I can understand how passenger flights will take a while longer - but would cargo flights that don't have nearly the safety concerns would be AI piloted much sooner? If so, how much sooner?
To first order, the bigger a vehicle is the less you worry about the cost of the pilot/driver. The biggest untold story in aviation is the battle between the pilots of small "regional aircraft" vs "mainline aircraft", the former of which generate less value for the same amount of work and necessarily get paid less. Unions have enforced "scope clauses" that have prevented a new generation of slightly larger regional aircraft which could lower costs at small airports and have no trouble getting filled as those lower costs get passed on to consumers. As it is small airports are dying out, harming smaller cities and towns and giving the "left behind" all the more reason to lash out.
Similarly there is a lot of a talk of crisis in truck driving, both at the local and long-haul levels. My brother-in-law has a CDL and he is always talking about how inexperienced drivers seem to wedge their trucks on a bridge in Binghamton once a month, stall out on the highway and get into accidents, etc.
If you say autopilot that implies a wildly different technology. I think the first successful autopilot landing with passengers onboard happened last week.
Taking off is much easier than landing and if passengers aren’t involved…
I guess the question is not about technology (might be ready now) and is instead about regulation (when will the FAA allow fully autonomous flights). I’m guessing the current generation of regulators will need to die before that happens so 25+ years.