Latest news with #contractworkers
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Duolingo CEO walks back AI-first comments: ‘I do not see AI as replacing what our employees do'
A week after declaring that AI would eventually replace contract workers at the language-learning app, Duolingo's CEO said the company was 'continuing to hire' and would support its existing workers in getting up to speed on the technology. It follows buzzy startup Klarna in backing off an AI-first promise. Language-learning app Duolingo has become the latest company to publicly temper its AI enthusiasm after a series of bold proclamations on AI replacing humans garnered severe criticism. Luis von Ahn, co-founder and CEO, took to LinkedIn on Thursday to walk back a previous stance pushing AI use over human employees. 'To be clear: I do not see AI as replacing what our employees do (we are in fact continuing to hire at the same speed as before),' he wrote. 'I see it as a tool to accelerate what we do, at the same or better level of quality. And the sooner we learn how to use it, and use it responsibly, the better off we will be in the long run.' He added, 'No one is expected to navigate this shift alone. We're developing workshops and advisory councils, and carving out dedicated experimentation time to help all our teams learn and adapt.' The clarification is a 180-degree turn from the company's position a week ago, when it declared it would 'gradually stop using contractors to do work AI can handle,' evaluate AI fluency in workers' annual reviews, and only add new employees 'if a team cannot automate more of their work.' Von Ahn also appeared to throw his weight behind AI over human teachers in a podcast appearance. Speaking on No Priors with Sarah Guo, he predicted that AI would soon be able to teach any subject, at a greater scale, and create 'better learning outcomes' than human teachers, but added that schools would continue to exist 'because you still need childcare.' The criticism flew in. On the company's popular TikTok and Instagram accounts, commenters piled on to bash AI on every recent post. (On one video where a baby owl plushie asked 'mama, may I have cookie,' the top comment read: 'mama may I have real people running the company 💔') The company even put von Ahn in his own TikTok, opposite a masked, hoodie-wearing person to explain that 'AI will allow us to reach more people.' A Duolingo spokesperson told Fortune: 'We're still growing our team, and we're training and developing our talent so they benefit from using AI.' He added, 'All AI content is created under the direction and guidance of our learning experts. We have rigorous quality standards in place to ensure that any content we publish is safe, accurate and aligned with the CEFR,' referencing an international standard to measure language ability. Duolingo's self-correction is just the latest in a recent trend. Fintech app Klarna had its own turnaround on AI last month. After publicly touting the superiority of its AI chatbot, saying it hadn't hired humans in a year, the company's CEO revealed that the 'lower quality' of the chatbot meant it would start hiring humans again after all. Shopify faced similar criticism after a memo essentially said that AI-driven productivity would replace new hires. The backlash to Duolingo is the latest evidence that 'AI-first' tends to be a concept with much more appeal to investors and managers than most regular people. And it's not hard to see why. Generative AI is often trained on reams of content that may have been illegally accessed; much of its output is bizarre or incorrect; and some leaders in the field are opposed to regulations on the technology. But outside particular niches in entry-level white-collar work, AI's productivity gains have yet to materialize. An IBM survey of 2,000 leaders found that 3 in 4 AI initiatives fail to deliver their promised ROI. A recent National Bureau of Economic Research study of 25,000 workers in AI-exposed industries found that the technology didn't make workers massively more productive and had next to no impact on earnings as well as hours. That 'this tool that's been adopted so fast, where the expectations are so high, [was] not making a difference in earnings was a surprise to me,' University of Chicago economics professor Anders Humlum, one of the NBER study authors, told Fortune. 'It seems it's a much smaller and much slower transition than you might imagine if you had just studied the technology's potential in a vacuum.' This story was originally featured on Error in retrieving data Sign in to access your portfolio Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data Error in retrieving data
Independent Singapore
24-05-2025
- Automotive
- Independent Singapore
Buried in bureaucracy: How cemetery workers lost their only way around
SINGAPORE: The quiet paths of Lim Chu Kang Muslim Cemetery were thrown into the public spotlight this week after the Land Transport Authority (LTA) announced that several auto-rickshaws — locally referred to as 'tuk-tuks' — had been seized for investigation. The vehicles, unregistered and lacking license plates, had been used by cemetery workers to ferry tools and materials across the vast, winding grounds. The seizures followed public complaints, with concerns raised over road safety, but beneath the surface of this enforcement action lies a deeper ethical question: what happens when survival, accessibility, and tradition collide with regulation? The long, lonely roads of Lim Chu Kang Lim Chu Kang cemetery is one of Singapore's largest remaining burial grounds, covering over 300 hectares. Divided into sections for various religious groups, the Muslim cemetery alone covers over 26 hectares, with burial plots, tombstone yards, and maintenance sheds spread far apart along sun-beaten gravel roads. A 60-year-old groundskeeper who has worked in the cemetery since his teens. 'I can't walk far — my leg gives way.' Many of these workers, some past retirement age, are self-employed or contract labourers hired by families to maintain graves, lay grass, or install tombstones. They do not have employer-provided vehicles and cannot afford trucks or vans. Several said they resorted to tuk-tuks — often solar-powered and imported from China — as a last resort to stay mobile and keep earning a livelihood. A question of use, not abuse Unlike road-bound private hire vehicles or scooters used for leisure, these tuk-tuks seldom leave the cemetery. An owner of one of the tuk-tuks said he paid S$3,800 for his, which runs on solar energy and can last for days on a backup battery. For many workers, the investment is significant — more of a necessity than a convenience. The LTA has a clear mandate: All motor vehicles used on public roads or lands must be approved and registered to ensure safety and compliance. This ensures accountability and technical roadworthiness, especially in shared public spaces. However, in places like Lim Chu Kang, the distinction between public and private terrain is blurred. While technically public land, cemeteries are closed, quiet zones with little to no vehicular traffic beyond hearses, family visitors, and workers. Should the same regulatory expectations that apply to expressways be applied to remote cemetery paths used exclusively by older workers to transport stones and gardening tools? Unlike salaried gravediggers employed by mosques or the National Environment Authority (NEA), many of these workers operate independently. They are not unionised or represented, and their earnings depend on maintaining the trust of grieving families and returning customers. The seized vehicles are now impounded, and several workers say they are unsure how they will carry out their duties. Others are waiting, hoping for leniency or clarity.
Yahoo
24-05-2025
- General
- Yahoo
The US buried millions of gallons of wartime nuclear waste – Doge cuts could wreck the cleanup
In the bustling rural city of Richland, in south-eastern Washington, the signs of a nuclear past are all around. A small museum explains its role in the Manhattan Project and its 'singular mission – [to] develop the world's first atomic bomb before the enemy might do the same'. The city's high school sports team is still known as the Bombers, with a logo that consists of the letter R set with a mushroom cloud. Richland lies just 30 miles from the Hanford nuclear site, a sprawling plant that produced the plutonium for America's atomic weapons during the second world war – including the bomb dropped over Nagasaki. Over the decades, thousands of people in the Tri-Cities area of southern Washington worked at the plant, which shuttered in 1989. But a dark legacy of Hanford still lingers here: vast amounts of highly radioactive waste nobody is quite sure what to do with. Residents have long spearheaded an operation to deal with 56m gallons of nuclear waste left behind in dozens of underground tanks – a cleanup that is expected to cost half a trillion dollars and may not be completed until 2100. The government has called it 'one of the largest and most expensive environmental cleanup projects worldwide'. In recent weeks, what has already been a costly and painstakingly slow process has come under renewed scrutiny, following an exodus of experts from the Department of Energy (DoE) that is overseeing the cleanup being executed by thousands of contract workers. Related: Nuclear waste ravaged their land. The Yakama Nation is on a quest to rescue it According to local media, several dozen staff, who reportedly include managers, scientists and safety experts, have taken early retirement or been fired as part of a broader government reduction overseen by Elon Musk and his 'department of government efficiency'. The government has refused to provide a specific figure for how many people involved with cleanup efforts have left. The top DoE manager at the Hanford site, Brian Vance, who had many years of experience, resigned at the end of March without giving a reason. The changes have thrown the communities around the Hanford plant into limbo. And while the Department of Energy has said that only six staff have been fired, and reiterated its commitment to the cleanup, that hasn't managed to assuage locals' concerns. Those raising the alarm include politicians from both parties, environmental activists, and Indigenous communities who have historically owned the land on which the 560 sq mile (1,450 sq km) site sits. The US senator for Washington Patty Murray said workers were already understaffed, and that cutting further positions was 'reckless'. 'There is nothing 'efficient' about indiscriminately firing thousands upon thousands of workers in red and blue states whose work is badly needed,' the Democrat said. Dan Newhouse, the local Republican congressman is similarly concerned. 'A strong, well trained federal workforce is essential,' he wrote in a weekly newsletter to constituents. Concerns have also been raised by some over the difficulty former workers face in making medical compensation claims to the government for everything from cancer to acute pulmonary disease linked to their time at the plant. Taken together, there is fresh anxiety in a community, where many are still living with the health and environmental effects of Hanford. ••• Richland, part of the Tri-Cities, was obtained by the army in 1943 to house workers engaged in top-secret efforts to produce plutonium used in the world's first nuclear explosion – the-so-called 'Trinity' device tested some 200 miles from Los Alamos, New Mexico, in 1945. Though the city was returned to the public a decade later, it can still feel like a company town. To get anywhere near what is known as Hanford's B-reactor, the world's first full-scale plutonium production reactor, you need to sign up for an official tour. Yet a view of its grey, single tower, looming from the hillside, can be seen from state route 24, close to the Columbia River. Those expressing concern about the federal government downsizing include local Indigenous groups who historically owned the land where the site is located and were pushed off it by the government. The Hanford plant area contains the location of several sacred sites, among them Gable Mountain, which were used for ceremonies, and the area of Rattlesnake Mountain, or Lalíik, which has for centuries been used to hunt elk. The site is also located close to the Yakama Indian Reservation, home to 11,000 people, and the tribe has long pushed to be central to decisions about the cleanup and what it is eventually used for. The tribe recently signed a deal to carry out their first elk hunt in the area for seven decades. 'One of the biggest fears is that without proper manpower, there might not be a very good crew for the cleanup of the property,' says Gerald Lewis, chairman of the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation. 'Without this cleanup, that's been happening for a number of years, we're afraid of a nuclear mishap.' Dr Elizabeth McClure, a health data specialist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, is currently conducting research in the communities around Hanford. She says there is a history of government-led cover-ups over the years at the site, including what is known as 'the Green Run', the intentional release of 8,000 so-called curies of iodine-131 into the atmosphere in 1949. By comparison, the leak of radioactive material at the Three Mile Island accident in 1979 involved just a dozen. The Green Run was only acknowledged by the government in 1986. It later emerged that so-called 'downwinders', suffered higher rates of cancer and harm to their lymphatic system. She says Indigenous communities, and other marginalised groups, are often not included in research into the broader impact of places such as Hanford. 'In public health, we're doing work to improve the wellbeing of the public,' she says. 'If you aren't getting the insights and feedback of who's being harmed, you're not going to be able to make improvements.' Also monitoring developments is Hanford Challenge, an environmental group that has highlighted – among other issues – the estimated million gallons of radioactive waste already leaked into the soil because several dozen storage tanks are cracked. A plan to send 2,000 gallons of waste for treatment in Utah or Texas was put on hold after protests from communities on the route, including the city of Spokane and the Umatilla Indian Reservation. Nikolas Peterson, a spokesperson for Hanford Challenge, is concerned about job losses and how it will impact a cleanup operation that is taking place far away from the public eye. 'This level of reduction in staffing raises serious concerns about oversight, accountability and continuity. While the contractor workforce performs the bulk of the cleanup work, DoE staff play a critical role in setting priorities, ensuring compliance and maintaining transparency with the public,' he said. 'A diminished federal presence could slow decision-making, weaken oversight and reduce opportunities for meaningful engagement with stakeholders.' ••• For former plant workers like Larry White, the legacy of Hanford is complex. White says he loved the camaraderie of the job, sucked up the hour-long commute, and didn't grumble when he was required to put on protective gear that made the temperature soar. But the job left him with lingering scars. White developed skin cancer and a progressive lung disease that has made it painful to breathe. Even now, as the 83-year-old makes out medical compensation claims, he is not one to complain, even though it hurts to breathe. 'I was treated good while I was there. They took care of us,' says White, who owns and helps farm seven acres in Yakima, a town some 45 miles from Hanford. Since 2000, the government has paid out at least $2.2bn to former Hanford employees, representing 13,000 people. White is being helped by his son, Doug White, a consultant, community activist and part-time farmer who ran unsuccessfully as a Democrat for Newhouse's seat in 2022. His son admits he is struggling with the paperwork required to process the claim and is struggling to get help. He says it is essential officials are transparent. 'I'm finding it extremely complicated, unintelligible and opaque,' says White. 'It's a struggle. It's an absolute struggle.' Another former staff member, Richard Badalamente, spent 22 years working as a behavioral scientist at the DoE's National Laboratory, originally part of the Hanford site. Today he's a campaigner for environmental and other causes. Badalamente, 88, says the concerns triggered by news about a reduction in staff symbolise the peculiar relationship between the Hanford community and its history. 'The concern is twofold,' he says. He says the economic 'fuel' for the region comes from the massive operation that may not be completed for 75 years. He adds: 'The concern is the Trump administration will not support a robust cleanup.' It appears many of the recent departures have come as part through voluntary redundancy, or delayed resignation program (DRP), that have been used in other government departments to trim numbers. The DoE said by email it would not provide a number for how many employees had opted for early retirement. It said all requests 'were subject to approval, and certain public safety, national security, law enforcement, or other essential employees may not be approved for participation'. It also would not say how staff had been selected. It confirmed Vance's deputy, Brian Stickney, was among those who had taken early retirement. Vance did not respond to inquiries from the Guardian. Asked about the impact on the cleanup, the spokesperson said: 'The DoE is committed to meeting cleanup responsibilities at Hanford safely and effectively while delivering on President Trump's mission to increase innovation across the federal government and promote greater efficiency and accountability.' In a note to staff, he said: 'Hanford's cleanup mission is one of the most complex and challenging in the world, and the progress we have made is nothing short of remarkable.' How swiftly that progress now goes remains to be seen. Back at the visitors' museum in Richland, near the black-and-white photos of Ronald Reagans's 1956 morale-boosting visit to Hanford, a 15-minute informational film highlights in plain, unemotional language the scale of the 'unintended consequences and legacies of the Manhattan Project'. Solving these complex environmental problems, the film says, will rely on the same 'drive, dedication, human ingenuity and political will' put into building the bomb. • This article was amended on 20 May 2025. It was iodine-131, not 'iodine-1', that was released into the atmosphere in 1949.
The Guardian
15-05-2025
- Politics
- The Guardian
The US buried millions of gallons of wartime nuclear waste – Doge cuts could wreck the cleanup
In the bustling rural city of Richland, in south-eastern Washington, the signs of a nuclear past are all around. A small museum explains its role in the Manhattan Project and its 'singular mission – [to] develop the world's first atomic bomb before the enemy might do the same'. The city's high school sports team is still known as the Bombers, with a logo that consists of the letter R set with a mushroom cloud. Richland lies just 30 miles from the Hanford nuclear site, a sprawling plant that produced the plutonium for America's atomic weapons during the second world war – and later the bomb dropped over Nagasaki. Over the decades, thousands of people in the Tri-Cities area of southern Washington worked at the plant, which shuttered in 1989. But a dark legacy of Hanford still lingers here: vast amounts of highly radioactive waste nobody is quite sure what to do with. Residents have long spearheaded an operation to deal with 56m gallons of nuclear waste left behind in dozens of underground tanks – a cleanup that is expected to cost half a trillion dollars and may not be completed until 2100. The government has called it 'one of the largest and most expensive environmental cleanup projects worldwide'. In recent weeks, what has already been a costly and painstakingly slow process has come under renewed scrutiny, following an exodus of experts from the Department of Energy (DoE) that is overseeing the cleanup being executed by thousands of contract workers. According to local media, several dozen staff, who reportedly include managers, scientists and safety experts, have taken early retirement or been fired as part of a broader government reduction overseen by Elon Musk and his 'department of government efficiency'. The government has refused to provide a specific figure for how many people involved with cleanup efforts have left. The top DoE manager at the Hanford site, Brian Vance, who had many years of experience, resigned at the end of March without giving a reason. The changes have thrown the communities around the Hanford plant into limbo. And while the Department of Energy has said that only six staff have been fired, and reiterated its commitment to the cleanup, that hasn't managed to assuage locals' concerns. Those raising the alarm include politicians from both parties, environmental activists, and Indigenous communities who have historically owned the land on which the 560 sq mile (1,450 sq km) site sits. The US senator for Washington Patty Murray said workers were already understaffed, and that cutting further positions was 'reckless'. 'There is nothing 'efficient' about indiscriminately firing thousands upon thousands of workers in red and blue states whose work is badly needed,' the Democrat said. Dan Newhouse, the local Republican congressman is similarly concerned. 'A strong, well trained federal workforce is essential,' he wrote in a weekly newsletter to constituents. Concerns have also been raised by some over the difficulty former workers face in making medical compensation claims to the government for everything from cancer to acute pulmonary disease linked to their time at the plant. Taken together, there is fresh anxiety in a community, where many are still living with the health and environmental effects of Hanford. Richland, part of the Tri-Cities, was obtained by the army in 1943 to house workers engaged in top-secret efforts to produce plutonium used in the world's first nuclear explosion – the-so-called 'Trinity' device tested near Los Alamos, New Mexico, in 1945. Though the city was returned to the public a decade later, it can still feel like a company town. To get anywhere near what is known as Hanford's B-reactor, the world's first full-scale plutonium production reactor, you need to sign up for an official tour. Yet a view of its grey, single tower, looming from the hillside, can be seen from state route 24, close to the Columbia River. Those expressing concern about the federal government downsizing include local Indigenous groups who historically owned the land where the site is located and were pushed off it by the government. The Hanford plant area contains the location of several sacred sites, among them Gable Mountain, which were used for ceremonies, and the area of Rattlesnake Mountain, or Lalíik, which has for centuries been used to hunt elk. The site is also located close to the Yakama Indian Reservation, home to 11,000 people, and the tribe has long pushed to be central to decisions about the cleanup and what it is eventually used for. The tribe recently signed a deal to carry out their first elk hunt in the area for seven decades. 'One of the biggest fears is that without proper manpower, there might not be a very good crew for the cleanup of the property,' says Gerald Lewis, chairman of the Confederated Tribes and Bands of the Yakama Nation. 'Without this cleanup, that's been happening for a number of years, we're afraid of a nuclear mishap.' Dr Elizabeth McClure, a health data specialist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, is currently conducting research in the communities around Hanford. She says there is a history of government-led cover-ups over the years at the site, including what is known as 'the Green Run', the intentional release of 8,000 so-called curies of iodine-1 into the atmosphere in 1949. By comparison, the leak of radioactive material at the Three Mile Island accident in 1979 involved just a dozen. The Green Run was only acknowledged by the government in 1986. It later emerged that so-called 'downwinders', suffered higher rates of cancer and harm to their lymphatic system. She says Indigenous communities, and other marginalised groups, are often not included in research into the broader impact of places such as Hanford. 'In public health, we're doing work to improve the wellbeing of the public,' she says. 'If you aren't getting the insights and feedback of who's being harmed, you're not going to be able to make improvements.' Also monitoring developments is Hanford Challenge, an environmental group that has highlighted – among other issues – the estimated million gallons of radioactive waste already leaked into the soil because several dozen storage tanks are cracked. A plan to send 2,000 gallons of waste for treatment in Utah or Texas was put on hold after protests from communities on the route, including the city of Spokane and the Umatilla Indian Reservation. Nikolas Peterson, a spokesperson for Hanford Challenge, is concerned about job losses and how it will impact a cleanup operation that is taking place far away from the public eye. 'This level of reduction in staffing raises serious concerns about oversight, accountability and continuity. While the contractor workforce performs the bulk of the cleanup work, DoE staff play a critical role in setting priorities, ensuring compliance and maintaining transparency with the public,' he said. Sign up to Down to Earth The planet's most important stories. Get all the week's environment news - the good, the bad and the essential after newsletter promotion 'A diminished federal presence could slow decision-making, weaken oversight and reduce opportunities for meaningful engagement with stakeholders.' For former plant workers like Larry White, the legacy of Hanford is complex. White says he loved the camaraderie of the job, sucked up the hour-long commute, and didn't grumble when he was required to put on protective gear that made the temperature soar. But the job left him with lingering scars. White developed skin cancer and a progressive lung disease that has made it painful to breathe. Even now, as the 83-year-old makes out medical compensation claims, he is not one to complain, even though it hurts to breathe. 'I was treated good while I was there. They took care of us,' says White, who owns and helps farm seven acres in Yakima, a town some 45 miles from Hanford. Since 2000, the government has paid out at least $2.2bn to former Hanford employees, representing 13,000 people. White is being helped by his son, Doug White, a consultant, community activist and part-time farmer who ran unsuccessfully as a Democrat for Newhouse's seat in 2022. His son admits he is struggling with the paperwork required to process the claim and is struggling to get help. He says it is essential officials are transparent. 'I'm finding it extremely complicated, unintelligible and opaque,' says White. 'It's a struggle. It's an absolute struggle.' Another former staff member, Richard Badalamente, spent 22 years working as a behavioral scientist at the DoE's National Laboratory, originally part of the Hanford site. Today he's a campaigner for environmental and other causes. Badalamente, 88, says the concerns triggered by news about a reduction in staff symbolise the peculiar relationship between the Hanford community and its history. 'The concern is twofold,' he says. He says the economic 'fuel' for the region comes from the massive operation that may not be completed for 75 years. He adds: 'The concern is the Trump administration will not support a robust cleanup.' It appears many of the recent departures have come as part through voluntary redundancy, or delayed resignation program (DRP), that have been used in other government departments to trim numbers. The DoE said by email it would not provide a number for how many employees had opted for early retirement. It said all requests 'were subject to approval, and certain public safety, national security, law enforcement, or other essential employees may not be approved for participation'. It also would not say how staff had been selected. It confirmed Vance's deputy, Brian Stickney, was among those who had taken early retirement. Vance did not respond to inquiries from the Guardian. Asked about the impact on the cleanup, the spokesperson said: 'The DoE is committed to meeting cleanup responsibilities at Hanford safely and effectively while delivering on President Trump's mission to increase innovation across the federal government and promote greater efficiency and accountability.' In a note to staff, he said: 'Hanford's cleanup mission is one of the most complex and challenging in the world, and the progress we have made is nothing short of remarkable.' How swiftly that progress now goes remains to be seen. Back at the visitors' museum in Richland, near the black-and-white photos of Ronald Reagans's 1956 morale-boosting visit to Hanford, a 15-minute informational film highlights in plain, unemotional language the scale of the 'unintended consequences and legacies of the Manhattan Project'. Solving these complex environmental problems, the film says, will rely on the same 'drive, dedication, human ingenuity and political will' put into building the bomb.
