The Economics of Ghost Work: How Your Automation Is More Human Than You Think
The robots are here—but someone still has to clean up their mess.
A few weeks ago, I chatted with a founder who automated 90% of his customer support with AI. “It’s incredible,” he said. “The chatbot answers everything. We barely need a team anymore.”
“Barely,” huh?
What he didn’t know—what most people don’t know—is that behind every seamless automation, there’s an invisible army of human workers making sure the whole thing doesn’t fall apart.
AI isn’t as independent as we like to think, and the more we automate, the more hidden labor we create. Welcome to the economy of Ghost Work.
The Hidden Workforce Keeping AI Afloat
Automation is supposed to eliminate human labor.
In reality? It often just buries it.
“Ghost Work” refers to the thousands of people quietly training AI, reviewing flagged content, and fixing the endless stream of mistakes automation leaves behind.
They don’t get employee benefits, they don’t get recognized, and they definitely don’t get credit for keeping AI from making a fool of itself.
Consider this:
Amazon’s Mechanical Turk employs workers to complete tasks AI should be able to handle, but can’t—like identifying objects in images, cleaning data sets, and reviewing flagged content.
OpenAI, the company behind ChatGPT, hires thousands of low-wage contractors to improve responses, correct biases, and moderate content.
Social media giants like Facebook and TikTok rely on outsourced moderators to sift through flagged content and remove disturbing posts AI fails to catch.
Most of these workers make between $2 and $5 per hour, often working in places like the Philippines, India, and Kenya. Their jobs exist because AI is still deeply flawed—but the tech companies selling automation rarely acknowledge that fact.
The Business of AI’s Dirty Work
Ghost work is a multi-billion-dollar industry, yet it remains intentionally invisible.
A 2022 study found that over 260,000 gig workers worldwide were actively performing tasks for AI-driven companies, many of them unknowingly contributing to the “automated” services consumers use daily. The business model? Tech companies sell automation but quietly pay humans to do the heavy lifting behind the scenes.
Take Google’s reCAPTCHA, for example—the little “I’m not a robot” box you click when logging into a site. When AI struggles to determine whether a picture contains a stoplight, it gets sent to human workers who manually verify it. That means every time you solve a CAPTCHA, there’s a chance you’re helping train an AI that still needs human oversight.
The economic implications are massive:
Companies save millions by outsourcing to gig workers instead of hiring full-time employees.
Workers remain invisible, often working through third-party platforms that prevent them from unionizing or negotiating better pay.
AI gets marketed as fully autonomous, despite needing a constant influx of human labor to function properly.
The Ironic Future of Automation
The paradox of AI-driven automation is that the more we automate, the more we need humans to clean up the mess. The question is: How sustainable is a business model built on hidden labor?
There are already cracks forming:
AI training costs are skyrocketing. OpenAI reportedly paid outsourced workers over $200 million in 2023 alone to improve ChatGPT’s accuracy.
Regulations are creeping in. The European Union is pushing for AI transparency laws, which could force companies to disclose their reliance on ghost work.
Worker protests are growing. In 2023, Kenyan data annotators who helped train ChatGPT staged a strike, demanding fair pay for their contributions.
If these trends continue, tech companies will be forced to either acknowledge and compensate their human workforce fairly—or finally build AI that doesn’t need them. (Spoiler: the second option isn’t happening anytime soon.)
What This Means for Businesses Relying on Automation
So, if you’re a business owner thinking about going all-in on AI-powered automation, here’s what you need to know:
AI is not 100% autonomous. Even the best AI models still rely on human intervention.
Ghost work is a liability. If regulations change, businesses will have to adjust how they use AI—or risk backlash.
Ethical automation matters. If your business depends on AI, it’s worth questioning whether the systems you rely on are built on fair labor practices.
The Bottom Line: AI and automation aren’t magic—they’re just business models built on invisible labor. And for now, the robots still need babysitters.
So next time someone tells you their business is “fully automated,” just nod, smile, and ask: “But who’s fixing the mistakes?”
We also have a podcast dropping today!
Join me in this episode of The Queen of Automation as I sit down with James Mayer to challenge the biggest myths about money.
Most people assume financial planning means cutting back, budgeting every penny, and giving up what they enjoy. James has spent years helping people rethink this. It’s not about restriction—it’s about alignment. Instead of obsessing over where every dollar goes, it’s about making sure your money works for the life you actually want.
Click here to tune in.