Category: Automation Impact on Jobs

Automation and AI: how it will actually affect the workplace

Automation and AI: how it will actually affect the workplace

Unexpected item in bagging area: how is automation affecting the labour market? Image edited from Shutterstock Is there any consensus on the impact of automation and artificial intelligence on our working lives? Will society benefit or suffer? How will HR play its part in reshaping the workforce? Adam McCulloch examines the impact on jobs and people management.

A blasé optimism pervades the burgeoning automation revolution. More jobs, not fewer, will be the result and a happier workforce, freed from drudgery, will be able to pursue more meaningful activities – whatever those may be. But many employees will inevitably be […]

Digitisation to unlock 1.2m jobs, ease SA’s unemployment woes

Digitisation to unlock 1.2m jobs, ease SA’s unemployment woes

Digitisation, machine learning and automation have the potential to create new jobs purely as a result of improved productivity. Digitisation and automation could result in a net gain of up to 1.2 million jobs in SA by 2030.

This is according to a new report, “The Future of Work in South Africa: Digitisation, productivity and job creation”, from McKinsey & Company.

It notes that technology-related gains could triple SA’s productivity growth, more than double growth in per capita income, and add more than a percentage point to its real GDP growth rate over the next decade.The report comes after the country’s […]

Do we need a robot tax?

Do we need a robot tax?

Industrial revolutions throughout history play out like this: repetitive and mundane jobs are automated by new technology, livelihoods evaporate, skills become obsolete, and in the process humans are compelled to retrain and find new work. Whether it’s textile workers or checkout assistants, lamplighters or petrol-pump attendants, automation shows little mercy.

In the early-19th century, during the first industrial revolution, traditional jobs dried up, the labour share of income fell, while corporate profits surged, and the gap between the wages of the rich and poor skyrocketed. Today, we could be doing the time warp again as the third and fourth industrial […]

Maritime Regulators To Weigh Opposing Views On Port Automation

Maritime Regulators To Weigh Opposing Views On Port Automation

The agency responsible for the health of the U.S. maritime sector will be considering the role that labor and politics play in automating port operations.

In comments submitted to the U.S. Maritime Administration (MarAd), Daniel Reiss, president of Automated Terminal Systems (ATS), said that it’s a mistake for terminal operators and port authorities to appease labor by introducing automation gradually.

"Experience in the automotive and steel industry has demonstrated that such an approach is not only inefficient it is counterproductive," Reiss said. "In both industries, management concluded that the effort was ‘just not worth it’ and shut down facilities rather than […]

The evolution of US manufacturing

The evolution of US manufacturing

Amanda Del Buono is joined by Neil Ridley, Georgetown University , Center on Education and the Workforce, state initiative director, to discuss the center’s recent "The Way We Were" report, which analyzes the industry from the 1940s through today and how the workforce has been impacted.

Read the report here: http://bit.ly/2lYpVNk Transcript

Amanda Del Buono: Hello and welcome back to Manufacturing Tomorrow’s Workforce, I’m Amanda Del Buono. Today, I’m joined by Neil Ridley state initiative director of Georgetown University’s Center on Education and Workforce. In our interview, Neil shares some great insights to expand on a new report the university […]

Africa should not lose sight of 4IR opportunities

As the 28th World Economic Forum (WEF) on Africa convenes in Cape Town this week, it offers an opportunity to consider ways to accelerate economic growth across the continent.

By Pieter Bensch, executive vice-president at Sage Africa & Middle East

With the Fourth Industrial Revolution (4IR) sweeping across the world, one pressing concern is to evaluate how to harness digital technology to boost prosperity and employment across Africa.The 4IR will catalyse greater automation, higher productivity and lower costs across industries, driven by the advent of the Internet of Things, cloud computing, advanced robotics, intelligent software, artificial intelligence (AI), distributed ledgers, 3D […]

The Question of the Century: Will Automation Take Over Our Jobs?

The Question of the Century: Will Automation Take Over Our Jobs?

Share Tweet Share Share Artificial Intelligence robot replaces in the work of man. Turnover workers. Vector illustration flat design. Isolated on white background. Technologies replace people. Robotics industry. We’ve all heard that automation will take over our jobs, but that’s not entirely true. Many of the great inventions of the last two hundred years were designed to eliminate human labor.

Although machines took over human occupations, the fraction of US adults employed in the labor market is higher now than in the 1890s. For example — the automation in the food industry is huge, but why are there still chefs?

Well, […]

Labor Day

Labor Day

How work, opportunity, economic security for all happens in an age of technological change

Editor’s note: Staff Writer Amy H. Peterson attended the Poynter Institute’s Future of Work fellowship in late 2018. This article is part of her continuing work exploring the workplace and local employment numbers.

It’s Labor Day. We’re inundated with reports that the economy is great. It is great for the top 10 percent of earners. For everyone else, there are risks, according to the Brookings Institute among many other sources.What does this mean for us? Article Photos Iowa’s employment numbers month to month look tremendous: under […]

Tomorrow’s jobs: 7 future roles that will exist in the age of automation

Tomorrow’s jobs: 7 future roles that will exist in the age of automation

Forget Skynet gaining sentience and starting a nuclear apocalypse aimed at humanity. The real fear a lot of folks have about artificial intelligence, robots and other automated processes is what it means for all of our jobs. According to a famous Oxford University study , around 47% of currently existing jobs could potentially be automated away within the next 15 years. Terrifying, right?

But there’s good news as well. While it’s inarguable that a certain number of jobs will vanish in the wake of automation, lots of new jobs are going to be created by technology as well. Jobs like […]

Automation Could Wipe Out Almost Half of All Jobs in 20 Years

Automation Could Wipe Out Almost Half of All Jobs in 20 Years

Automation, robots and globalization are rapidly changing the workplace and governments must act fast and decisively to counter the effects or face a worsening of social and economic tensions, the OECD warned.

Almost half of all jobs could be wiped out or radically altered in the next two decades due to automation, the Paris-based group said in a report on Tuesday. According to OECD Labor Director Stefano Scarpetta, the pace of change will be “startling.”

Safety nets and training systems built up over decades to protect workers are struggling to keep up with the “megatrends” changing the nature of work, the […]