William Gould, one of the nation’s leading experts on employment, sees artificial intelligence as a “locomotive coming down the tracks” with countless jobs in its path. He offers one major takeaway: “We’re not ready.”

The Stanford University law school emeritus professor, who headed the U.S. National Labor Relations Board from 1994 to 1998 and the California Agricultural Labor Relations Board from 2014 to 2017, has spent his lengthy career studying labor and anti-discrimination law.

His work has taken him to Washington, D.C., Detroit, London and South Africa. This news organization met with Gould at Stanford Law, where in 1972 he became the first Black professor, after working as a visiting professor at Harvard University. Gould shed light on the looming threat to employment from artificial intelligence, possible social upheaval from massive job losses, and how topping up income through “wage insurance” for workers pushed by AI into lower-paying jobs may provide a partial solution.

Gould, author of the recently published memoir Those Who Travail and Are Heavy Laden, also discussed pushback against diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives, along with the state of the labor movement, and White South Africans coming to the U.S. as refugees under the administration of President Donald Trump. His remarks have been edited for length and clarity.