Category: Automation Impact on Jobs

The World’s Workers Have Bigger Problems Than a Robot Apocalypse

The World’s Workers Have Bigger Problems Than a Robot Apocalypse

The world’s workers seem to be in a bad spot: A recent study found that each new industrial robot displaces six employees. Automation is on the rise in fields from radiology to volleyball coaching . Workers in poorer manufacturing-reliant nations are especially vulnerable, it’s said, because their jobs could soon be done by robots. Yuval Noah Harari, author of the new book Homo Deus , speculates in a recent Bloomberg View column about the rise of a huge, embittered “useless class” living on the dole.

But if work is being automated out of existence, how do you explain a 2.8 […]

The changing business world completely passed me by

The changing business world completely passed me by

Workplace automation is advancing at an ever faster pace With the last few of years of my life spent running a barely-surviving business, I was so busy firefighting there was little time left over to register anything outside the company.

When I finally put my head up, I immediately saw the incredible number of modifications that had happened in virtually every area of our changing business world over the last decade – the world had been transforming fast, for both good and bad. It is already a dramatically different world than it was at the start of this millennium. Video […]

These College Students Are About To See How Robots Are Coming For Our Jobs

These College Students Are About To See How Robots Are Coming For Our Jobs

Much of the discourse about public education revolves around the idea of teaching kids “ 21st century skills ” and prepping them for the jobs of the future. Well, students at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, will soon get a personal look at the kind of technology that is likely to disrupt their post-graduation employment opportunities.

On Wednesday, the university announced that when students come back to campus in the fall, they’ll be able to ride automated shuttles around its North Campus. Instead of a shuttle with a human driver, students will ride on “two fully-automated, 15-passenger, all-electric shuttles,” […]

Disappearance of Work: QuickTake

Thirteen years ago, two prominent U.S. economists wrote that driverless cars couldn’t execute a left turn against oncoming traffic because too many factors were involved. Six years later, Google proved it could make fully autonomous cars, threatening the livelihoods of millions of truck and taxi drivers. Throughout much of the developed world, gainful employment is seen as almost a fundamental right. But what if, in the not-too-distant future, there won’t be enough jobs to go around? That’s what some economists think will happen as robots and artificial intelligence increasingly become capable of performing human tasks. Of course, past technological […]

Automation’s Destruction Of Jobs: You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet…

Automation's Destruction Of Jobs: You Ain't Seen Nothing Yet...

Authored by Charles Hugh Smith via OfTwoMinds blog,

Employers have no choice: it’s innovate/automate or die.

Automation–networked robotics, software and processes–has already had a major impact on jobs. As this chart from my colleague Gordon T. Long illustrates, the rise of Internet technologies is reflected in the steady, long-term decline of the labor force participation rate– the percentage of the populace that is actively in the labor market. The oft-repeated fantasy is that every new wave of technological innovation creates more jobs than it destroys. Not this time: the total number of full-time jobs has stagnated for […]

New Bells and Whistles in Manufacturing Ring up Near Record Output

New Bells and Whistles in Manufacturing Ring up Near Record Output

Ignore the drumbeat for the need to rescue the U.S. manufacturing sector. Manufacturing is not dead; far from it. Manufacturing has long buttressed the U.S. economy in myriad ways, and it seems poised to continue.

What’s changed about manufacturing is not output, but employment. It’s true, the industry has lost millions of jobs, but manufacturing output has surged at the same time and is approaching record levels, according to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis.

How does that happen? With thanks to automation, technology, 3D printing, artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things (IoT), and robotics. And yes, that […]

Amazon’s Real Agenda Behind Whole Foods Bid

Amazon's Real Agenda Behind Whole Foods Bid

There’s always a fine line between creative disruption and creative destruction. Such is the beastly nature of capitalism.

Amazon.com Inc. ‘s nearly $14 billion bid for Whole Foods is about more than just acquiring a means to sell high-end food products online. It’s about busting the supply chain in an ancient business.

I have no direct knowledge pipeline into Amazon’s strategy for acquiring Whole Foods , which is known for overpriced, organic products. But it’s clear that they want to re-invent the grocery business and create a new business model. There are several positive and negative scenarios. Jeff Bezos, chief […]

This Economic Model Organized Asia for Decades. Now It’s Broken

This Economic Model Organized Asia for Decades. Now It’s Broken

Thirty minutes by car into the scrubby desert outside Korla, in China’s remote Xinjiang region, a textile manufacturer owned by Jinsheng Group is building its latest factory complex. Inside the 16 billion-yuan ($2.4 billion) facility—a collection of stark white warehouses surrounded by an enormous expanse of pristine artificial grass—are rows of huge cotton spools, more than a million bright red and blue spindles, and almost no people. A few German engineers wander around, making sure the equipment runs at peak efficiency. This is the depopulated future of an industry that’s lifted millions of Asians out of poverty.

Jinsheng’s factory covers […]

7 In 10 Millennials Will Eventually Lose Their Jobs To Automation

7 In 10 Millennials Will Eventually Lose Their Jobs To Automation

woman and robot Millennials More Likely To Be Replaced By Automation Than Older Generations

According to new research from Gallup , 67% of millennials are likely to lose their jobs due to automation sometime in the future.

Breaking down the numbers: 37% of millennials have a high risk of losing their jobs, while an additional 30% are at medium risk.This is higher than the employment risk that their parents and grandparents face, as you can see in the chart below.Of course, this should not come as a surprise given that millennials are at the beginning of their working lives, […]

New Research Says Automation May Not Threaten Jobs After All

Contrary to dominant narratives, machines will not be coming for every human’s job anytime soon. In fact, automation may even have a positive effect on unemployment.

In recent years, practically everyone has become familiar with the narrative that automation in the workplace will cost more and more hardworking people their jobs . Indeed, according to a Pew poll , a sizeable majority of Americans are aware of and concerned by automation-based job loss, with 65% of respondents agreeing that robots and/or computers will either “definitely” or “probably” do much of the work currently done by humans in the next […]