"Companies employing people" will be replaced by "people employing AI". Open models are free, small, fast, trainable and easy to use. They capture 90% of the value at 10% the cost, and are private.
What we're looking at is a massive decrease in the relative economic value of the average human's work. If the economic value of a hundred people is less than what the company can produce with a single human operator running AI models, then those 100 people are economically worthless, and don't get to eat.
We drastically need to tax the usage of AI models on the huge windfall they're about to create for their operators, and use that to fund universal basic income for those displaced. Generally speaking, as automation and wealth disparity skyrocket, UBI will be required to maintain any semblance of the society we currently have. I am incredibly pessimistic about the chances of that happening in any real way though.
The rest of us have no choice. Despite millions of artists, animators, etc. all being resoundly opposed to AI art, the models that infringe their work are still allowed to exist, and it seems they're fighting a losing battle.
A lot of people are being "hysterical" because a lot of people don't have a choice.
To be clear, the problem of these scenarios is tightly intertwined with the problem of unfettered capitalism and wealth inequality in general. Food and shelter require money, and we get money by working a job. If millions of jobs disappear overnight, then of course millions of people are going to be distressed over no longer having ready access to food and shelter.
The idea of "just getting another job" doesn't scale to the destruction of entire industries employing tens of millions of people. This is how depressions are made.
The idea of "the depression will end someday" is not only not necessarily true as wealth inequality skyrockets, but is also cold comfort to the people who will lose their houses and for some, lives, due to the disruption.
A different economic system could perhaps allow us to appreciate these technological advances without worrying about them displacing our ability to live. But the American political system consistently and firmly rejects any ideas not rooted in social darwinist capitalism.
For your sake, I hope your resume is very impressive.