AIAndRisk

A salaried engineer sells certainty. The firm buys their firsthand knowledge of the artifacts, and that human capital is the worker’s equity. The moment the engineer lets an AI coding agent take risks on delivery or design, they erode the very knowledge the firm is paying for.

Owners play the uncertainty game. Profit is whatever remains after outcomes are known. An entrepreneur can push an AI agent into risky paths because the business, not the individual, owns the asset and the upside. They are rewarded for throughput and speed, not for holding every detail in their head.

This makes AI upside asymmetric. For the salaried contributor, AI is a convenience with a low ceiling because trust in the artifacts must stay inside the worker. For the owner, AI is a capital good that extends production, absorbs uncertainty, and frees time without demanding personal comprehension of every step. The owner can accept imperfect knowledge if the system works and customers are served.

If you are on salary, use AI to widen judgment: better questions, sharper reviews, clearer briefs. If you own the risk, use AI to lengthen your production chain, accept experiments you would not fund with payroll, and harvest the profit from uncertainty that the model is willing to shoulder.