Unions and bishops press for workers to shape workplace AI

Unions and bishops press for workers to shape workplace AI
Union leaders and Catholic bishops meeting at the Vatican argued that artificial intelligence should not be treated as a management-only decision when it affects hiring, pay and working conditions. Their shared position is not to halt technological change, but to ensure workers can help set its terms through collective bargaining, social dialogue and human oversight.

Liz Shuler, president of the AFL-CIO, warned against a model in which corporate leaders make far-reaching technology choices without those affected taking part. “Now, we have CEOs who want to play God to make decisions that affect hundreds of millions of working people without our participation and consent,” she said. She compared the AI transition with the early spread of electricity, when workers organized to seek safety rules and responsible deployment rather than reject the technology itself.

Gerardo Martínez made the labor movement’s contrast explicit: “Do not resist innovation, do not accept exclusion, and negotiate the transition.” In that view, automation may raise productivity, but an algorithm should not independently decide “employment, wages and rights” belonging to a worker. The AFL-CIO’s partnership with Microsoft was cited as a practical model for giving employees a formal role in AI development.

Church representatives reached a similar conclusion from Catholic social teaching. Bishop Daniel Flores invoked subsidiarity—the idea that communities affected by change should be able to voice their concerns—and said history is shaped by more than “what the powerful decide,” pointing instead to social friendship and justice. Cardinal Jaime Spengler likewise said each generation must guide change so that dignity, justice and fraternity are protected.

Together, the speakers presented negotiated transition rather than technological resistance as the route to workplace AI that serves people as well as business.

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