I have tried to avoid writing the following sentence for more than ten years, but the day is finally here:

It has come to this.

It really has. You can argue about politics, you can argue about policy, you can argue about who really won the 2020 election and the 2024 election for that matter. You can argue over the efficacy of vaccines, you can argue over food policy, you can argue about what causes poverty, you can argue about education and why so many kids can’t read by the 4^th grade. You can argue about which religion is the “real” faith, you can argue about doctrine and the tenets of faith, you can argue about what the founders meant in the words of the Constitution.

But when you fire missiles and drop bombs and the leader of a foreign nation is killed, along with much of its top political leadership, when a girls’ school is hit by a bomb and more than 160 schoolgirls die, when six U.S. service men and women are killed, when a U.S. submarine sinks a foreign warship and sends it and more than 180 sailors to the bottom of the sea, when explosions topple buildings and civilians die in the fire and rubble, I thought, at least until today, that we could agree that we were waging war.

Not according to Republicans. They argued today when opposing the vote forced by Democrats over the war powers resolution that the attack by U.S. forces on Iran isn’t a war. We are engaged in “targeted, strategic military strikes,” according to Republican Representative Anna Paulina Luna of Florida, who explained what’s going on in Iran in an interview on MSNOW over the weekend. In case we didn’t get what she meant, Luna completed her thought with this: “We did not invade. Are you seeing boots on the ground there? Because I have not.”

While this nonsense is going on in the foreground, as Republicans attempt to redefine Trump’s orders to the military so they don’t fall under the War Powers Resolution of 1973, military commanders all around the world have quite a different definition of Trump’s actions. The Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF) has reported receiving more than 110 complaints from service members from every military branch at 30 military installations around the world. They report that commanders are framing Trump’s war on Iran as “Biblically sanctioned” and part of the “End Times” prophesy in the Bible’s Book of Revelation. One non-commissioned officer wrote in an email to the MRFF that his commander told his soldiers that Trump’s attack on Iran was “all part of God’s plan” and that “President Trump has been anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth.”

Oka-a-a-ay…

But according to Republicans in the Senate, it’s not a “war,” at least as it’s defined in a law written by the United States Congress, which states that a president can only commit military forces to war with the authorization of Congress, or if there is “a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces.” Under such a condition, the president must notify the Congress of the military action he has ordered within 48 hours, and the actions ordered by the president are forbidden to last more than 60 days without a specific authorization of the use of military force or declaration of war by the Congress.

No such formal notification has been made by Donald Trump to the Congress, nor has he requested an authorization of the use of military force.

It’s tempting to say that we are in untested waters here, but we’re not. We’ve been here before, and recently. Trump committed soldiers into combat when he ordered special forces to attack President Maduro’s compound in Venezuela and kidnap and remove him to stand trial in the United States. Seven U.S. service members were wounded during the assault which killed 47 Venezuelan soldiers and 32 Cubans who were serving as a special military guard for Maduro. Additionally, during his State of the Union speech last week, Trump awarded the Medal of Honor to the pilot of one of the helicopters involved in the raid on Maduro’s compound, who received multiple gunshot wounds during the action.

Uhhhh, the last time I looked, the Medal of Honor is the highest award for heroism that can be given for actions in combat, and combat happens during a war, so Trump has committed troops to war at least once already, and possibly twice, if you define his aerial bombing of Iran’s nuclear facilities last year as combat, and given the fact that U.S. aircraft were dropping bombs on Iran that killed people on the ground and destroyed Iranian military facilities, I would call that combat, and thus a war.

Quibbling and hairsplitting over the use of the word “war” is unbecoming of this nation and an insult to the men and women who serve in our armed forces. So are the statements made by Secretary of War – there’s that word again – Pete Hegseth, when he attacked the media today for reporting on the deaths of six American service members because they want to “make the president look bad.”

The president already looks bad, Pete. He has called soldiers who lost their lives in our wars “losers” and “suckers.”

Donald Trump and Congressional Republicans are bound and determined that our military forces should perform this all-out bombing campaign on Iran because…

Well, actually, they’re still figuring out reasons and excuses and justifications and explanations for attacking Iran. But it’s not a war, okay? Senator Markwayne Mullin, Republican of Oklahoma, has figured out what it is: “We’re not at war with Iran. We’re making sure that they do not have the capability to harm us anymore.” Presumably, Markwayne will get back to us with an example of the last time Iran brought “harm” to us.

Maybe they should just call it a “special military operation,” Vladimir Putin’s term for his four-year war on Ukraine.

It’s perfect, in a twisted, horrid, unthinkable way: They not only don’t know what they’re doing, they can’t even agree on what to call it.

Leave a comment

Share

Give a gift subscription

The American work environment has gone through a significant transformation in the last 20 years. Millions of people today make a living through app-based platforms, freelance marketplaces, as well as contract-based industries. 

However, the workers compensation systems were tailored to the traditional employer-employee relationship. Independent contractors are usually outside of that protective frame. This detachment has resulted in a wide coverage gap that exposes many injured workers to financial vulnerability.

A System Built for a Different Workforce

The workers compensation laws emerged in the early twentieth century as a compromise between labor and industry. Employers agreed to bear liability to job-related injuries irrespective of the fault and workers waived the right to sue in the majority of cases. In exchange, workers gained medical coverage and partial wage replacement during recovery. However, eligibility depends on classification as an “employee”, a distinction that has become increasingly contested.

The Expansion of Contract-Based Work

Independent contracting has taken off in transportation, delivery, construction, media, health, and technology. By categorizing workers as contractors, companies save on payroll, escape the obligation to provide benefits, and restrict insurance claims. Digital platforms have expanded this model through short-term, task-based arrangements. 

While flexibility may benefit some individuals, the structure shifts substantial risk onto workers who may not fully understand the consequences of their classification. As more individuals operate outside traditional employment models, the number of workers without automatic workers’ compensation coverage continues to grow.

When Injury Occurs Without a Safety Net

If an employee gets injured on the job, their medical bills are covered and wage replacement begins during recovery. When an independent contractor is injured, there is no automatic safety net. The individual may rely on personal health insurance, pursue civil litigation, or absorb the costs directly. 

In metropolitan areas like Miami, a Miami workers comp lawyer may consider misclassification, but that process can be lengthy and uncertain. During the consideration period, the income often stops so medical expenses accumulate. The absence of guaranteed benefits creates immediate financial strain, particularly for households dependent on a single income.

Catastrophic Outcomes and Legal Complexity

The stakes become higher in severe incidents. If a contractor dies in the course of executing his work-related responsibilities, families may end up with wrongful death lawsuits without workers compensation death benefits. Civil claims involve establishing negligence which is heavier than a no-fault claim. 

Criminal lawyers can be also introduced in situations connected with unsafe working conditions or misconduct on the side of the employer, especially, when the deaths were caused by regulatory violations. These layered legal processes highlight how far removed contractors are from streamlined protections.

The Patchwork of Classification Standards

Legal standards for determining worker classification vary by state. Some jurisdictions apply a control-based test, while others rely on the ABC test or economic realities analysis. This patchwork creates inconsistent protections. Enforcement agencies often lack resources to investigate widespread misclassification, as a result questionable practices persist.

The consequences extend beyond individual workers. When injured contractors lack adequate coverage, costs shift to public healthcare systems and family support networks, undermining the original purpose of workers’ compensation.

Endnote 

Addressing the gap requires deliberate reform. Legislators could broaden legal definitions of employment, increase the punishment of misclassification, or impose portable benefits such as injuries, which are paid into by firms that depend on contract workers. Without structural adjustments, labor protections will remain misaligned with today’s workforce.

Photo: Indosup via Pixabay.

CLICK HERE TO DONATE IN SUPPORT OF OUR NONPROFIT COVERAGE OF ARTS AND CULTURE

The post Independent Contractors and the Workers’ Comp Coverage Gap appeared first on DCReport.org.

Why did Donald Trump start a war with Iran?

It does not, on first glance, make much sense. The president has now run three times on a platform of making America great again, by which he clearly stated meant making America isolationist again. The Iraq War, he has said many times, was a debacle and an embarrassment. Kamala Harris, he insisted, would torpedo the country into war with Iran.

To believe that this all meant Trump had an ideological opposition to wars of choice is to fundamentally understand the president’s views, and the man himself.

Subscribe now

Trump is ideologically flexible on just about everything, but he has a handful of very particular impulses that have shaped his entire life. The first is that he believes power is zero-sum, that it is grabbed rather than earned, and that he needs – and deserves – as much of it as possible. The second is a deep suspicion of people who are different from him, in terms of race but also in terms of approach to life. It’s racism, but not just racism – he can find common cause with Saudi royals who share his fecklessness, unadulterated self-interest, and dismissiveness toward their many lessers, but is triggered to rage at the thought of hard-scrabble immigrants taking great risks to make it to America and doing back-breaking work once they arrive, and devoid of even the barest shred of empathy for young Black and brown men born into every disadvantage, especially when, like the much-luckier Trump’s, their life choices veer into the criminal. Trump disdains the weak, but he also disdains those who hustle and scrap, and he really hates those who inconvenience him in any way. Finally, he is both spectacularly thin-skinned and a master of the distraction spectacle. He understands, perhaps better than any politician in my lifetime, just what valuable currency attention can be. And he rose to power at the exact time the attention economy surpassed all others.

Trump was never anti-war. He just believed that Iraq made America generally, and George W. Bush specifically, look weak. He was never an isolationist – he just wanted America to be dominating other nations, not helping them.

Read more

The Opinionated Ogre is a Stay-at-Home parent first, foul-mouthed hater of fascist Republicans second. He’s been making the most horrible people in the country miserable for over 15 years, and the hate he feels for American Nazis is eternal and without limits. He plans to stop torturing right-wing trash the day the last fascist dies. So, you know, never. Please help support this potty-mouthed newsletter for just $5/month or $50/year (Almost 17% less!)

🌊Join The Blue Wave!🌊

Can’t do a sub? We got you!

It’s been just two days since our authoritarian regime started a full-scale bombing campaign on Iran, blowing up a good chunk of their authoritarian regime. Trump and the GOP have been spraying incoherent nonsense all over social media and the news to explain why we are doing this now.

We’re there to stop Iran’s nuclear program. Which we totally destroyed last year. We’re actually there to liberate the people of Iran. But we blew up a school filled with little children. We’re definitely not doing regime change. We are doing regime change. Iran has been attacking us for decades, so this is actually self-defense. Argle Bargle Operation Epic Fury! ‘Muuuuurika! Fuck yeah!

In reality, there are several real reasons we’re attacking Iran, none of them legitimate, and absolutely none of which the regime (our regime) can explain to the public without immediately being dragged out into the street and lynched by their own base.

Among the more immediate goals:

• Boost Trump’s rock-bottom popularity with a little wag the dog action

• Change the nation’s attention away from the Epstein files

• Set up a “national threat” narrative to seize control of the midterms

• Pay back the massive bribes from several Gulf states

• Boost the price of oil to help Russia’s war effort

• Soothe Trump’s fragile ego after being slapped down by “his” SCOTUS last week

There’s also the whole “Fulfill the biblical prophecy of war in the Middle East and the destruction of Israel” yadayadayada that the Evangelicals frenetically masturbate over on a daily basis. That last one is not really high on Trump’s list of things he gives a shit about, but there are more than enough theocratic neo-cons in his regime that do, and they are whispering in his ear how tough blowing up brown people in the Middle East will make him look. Trump is a moron who believes anything he is told as long as he’s told it will make him look tough and manly.

The problem is that our would-be dictator has surrounded himself with equally stupid people who are wildly out of touch with even their own base, much less the rest of the public. While MAGAland is dutifully obeying and making mouth noises in support of the Dear Leader, there has not been the intense “rally around the flag” effect the regime was looking for:

Poll Finds No Rally Effect After Iran Strikes

Morning Consult: “Trump approval (44% to 53%) and his foreign policy approval (43% to 52%) are unchanged from pre-strike baselines. The strikes have not moved his numbers immediately.”

The country is split: “41% of registered voters say strikes necessary vs. 42% who prefer diplomacy.”

What happens when you throw a war and no one rallies to your flag?

It’s not really all that hard to understand why this didn’t work. The regime looked at how George W. Bush’s popularity surged during the Iraq War and assumed they could replicate it. Things were awesome back then. The press fell in line. Dissent was crushed. The regime had a free hand to do any illegal thing it wanted, no questions asked.

But, again, these are very stupid people who are only looking at the end result and want to take shortcuts to get there. Regardless of whether you think our decades of heavy-handed “diplomacy” in the Middle East justified 9/11 or not, we were attacked. We were hit harder than we have been in over half a century. The Bush regime followed that up with months of carefully planned and planted lies and propaganda to justify a war of aggression against Iraq after we had, not unreasonably, invaded Afghanistan.

Did you know the Opinionated Ogre has a weekly podcast? It’s true! New episodes every Thursday! Catch the latest episode here:

Join The Ogre Nation Conversation!

All of that combined allowed the Bush regime to launch a war of choice with a lot of public support, even as it kicked off the largest anti-war protests in history. Protesters were smeared as “terrorist-lovers” and silenced by the press because everyone was afraid of the right’s “toxic patriotism.”

But the Trump regime doesn’t have a terrorist attack to weaponize and they were too lazy or stupid (or both) to bother with a coordinated propaganda campaign. They quite literally cannot settle on a single lie about why the fuck we’re attacking Iran. It changes from day to day, sometimes from hour to hour.

There was never going to be a boost in public support under those circumstances, and a first-year PR graduate would have been able to explain that. Hell, I don’t have any PR training at all, and even I knew that.

Meanwhile, even though the Epstein files are not currently the front-page headlines, that’s not going to last long. There are millions of files still being pored over, and we know the DoJ tried to hide dozens of pages, describing in graphic detail, how Trump sexually assaulted a little girl. That story is just one of many that haven’t run their course yet.

There are also still millions of files being illegally withheld, and one can only imagine how much worse those revelations will be when we finally get them. Maybe they’ll be leaked. Maybe someone will post them by accident. Maybe the courts will force the regime to obey the law. Regardless, they won't stay hidden forever, and the cover-up guarantees we will continue to talk about Donald Trump being a pedophile.

So, while Trump is paying back his Middle East benefactors and helping out his good friend Vlad while also making himself feel like a Big Boy playing with his military, Trump’s main goals have already failed. Honestly, though? He’s probably made things worse.

As the weeks drag on and more Americans are killed, Trump’s already precarious popularity will dwindle. When gas prices spike and inflation spikes with it, his base will become enraged. They won’t abandon him, because that will never happen. But they will vent their anger on their elected Republican officials, and their already low enthusiasm will dry up even further. The midterms, already a trainwreck for the GOP, will start to resemble the kind of wipeout you read about in history books and wonder how it could possibly be real.

That means Trump’s plans to seize control of the elections will be thwarted on the spot. With no public support from anyone, including his own base, his regime of fascists will not have the juice to seize control of elections anywhere. Not in blue states, red states, or blue cities in red states. Nothing. Nowhere. Maybe if the regime had waited to attack until closer to the election or maybe not told everyone their plan to issue an executive order claiming China Iran was attacking our elections, they might have pulled it off. But, again, they were too lazy or stupid to plan this properly.

I’ve said this before, and I will definitely say it again (probably a lot): When the history books are written about this period, they will note that the thing most responsible for bringing down Trump’s fascist regime was their own monumental incompetence. Thank god for idiot Nazis.

I hope you feel better informed about the world and ready to kick fascists in the teeth to protect it. This newsletter exists because of you, so please consider becoming a supporting subscriber today for only $5 a month or just $50 a year (a 17% discount!). Thank you for everything!

☠️This Subscription Kills Fascists☠️

Prefer a one-and-done tip? Click here!

There are 245 days until the most important midterm election in American history. The regime is afraid, and they should be. We are legion, and they are weak. Stay strong. You are never alone.

These are dark times but I will continue to tell the stories you need to hear in a clear (and usually profane) voice. If I entertain/anger/inform you, preferably all three, please consider becoming a supporting subscriber today for only $5 a month or just $50 a year (a 17% discount!).

🚫Do Not Obey🚫

Click here to leave a one-time tip!

When George W. Bush invaded Iraq, he made a lot of public noise about how the war wasn’t an attack on Islam. It wasn’t about religion at all! Honest! But in private, he and his people talked about a new crusade in the Middle East. The choice of words was deliberate.

The Crusades, if you slept through that particular history class, were a series of bloody religious wars waged by Christians in the West to conquer mostly Muslim-held lands in the East. This went on for centuries and caused untold misery. Typical of religious zealots motivated by greed and insanity. The Iraq War was just the latest iteration.

Or, at least it was until this past Saturday when the United States, at the direction of Donald Trump, launched an unprovoked war against Iran.

Trump had been building up to this attack for months, and no one was really surprised by it.1 We were all confused, though. What was the reason, exactly, we were attacking Iran? Not their nuclear program. Not because Iran had done anything recent or specific. Not to “defend” the people of Iran from their brutal government.

What the fuck were we doing waging war against a country 6,000 miles away? A war no one in this country wants?

Well, we appear to have an answer now. White Christian Nationalism. Specifically, the Armageddon part of it. We seem to be engaged in a war to fulfill biblical prophecy. If that sounds insane, that’s a rational response to completely unhinged people.

Let’s be clear: Yes, part of this war is Trump’s attempt to bolster his popularity. Yeah, part of it is to force the public’s attention away from the Epstein files. Definitely part of it is to create a pretext for declaring a “national emergency” over elections. As I explained yesterday, though, none of that is going to work the way the regime is hoping:

But there’s more (or, rather, less) to this idiotic conflict. A level of reckless stupidity that goes beyond even what this regime of morons, pedophiles, and grifters is usually (in)capable of.

When Bush charged into Iraq, they knew it would be a mess afterwards but assumed they would just awesome their way out of it. America would kick ass, take names, and rewrite reality until everyone acknowledged how amazing we were. Blow it all up, and when the pieces fell back down to earth, they would fall into neat little boxes of our choosing because ‘Murika, fuck yeah!

When that didn’t happen, the Bush regime blew up more stuff and scrambled to undo the damage. It was too late, of course, and it took 20 years, hundreds of thousands of lives, and trillions of dollars before we stopped trying to put the toothpaste back in the tube. Truly, a 21st Century Crusade in every way. Well done!

By way of contrast, the Trump regime has charged into Iran, started blowing stuff up, and has no plan at all for what happens next.

How long will we be bombing Iran? Four weeks? Five weeks? Who knows? Our Glorious Military War Hero Donald Trump certainly doesn’t:

Are we going to land troops in Iran? Something the US military is not at all prepared for and would be a years-long bloodbath? We can’t say! Maybe! Maybe not!

So what is going on here? Why have we kicked off what looks to be a war with absolutely no planning beyond “topple the government and unleash absolute chaos throughout the entire Middle East and beyond?”

Like every dime-store villain, the white Christian Nationalists have started to tell us their plan:

U.S. Troops Were Told Iran War Is for “Armageddon,” Return of Jesus.

A combat-unit commander told non-commissioned officers at a briefing Monday that the Iran war is part of God’s plan and that Pres. Donald Trump was “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth,” according to a complaint by a non-commissioned officer.

From Saturday morning through Monday night, more than 110 similar complaints about commanders in every branch of the military had been logged by the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (MRFF).

The complaints came from more than 40 different units spread across at least 30 military installations, the MRFF told me Monday night.

Those are just the death cultists we know about. It’s safe to assume there are hundreds, if not thousands, more of them hiding like cockroaches throughout the military, with Pete Hegseth being at the top of the Org Chart.

If you’ll recall, Hegseth quite literally has Crusader tattoos:

Pete Hegseth’s Tattoos and the Crusading Obsession of the Far Right

The symbols sported by Trump’s defense pick reveal how the medieval past is being reimagined by Christian nationalists, behind a shield of plausible deniability

These are mentally ill lunatics dreaming of Armageddon, whose highest aspiration is to kill in the name of Jesus and hopefully commit an atrocity so great that it triggers WWIII, ushering in the wondrous return of Christ. Of course, it would mean the death of billions, but that’s OK because the “good” Christians will be saved by God.

They could have kept their mouths shut. They could have pushed their extremist agenda and not said a fucking word. But they’re so unbelievably stupid and delusional, they just couldn’t stop themselves from blurting it out. In the name of Jesus, of course.

Under normal circumstances, every one of these assholes would be court-martialled and removed from command immediately. They are a danger to their troops and a danger to the Iranian people, whom we are, remember, supposed to be “saving.” With this kind of death wish clouding their judgment and erasing what little humanity they have, these white Christian Nationalists2 will take any opportunity to commit war crimes. The more egregious, the better. They will not look to de-escalate any situation. They will not look to avoid civilian casualties. They will be looking to push the violence as far as possible because Armageddon is upon them, and well, sacrifices must be made. In the name of Jesus, of course.

Our only saving grace, if you’ll forgive the phrase, is that Trump is not a Christian Nationalist. He allows himself to be manipulated by them when it’s convenient, but this war is going to go badly, and it’s going to make him extremely unpopular. He’s being told it will make him a studly hero and, more importantly, it will allow him to declare a national emergency over the midterms. That’s the real goal here for Trump.

Either the regime will invent a threat to “the integrity of America’s elections” or there will be a terrorist attack of some kind (there may have been one in Texas already). Regardless, the regime will clutch its pearls and scream that we’re all in danger and the only way to keep us safe is for the federal government to seize total control of the elections in every state.

But since the morons in the regime already told us they plan to do this, we’re already building a resistance, both socially and legally, to the idea. It won’t work, and when Trump’s “national emergency” fails, he will instantly lose interest in the war in Iran. If it can’t help him win (popularity/rally to the flag) or steal (national emergency/executive order) the midterms, then all the war is doing is making him unpopular and angering his base.

War in Iran will also trash the already weak economy, push up gas prices, spike inflation, piss off the military vote as troops increasingly die with no clear directive as to what the fuck they’re supposed to be doing, and solidify resistance on the left into massive protests well beyond 10-15 million of us in the streets.

When that all comes crashing down, Trump will turn tail and run from the war. He will tell Hegseth to end it, blame JD Vance or Netanyahu, declare victory, and throw himself a parade. If we’re lucky, this will happen before the white Christian Nationalists put boots on the ground and get us stuck in a quagmire and before they kill tens of thousands of Iranians and shatter their nation’s infrastructure.

Is it horrifying that we’re pitting Trump’s self-interest against the nihilism of the white Christian Nationalist death cult? Yes. But unless they work up the nerve to remove him, I’m willing to bet on Trump folding when the going gets rough.

This is one of the few times I really REALLY hope I’m right because the alternative is another forever war being carried out by genocidal monsters who want nothing more than to die for their god.

I write to help you cope with the fear and anger threatening to overwhelm you every day. If this newsletter gets you through these dark times, please consider becoming a contributing supporter for only $5 a month or just $50 a year (a 17% discount!). Thank you for everything!

🌟BECOME A CONTRIBUTING SUBSCRIBER!🌟

Prefer a one-and-done tip? Click here!

There are only 244 days until the midterms, and the regime is afraid of us. Keep making them afraid every single day. Remember, you are never alone. We beat the fascists once. We will fucking do it again.

There are certainly examples where new technology has replaced jobs. The US had 350,000 telephone switchboard operators in 1950, and the job just went away. The tractor played a big role in reducing the number of US farmers in the first half of the 20th century. Almost every village of any size had a blacksmith though much of the 19th century, but with the rise of industrial production, there weren’t enough of them left to be counted as a separate employment category in the 1900 census. And now here we are with the new artificial intelligence tools, and warnings that all manner of jobs that use computers–across a wide array of industries–could be at risk.

It seems obvious to me that many jobs will change as new technologies appear. Many of the tasks involved in my own job, running an academic economics journal since the late 1980s, changed substantially with the arrival of the internet, for example. But the job itself didn’t go away; indeed, the internet probably made me better at my job. For example, it’s a lot easier for me to look up cited articles from my desk than it was to walk over into the library stacks to find the article–and so I check many more articles as a result.

Thus, a key issue here is the extent to which the new AI tools replace workers outright, like telephone switchboard operators, or whether they allow workers to be more productive and effect–or even create the possibility for new and previously unimagined jobs. Daron Acemoglu, David Autor, and Simon Johnson work through these distinctions in “Building pro-worker artificial intelligence” (Hamilton Project at the Brookings Institution, February 2026). They write: “We define pro-worker technologies—including AI—as technologies that make human skills and expertise more valuable by expanding worker capabilities.”

They emphasize a key point about AI tools: such tools may actually be more useful when collaborating with humans. They write:

A modern AI system can ingest drone imagery and soil sensor data from a farm’s every acre, the complete sensor logs from a building’s HVAC system, or the detailed vital signs of a single patient observed over many months to support workers making high-stakes decisions. Drawing on this pretraining, AI tools can think alongside workers, identify relevant context, generate well-informed responses to questions, and present lucid, well-structured data to support decisionmaking. This is collaboration.

You may object: “If AI can behave like an expert, can’t it simply replace experts, thus automating their expertise into irrelevance?” In some cases, the answer is yes. But in many more cases, we think the answer is no: AI will prove more effective at collaboration than
at automation. Precisely because AI is not rule-bound, it is less trustworthy as an autonomous actor than a conventional computer system, and more valuable as a collaborator (Narayanan and Kapoor 2025).

To be useful, an automation tool must deliver near-flawless performance almost all the time. You would not tolerate a spreadsheet that hallucinated values, a robotic surgeon that glitched-out during bypass surgery, an agentic investing tool that squandered your money while you were not paying attention, or an AI-powered vending machine that gave away PlayStations and stocked live fish at the behest of persuasive customers (Stern 2025). For most of these tasks, the stakes are too consequential and the decisions too nuanced to be fully delegated to an automatic system that acts on its own discretion. The AI needs human expertise.

A collaboration tool does not need to be anywhere close to infallible to be useful. A doctor with a stethoscope can better diagnose a patient than the same doctor without one, and a contractor can pitch a squarer house frame with a laser level than they could by eyeballing it. These tools do not need to work flawlessly, because they do not promise to replace the expertise of their user. They make experts better at what they do—and extend their expertise to places it could not go unassisted. Rather than making expertise unnecessary, they render expertise more valuable by extending its efficacy and scope. It is this complementarity between machine capacity and human expertise that we believe imbues AI with vast pro-worker potential.

The authors provide concrete examples of pro-worker uses of AI for teachers, electricians’ assistants, patent examiners and others. They point out that the use of AI-assisted hearing aids might enable some workers to expand their on-the-job capabilities. However, they also worry that economic incentives and business habits may tend to emphasize AI applications that substitute for current jobs, rather than complement them. Thus, they argue for the public sector to nudge the incentives for pro-worker AI tools where possible. One of their examples stuck with me:

Indeed, the public sector already heavily shapes the path of technology in health care and education. For example, the federal Health Information Technology for Economic and Clinical Health (HITECH) Act of 2009 dramatically accelerated electronic health record adoption in U.S. hospitals through financial incentives and penalties. Within less than a decade, the
United States went from approximately 10 percent of hospitals with electronic health records to near-universal adoption (Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology 2017). In a similar vein, the federal schools and libraries universal support (E-Rate) program, established by the Telecommunications Act of 1996, provides ongoing subsidies to schools and libraries for Internet connectivity. As of 2021, 95 percent of U.S. public school classrooms had WiFi (Munson 2023).

They also point out that the US corporate tax code treats investment in machinery more favorably than investment in, say, worker training and skills. That policy difference could be at least equalized. In this and other ways, the future uses of AI are not purely determined by technological advance, but instead by the incentives and beliefs of economic players–firms that develop AI technologies, firms that use them, managers thinking about how work should evolve, the the willingness of workers to build new skills.

The post Can AI Tools Be Pro-Worker? first appeared on Conversable Economist.