While it doesn’t seem like it now, the world is facing a burgeoning population crisis.

Falling birth rates and the growing effects of climate disasters are causing humans to fall below the threshold of the replacement rate. Eventually, the population will not increase or hold steady – it will start to fall.

The problem is that for at least while, that leaves older people vulnerable with not enough young people to fill their shoes in the labor market. Care for the elderly will become an increasingly unmanageable burden, and jobs will be undone.

But IBM CEO Arvind Krishna believes that AI could be our path forward as a species.

With AI filling in for blue-collar and white-collar jobs, it allows humans to fill other niches and create new industries.

Krishna says, “I do think clerical white-collar work is going to be able to be replaced by this.” He added, “We do have a shortage of labor in the real world, and that’s because of a demographic issue that the world is facing. So we have to have technologies that help.” He continued, “Maybe we can find tools that replace some portions of labor, and it’s a good thing this time.”