do not use AI for writing communications and do not plan to.",
      "sources": [
        {
          "creator": "Pew Research Center",
          "title": "AI in Hiring and Evaluating Workers: What Americans Think",
          "year": 2023,
          "sample": "11,004 US adults, December 2022",
          "method": "American Trends Panel, probability-based. An older wave of all adults.",
          "figure": "71% oppose AI making final hiring decisions; 7% favor it",
          "url": "https://www.pewresearch.org/internet/2023/04/20/ai-in-hiring-and-evaluating-workers-what-americans-think/",
          "quote": "they oppose AI use in making final hiring decisions by a 71%-7% margin"
        }
      ]
    },
    {
      "question": "Why do workers want AI to take over some tasks?",
      "answer": "Mainly to free time for higher-value work (69.4% of the reasons given in the Stanford study), and because tasks are repetitive (46.6%) or AI could improve quality (46.6%). Among workers voicing concerns, the top one was lack of trust in AI's accuracy or reliability (45.0%).",
      "sources": []
    }
  ],
  "numbers_you_may_have_seen": [
    {
      "claim": "Workers want AI to automate 46% of their jobs (Stanford).",
      "what_the_source_says": "46.1% is the share of 844 listed tasks whose average rating leans toward automation, not weighted by time. Only 7.1% got a strong vote."
    },
    {
      "claim": "75% of employees are comfortable working with AI agents (Workday).",
      "what_the_source_says": "The sample was 2,950 decision-makers and software implementation leaders, in a vendor survey. It does not describe the general workforce."
    },
    {
      "claim": "Only 10% of employees trust AI to make decisions (KPMG).",
      "what_the_source_says": "The question covered only managerial decisions about people. 10% chose AI with 75% of the say and 2% AI alone; 29% chose an even split."
    }
  ],
  "citation": "EVY (2026). Which work tasks do people want AI to do on its own, and which do they want to keep? The AI at Work Fact Book, F-24. https://evy.so/facts/tasks-workers-want-ai-to-do/ (last checked October 14, 2026). CC BY 4.0.",
  "license": "CC BY 4.0"
}