The Department of Labor released a far-reaching set of principles that provide employers and developers that create and deploy artificial intelligence with guidance for designing and implementing these emerging technologies in ways that enhance job quality and protect workers’ rights.
The principles, developed pursuant to President Biden’s Oct. 30, 2023, Executive Order 14110, are applicable to all sectors and are as follows: centering worker empowerment by informing workers and their representatives of, and receiving their genuine input in, the design, development, testing, training, use and oversight of AI systems for use in the workplace; ethically developing AI systems to be designed, developed and trained in a way that protects workers; protecting labor and employment rights by not using AI systems to violate or undermine workers’ right to organize, health and safety rights, wage and hour rights, and anti-discrimination and anti-retaliation protections; using AI to enable workers so that AI systems assist, complement and enable workers and improve their job quality; supporting workers impacted by AI for those experiencing job transitions related to AI, including through trainings and worker development; establishing AI governance and human oversight at organizations through clear governance systems, procedures, human oversight and evaluation processes regarding AI systems used in the workplace; ensuring transparency in AI use with workers and job seekers regarding AI systems being used in the workplace; and ensuring responsible use of worker data that is collected, used or created by AI systems to be limited in scope and location, used only to support legitimate business aims, and protected and handled responsibly.