As fears grow that artificial intelligence (AI) will destroy jobs, Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev says the opposite may be true.

Tanev argues that AI will not eliminate work, but will redefine what it means to have a job.

“AI will lead to an explosion of not just new jobs, but new work families,” Tenev told FOX Business’ Charles Payne during “FOX Business In Depth: The AI ​​Arms Race”.

Tenev said skepticism about new technologies is nothing new, comparing the shift in AI today to the country’s transition from agricultural and factory work to office and digital work over the past century.

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Vlad Tenev, CEO of Robinhood Markets Inc., speaks during a Bloomberg Television interview on the sidelines of the Token2049 conference in Singapore on Oct. 2. (Getty Images)

“Maybe 100 years ago, our ancestors would be looking at what we’re doing right now, which is kind of digitally talking about AI. They think, you know, this is not real work,” Tenev said.

“I think in the same way that they probably wouldn’t think of what we’re doing as real work, we’re going to look forward to working families and working opportunities in the future,” he added.

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Those future jobs, Tenev said, could include new forms of investment and trade for a living, roles that many people don’t currently see as viable full-time careers.

“Maybe this isn’t real work,” Tenev said.

Vlad Tenev, CEO of Robinhood Markets Inc., speaks during a Bloomberg Television interview in London, England on July 8. (Getty Images)

“But for people in the future, it will certainly feel very real and stressful, and it will carry with it all the feelings we have about our work,” he added.

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Tenev argues that technological disruption always has reforms of labor standards rather than removing them altogether. He noted that while similar changes have occurred before, the pace of change today is much faster.

“While we’ve seen outages like this in the past, we have a feeling it’s going to be faster,” he said.

“The speed, the speed of change and the acceleration makes us very nervous.”

Robinhood Markets Inc. CEO Vlad Tenev speaks during a Bloomberg Television interview in London, Britain, on Nov. 29, 2023. (Jose Sarmento Matos/Bloomberg via Getty Images/Getty Images)

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Automation and AI have already begun to replace some professional tasks, for companies like today Amazon and Salesforce citing it as a factor behind recent layoffs.

The changes have fueled concern in Washington, where a December 2025 Senate report listed fast food, customer service and executive assistant jobs as among the most vulnerable to automation.