For years expensive management consultants have gone into companies, looked at their books and usually recommended mass layoffs and asset stripping.  While these antics increased stock prices and executive bonuses it resulted in the destruction or at least weakening of the middle class.

Outfits like McKinsey provided a way to get something done but allowing managers to feel less responsible about the decisions. After all, it was not their choice to sack staff, it was the advice of the management consultants. Such consultants made their name and a fortune effectively putting people onto the street.

However, the same logic which gave power to consultants is also suggesting using AI instead. For start, it is much cheaper and still allows a company to evade responsibility by saying that it's obeying and doing what the AI says.

Practically, AI will replace management consultants using the same rationale that the consultants replaced humans and with the same amount of empathy. While AI might do similar harm to humanity in some respects, at least it is delivering a dose of karma to the management consultants.

Sci-fi writer Ted Chiang, writing for New Yorker suggests it is important to learn from the rise of the management consultant and not allow AI to take its place.