Companies are eliminating the grunt work that used to train young professionals — and they don’t seem to have a clear plan for what comes next.

AI is analyzing documents, writing briefing notes, creating Power Point presentations or handling customer service queries, and — surprise! — now the younger humans who normally do that work are struggling to find jobs. Recently, the chief executive officer of AI firm Anthropic predicted AI would wipe out half of all entry-level white-collar jobs. The reason is simple. Companies are often advised  to treat ChatGPT “like an intern,” and some are doing so at the expense of human interns.

This has thrust college grads into a painful experiment across multiple industries, but it doesn’t have to be all bad. Employers must take the role of scientists, observing how AI helps and hinders their new recruits, while figuring out new ways to train them. And the young lab rats in this trial must adapt faster than the technology trying to displace them, while jumping into more advanced work.

Consulting giant KPMG, for instance, is giving graduates tax work that would previously go to staff with three years of experience. Junior staff at at PriceWaterhouseCoopers have started pitching to clients. Hedge fund Man Group Plc tells me its junior analysts who use AI to scour research papers now have more time to formulate and test trading ideas, what the firm calls “higher-level work.”

I recently interviewed two young professionals about using AI in this way, and perhaps not surprisingly, neither of them complained about it. One accountant who had just left university said he was using ChatGPT to pore over filings and Moody’s Ratings reports, saving him hours on due diligence.

Another young executive at a public-relations firm, who’d graduated last year from the London School of Economics, said tools like ChatGPT had cut down her time spent tracking press coverage from two and a half hours to 15 minutes, and while her predecessors would have spent four or five hours reading forums on Reddit, that now takes her only 45 minutes.

I’m not convinced, however, that either of these approaches is actually helping recruits learn what they need to know. The young accountant, for instance, might be saving time, but he’s also missing out on the practice of spotting something fishy in raw data. How do you learn to notice red flags if you don’t dig through numbers yourself? A clean summary from AI doesn’t build that neural pathway in your brain.

The PR worker also didn’t seem to be doing “higher-level work,” but simply doing analysis more quickly. The output provided by AI is clearly useful to a junior worker’s bosses, but I’m skeptical that it’s giving them a deeper understanding of how a business or industry works.

What’s worse is that their opportunities for work are declining overall. “We’ve seen a huge drop in the demand for ‘entry-level’ talent across a number of our client sets,” says James Callander, CEO of a Freshminds, a London recruitment firm that specializes in finding staff for consultancies. An increasing number of clients want more “work ready” professionals who already have a first job under their belt, he adds.

That corroborates a trend flagged by venture capital firm SignalFire, whose “State of Talent 2025” report pointed to what they called an “experience paradox,” where more companies post for junior roles but fill them with senior workers. The data crunchers at LinkedIn have noticed a similar trend, prompting one of its executives to claim the bottom rung of the career ladder was breaking.

Yet some young professionals seem unfazed. Last week, a University of Oxford professor asked a group of 70 executive MBA students from the National University of Singapore if Gen Z jobs were being disproportionately eroded by AI. Some said “no,” adding that they, younger workers, were best placed to become the most valuable people in a workplace because of their strength in manipulating AI tools, recounts Alex Connock, a senior fellow at Oxford’s Saïd Business School, who specializes in the media industry and AI.

The students weren’t just using ChatGPT, but a range of tools like Gemini, Claude, Firefly, HeyGen, Gamma, Higgsfield, Suno, Udio, Notebook LM and Midjourney, says Connock.

The lesson here for businesses is that sure, in the short term you can outsource entry-level work to AI and cut costs, but that means missing out on capturing AI-native talent.

It’s also dangerous to assume that giving junior staff AI tools will automatically make them more strategic. They could instead become dependent, even addicted to AI tools, and not learn business fundamentals.  There are lessons here from social media. Studies show that young people who use it actively tend not to get the mental health harms of those who use it passively. Posting and chatting on Instagram, for instance, is better than curling up on the couch and doom-scrolling for an hour.

Perhaps businesses should similarly look for healthy engagement by their newer staff with AI, checking that they’re using it to sense-check their own ideas and interrogating a chatbot’s answers, rather than going to it for all analysis and accepting whatever the tools spit out.

That could spell the difference between raising a workforce that can think strategically, and one that can’t think beyond the output from an AI tool.

Parmy Olson is a Bloomberg Opinion columnist covering technology. A former reporter for the Wall Street Journal and Forbes, she is author of “Supremacy: AI, ChatGPT and the Race That Will Change the World.”

“It’s clear that this system can’t be salvaged with iterative tweaks. It needs political courage and bold reforms that will reboot the housing market.”

The view from Dean Street near Vanderbilt Avenue in Brooklyn. (Phot by Adi Talwar)

Every week, I speak with dozens of renters who feel overwhelmed with crippling rent increases, unresponsive landlords, and a system designed to wear them down. Many are ready to leave the city altogether because they can’t afford to stay. As New York’s mayoral candidates debate zoning targets for 2035, renters are dealing with an urgent, immediate crisis that just can’t wait.

It’s clear that this system can’t be salvaged with iterative tweaks. It needs political courage and bold reforms that will reboot the housing market. If the next mayor is serious about housing, here are five policies they should kickstart in their first 100 days:

Turn city voucher programs into a cash-based housing allowance

The city’s voucher program is failing the people it is supposed to serve. Despite an increasing budget, growing from $174 million in 2019 to over $816 million in 2024, the program is underperforming. A recent audit by the State Comptroller found that households approved for CityFHEPS waited an average of 10 months to move out of shelters, with some families waiting more than three years for placement.

Even when renters finally secure vouchers, they’re blocked by endless administrative red tape and widespread landlord discrimination. These vouchers can’t be used for shared housing, sublets, or rooms in family homes, even though these are common, affordable options for many renters.

Instead of forcing tenants to navigate a rigid and bureaucratic system, the city should issue portable, cash-based subsidies, paid directly to renters. A portable benefit would also improve voucher acceptance, giving renters leverage in lease negotiations and reducing the stigma that often accompanies subsidy holders. 

Make rental assistance available before eviction happens

The city needs to intervene earlier. The data is clear: an average shelter stay for a family costs the city over $100,000 per year, while early rental assistance can cost as little as $3,500. Beyond the financials, eviction prevention keeps people rooted in their communities. If we can stop eviction before it begins, we can keep our neighbors safe and healthy and prevent the lasting damage that forced relocations or foreclosures can cause. 

Reform the Rent Guidelines Board (RGB) for smarter rent policy

Every year, the RGB votes on rent increases for over 1 million stabilized apartments. However, the board applies the same adjustment to all units, regardless of the borough, building condition, or landlord history.

That’s outdated. Why should a landlord with hundreds of open violations be able to increase rents? Why should a luxury rent-stabilized building in Hudson Yards get the same increase as a small owner with six units in Brooklyn? We need a policy that reflects the realities of New York’s housing stock.

Smart rent regulation must be data-driven, context-aware, and tied to tenant protections. The next mayor needs to appoint a bold and reform-oriented board, and the board also needs to be given the mandate and support to reshape and reinterpret how increases are established.

Reward good landlords with real incentives

Enforcement alone won’t fix our housing crisis. We also need to reward the landlords who maintain their properties and rent responsibly. A “Good Landlord Program” could offer:

Tax breaks for clean code records

Low-interest loans for capital improvements

Fast-track permits for owners who accept vouchers and comply with the law

We know incentive programs can work. In Phoenix, Arizona, the Threshold program incentivized landlords to accept housing vouchers, resulting in over 1,000 previously unhoused individuals gaining access to homes or apartments. Before its launch, about 65 percent of voucher recipients could find landlords willing to rent to them, a figure that increased to almost 90 percent after the program’s implementation. 

Too often, we treat all landlords the same. We need to start recognizing and rewarding those who are part of the solution. 

Fix Housing Preservation & Development (HPD) enforcement and start collecting fines

New Yorkers report heat outages, leaks, mold, and pest infestations every day, but code enforcement is inconsistent. In 2024, housing code violations in New York City jumped 24 percent, totaling 895,457 violations, yet many landlords face minimal financial consequences. HPD is understaffed, and most fines issued to bad landlords go uncollected. It’s estimated that over 97 percent of fines issued to delinquent landlords are never collected. The next mayor needs to give city agencies the mandate and resources to enforce existing laws and reinvest penalties into housing support. 

These aren’t radical proposals, but they do challenge the status quo. The next mayor can’t afford to govern by appeasing every stakeholder. We need to rip out the failing parts of this system before even more New Yorkers are pushed out. Change in New York is never easy, but these are implementable, common-sense policies that can be set in motion on day one. 

Housing is a right, not a privilege. We need a mayor that won’t just manage the housing crisis, but truly reimagine how New Yorkers live. 

Allia Mohamed is the co-founder and CEO of openigloo, a NYC-based rental platform that helps tenants find quality housing by crowdsourcing building reviews, surfacing city data, and promoting landlord transparency.

The post Opinion: What NYC’s Next Mayor Must Do On Housing In The First 100 Days appeared first on City Limits.

Leading up to this year’s November election, the St. Paul DFL will skip the tradition of endorsing a mayoral candidate. It won’t be vetting candidates for the sole city council race in a special election this August. In fact, the capital city chapter may not be issuing statements at all any time soon.

Dieu Do stepped down as chair of the St. Paul DFL last July at the end of her two-year term. Since then, no one has stepped up to take her place, leaving the future of the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party’s St. Paul chapter up in the air. Rick Varco, a political director with the labor union SEIU Healthcare Minnesota, remains the party treasurer and the only person left on the executive board. The unit ended last year with less than $3,000 in the bank.

“The St. Paul DFL has not disbanded but we did not hold 2025 caucuses,” said Varco, who was traveling this week and communicated by email. “I am the only current officer of five positions.”

With key board positions vacant and the chapter short on funds, the St. Paul DFL has chosen not to host a citywide endorsing convention this summer for mayor. Nor will it host a ward convention for the open Ward 4 seat on the St. Paul City Council, which represents Hamline-Midway and most of four surrounding neighborhoods.

Varco noted that as a result of a successful ballot measure in November 2024, future mayoral and council elections will line up with presidential elections, the next one being in 2028, and the party unit’s constitution needs to be adjusted accordingly.

Adjusting the constitution requires caucuses, ward conventions and a city convention, which cost between $10,000 and $20,000, he said. According to filings with the Minnesota Campaign Finance and Public Disclosure Board, the party’s cash balances at the end of last December totaled $2,800.

Varco is currently working with the state DFL and others “to develop an alternative plan to adjust our constitution,” he wrote. “That should put the St. Paul DFL in a position to make endorsements in the future.”

For now, some political candidates feel shut out.

“It’s … disappointing that I haven’t had the chance for meaningful dialogue with party members about how we can improve our city’s performance,” said Yan Chen, a biophysicist and mayoral candidate in the November election. “I am a proud DFLer, and I will make that clear to voters. I also intend to seek support from DFL-aligned organizations, including organized labor, to at least honor the ‘L’ in DFL.”

Non-partisan endorsements?

Garrison McMurtrey, a former chair and outreach director for the St. Paul DFL, was elected to the Ramsey County Board in February. He confirmed he no longer serves on the St. Paul DFL executive committee and referred further questions to Varco. Other former members did not respond to requests for comment.

The St. Paul DFL’s primary role is to endorse and back candidates for city council, school board and mayor; candidates for federal, state and county offices seek the endorsement of their respective party chapters. For example, U.S. Rep. Betty McCollum has repeatedly received the endorsement of the CD4 DFL, representing the fourth Congressional district.

Megan Thomas, a longtime organizer within the party who was otherwise not intimately familiar with the status of the St. Paul board, said that like any volunteer-run organization, it was not uncommon for participants to “drift away” with time. After the seven city council members were elected in 2023, the unit’s major work was done.

The St. Paul DFL’s website has barely been updated since sometime two years ago. A landing page tells visitors there are seven council elections “this year,” referring to November 2023.

The party unit’s hiatus comes even as St. Paul and other blue cities have been buffeted by federal cuts to major institutions and the Trump administration ramps up rhetoric and policy at odds with Democratic priorities. Thomas and others acknowledged it’s an unfortunate time to take a break.

Still, over the years, even some past presidents of the St. Paul political unit have questioned why it needs to host endorsing conventions at all, given that it concerns itself with non-partisan races. The central picture on the chapter website’s landing page features 11 DFL-endorsed elected officials who hold non-partisan roles: Six of the seven members of the city council, four members of the St. Paul School Board board and the mayor. Officially, those are all non-partisan positions; no party affiliation is listed on the voter ballot.

The St. Paul DFL isn’t the only St. Paul unit of a major party to fall under the radar. The last candidates to run for public office in St. Paul under the Green Party banner were mayoral candidate Elizabeth Dickinson in 2017 and council candidate Danielle Swift in 2019. Neither won office.

It’s unclear who was the last candidate to hold the official endorsement of the St. Paul Republican City Committee, but it’s been a while. Eva Ng ran for mayor with the Republican endorsement in 2009 against then-St. Paul Mayor Chris Coleman, a DFLer, and three Republicans — Kevin Huepenbecker, Pat Igo and Lizz Paulson — sought school board seats in 2011.

While not officially a political party, the Twin Cities chapter of the Democratic Socialists of America was active in the 2023 council elections and is supporting Cole Hanson in Ward 4 this summer.

Ranked-choice election makes endorsements moot?

Meanwhile, some say culling the field before election day through the endorsement process undermines the point of ranked-choice voting. Ranked-choice elections allow an unlimited number of candidates for mayor or city council onto the general election ballot. Whether that makes DFL endorsements outdated or more important than ever in helping voters understand a busy field remains a matter of perspective, but there’s now less incentive for candidates to drop out of a race after failing to secure the endorsement.

In 2019, hours after promising to abide by the party’s endorsement process, more than one candidate for the Ward 1 office who had not received the endorsement decided to run in the general election anyway.

Also of concern, endorsing conventions have sometimes descended into chaos, rancor and accusations of malfeasance, and the cost and complication involved with hosting conventions have discouraged volunteers.

In 2019, council candidate Anika Bowie filed a complaint with the state party alleging voting irregularities and inappropriate volunteer behavior at the Ward 1 convention. Nothing much came of it, and Council Member Dai Thao was able to retain the party’s endorsement.

Four years later, when the April 2023 Ward 1 convention ended without endorsement and a mass delegate walk-out after nearly 10 hours, some in the Central High School auditorium audience wondered whether the process had simply more to confuse and alienate non-English speakers and first-time attendees than invite them into a big tent. No one received the endorsement, but Bowie won the eight-way race for the open Ward 1 seat that November.

Beth Commers, a past-president of the St. Paul DFL, foresees better days ahead for the local party under Varco’s direction.

“The St. Paul DFL was impacted by the switch to even-year elections,” Commers said. “The St. Paul DFL needs to reconfigure to endorse like the Ramsey County DFL operates. … Varco has a clear plan.”

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The way Winston Wisely was dealing, one run was plenty for Mahtomedi.

After all, his opponents managed just one hit.

The junior left-hander took a no-hitter into the fifth inning and Mahtomedi beat Simley 10-0 in six innings Wednesday afternoon a Class 3A baseball tournament quarterfinal.

“That was for sure one of my best, but it wasn’t like out of the ordinary,” said Wisely, who allowed four hits in a 3-0 win over the Spartans April 15.

Playing in centerfield, Ethan Felling has had a great view of Wisely’s dominance this season.

“This is a common outing for this kid, Pumps the zone every time with all of his pitches. This is a name to remember,” said Felling, who will play for the University of Minnesota next year.

Felling and Jake Reubish each reached base four times, Cody Loida had three hits, as the third-seeded Zephyrs (17-7) advance to play No. 7 Hutchinson in a semifinal at 9:30 a.m. Thursday back at the Mini Met in Jordan. The Tigers beat Totino-Grace 5-3 Wednesday.

A tournament participant for the 10th time since 2014, Mahtomedi won the 2021 crown and took second the past two seasons.

Reubish made the defensive play of the game for Mahtomedi with a sliding stop to start an inning-ending double play in the fifth, when Simley had its first baserunner via a Wayne Seelhammer hit.

“It sucks because it wasn’t a great swing that one hit but props to him for turning on the baseball and getting it over the infield,” said Wisely, who needed just 61 pitches for his career best low-hit game.

“My fastball, I was really consistent with it in the zone, my curveball was great especially in strikeout situations, and my changeup was good. I just kind of used it as a get-me-over pitch, kind of maybe one strike, get it to a two-strike count, put the pressure on them and take a little bit of speed off the fastball.”

A tournament newcomer, Simley (15-8) entered as winners of eight straight, the last three via shutout. Its last loss was a 4-2 setback to Mahtomedi May 7.

“They strung their hits together, they handled our pitcher who’s been great all year,” said Simley coach Jon Heiderscheit. “We were able to get out of jams against them earlier in the year and we just played a little bit cleaner. But they’re a really good team and they’re battle tested.”

“That pitcher” is Steelhammer who allowed eight hits over five innings. He allowed one hit through five innings in a previous matchup this year with the Zephyrs.

Wisely provided insurance for himself with an RBI single in the fifth to plate Felling who tripled. A Peyton Whitlock single made it 4-0 three hitters later and Isaac Iten followed with a sacrifice fly.

Back-to-back-to-back RBI singles by Loida, Felling and Wisely began a five-run sixth inning that ended the game via a run rule.

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