White-collar workers have been at the center of much of the public handwringing over AI. Entry-level jobs in finance and software engineering seem to be on the chopping block. More college graduates are struggling to find work in a challenging job market, and unemployment ticked up to 5.6% by the end of 2025. Tech companies and other major employers have repeatedly cited AI adoption to justify layoffs.
There are, of course, plenty of factors driving these changes beyond AI, including a hiring slowdown. But there’s no denying AI will reshape the labor market over time—and not just for college-educated workers. A new report from the Brookings Institution in partnership with the nonprofit Opportunity@Work reveals how AI will also impact workers without college degrees, by interrupting the career pathways they have long relied upon to land higher-paying jobs.
“There is a ton of coverage on the challenges of AI for college-educated workers and specifically college graduates,” says Mark Muro, a senior fellow at the Brookings Metro program and co-author of the report. “We think there’s a huge gap. We need to talk about non-four-year degree holders, who are obviously at the heart of social mobility . . . and the status of the pathways and sequences of jobs that they depend on.”
It’s not just individual jobs that are at risk as AI spreads through the workforce. The technology is poised to reconfigure entire career pathways for all kinds of workers, particularly those who lack a college degree. Over 70 million people in the U.S. find their way into the workforce through other means, defined by Opportunity@Work as “skilled through alternative routes” (STARs). Opportunity@Work found that these workers often rely on what are described as “Gateway” jobs, which help them develop important skills and act as a critical bridge between “Origin” jobs—entry-level roles that allow them to get a foothold in the workforce—and more lucrative “Destination” jobs.
Among workers without college degrees, over 15 million are currently in jobs that are highly exposed to AI, according to the Brookings report. Of those workers, about 11 million hold Gateway jobs—and STARs also account for over 62% of people in Gateway jobs across the workforce, making them a crucial element of the broader employment pipeline. The majority of Gateway jobs that are likely to be disrupted are in clerical or administrative work, which also tends to be dominated by women, as previous research has highlighted. Nearly 13 million Destination jobs also have high exposure to AI, among them sales representatives and accountants.
“If these Gateway occupations play a critical role in a number of pathways, lots of pathways run through them, and they’re now at risk,” says Justin Heck, the senior director of research and data production at Opportunity@Work. “What does that mean for the lower wage workers for whom that would be the next step? And then what does that mean for all of the employers who are trying to hire for these Destination occupations who now don’t have that experience pipeline that they’ve relied on historically?”
Overall, just about half of the pathways between Gateway and Destination jobs are highly exposed—which means they are very likely to be automated or augmented in some way by AI, potentially compromising key pathways for many workers without a college degree. “When I think of customer service representatives, secretaries, and accounting clerks—these are often like entry points into white-collar work [and] office settings that then create the avenues for folks to move into different roles,” Heck says.
While many headlines have fixated on the plight of white-collar employees, these are actually the workers who may face the greatest repercussions if they are automated out of a job. There are some lower-wage jobs, particularly in manufacturing, that might prove more resilient because they require in-person, physical work. But as the report indicates, about a third of STARs have what’s called low adaptive capacity—which means they will likely find it more difficult to adjust to job displacement.
Even as college graduates struggle to find work and layoff announcements cast blame on AI, economists have been quick to note that there are few signs of large-scale upheaval in the labor market. But sentiment may be shifting on this matter, with economists more readily acknowledging the impact of AI even as they remain uncertain about what the future will hold. A new report from Boston Consulting Group concluded that over half of the jobs in the U.S. would be “reshaped” by AI in some way within just the next few years, but most would not be replaced outright. Automating aspects of a job—certain tasks—did not necessarily lead to widespread job losses.
But the Brookings report signals profound changes that go well beyond the impact to individual jobs. It’s not just specific jobs that might disappear or transform dramatically but also potential future opportunities—which, in turn, can affect the pool of skilled workers available to employers. The report also found that these career pathways can vary significantly from region to region, depending on the industries and jobs that tend to be most dominant in those areas. That means AI exposure is higher in certain cities than in others, based on which sectors have a strong foothold. As the report’s authors point out, it will take policy changes and sustained, collective action to stem those losses and help rebuild fractured pathways—and ensure that certain regions don’t bear the brunt of the impact.
“AI is not just reshaping the software developers,” Heck says. “This is coming to every community. Regional leaders need to think about: How can we respond in ways that continue to create mobility opportunities for the workers who live here—and meet the talent needs of the employers who want to stay here and invest in the community?”