Category: Automation Impact on Jobs

The Fallacy Behind “Robots Will Steal Your Jobs” Fears

The Fallacy Behind “Robots Will Steal Your Jobs” Fears

The rise of global populism and anti-immigration sentiments, coupled with the perpetual rising trend of automation and robotics has stoked the fear fires of job security . Many stories perpetuate erroneous stereotypes and falsehoods. The news reports and blog articles come in various flavors, but in a nutshell the stories state the U.S. is hemorrhaging jobs due to the thieves of illegal immigration and heartless robotics. The job displacement theory is built upon the idea that these two sources of labor (immigrants & robots) are cheaper and more productive than traditional blue collar and white collar American workers. skeeze […]

Future job automation to hit hardest in low wage metropolitan areas like Las Vegas, Orlando and Riverside-San Bernardino | ISEA

Future job automation to hit hardest in low wage metropolitan areas like Las Vegas, Orlando and Riverside-San Bernardino | ISEA

⇢ New research by the Institute for Spatial Economic A nalysis (ISEA) finds that job automation will hit certain metropolitan areas significantly harder than others. Low-wage cities like Las Vegas, NV, Orlando, FL, and Riverside-San Bernardino, CA are expected to be among the hardest-hit metros in terms of total job losses.

The impact of automation on jobs is likely to be more severe than previously anticipated. Based on recent advances in machine learning and mobile robotics, even non-routine jobs like truck driving, healthcare diagnostics, or even education can be affected.

“The replacement of jobs by machines has been happening continuously since […]

Robots eat our brains!

Robots eat our brains!

Don’t fear – humankind will adapt, this here Pew report says

The Pew Research Center’s latest report, The Future of Jobs and Jobs Training , warns that machines are eating our brains.

"Brains" here refers to the contents of our brains, our skills, rather than actual gray matter. "Machines are eating humans’ jobs talents," the report declares as a prelude to its exploration of the consequences of automation on education and employment. It’s an awkwardly phrased conceit, but you get the idea.The prospect of widespread joblessness as a consequence of clever software and nimble hardware is a bit less alarming […]

Why aren’t robots boosting economic productivity?

Why aren’t robots boosting economic productivity?

Robots are making inroads in the modern workplace, but the promised benefits aren’t materializing. The robot revolution is real, but the effects are doubly disappointing. Not only are they displacing workers and taking manufacturing jobs, somehow robots are failing to boost output or make the economy more productive.

When, for instance, an auto manufacturer installs cutting-edge robotic arms, two things are supposed to happen. First, the company becomes more efficient, allowing consumers everywhere to reap the benefit of less-expensive, robot-welded cars. Second, while they might lay off some assembly line workers, in theory those workers could move into high-demand jobs […]

Robot city, Philly: How will low-wage workers survive?

Robot city, Philly: How will low-wage workers survive?

Shopping Cart icon Buy Photo Jean Kendrick attended a Philly Tech Week panel discussion titled "Robot City: Automation and Low-Wage Workers" on May 4. She is the director of career services at the Urban League of Philadelphia. (Staff/Jane M. Von Bergen) It’s fine to talk about labor theory and the workforce of the future. Meanwhile, though, what’s going to happen to the parking garage attendant who loses her job when the garage installs an automatic ticket-taker?

That was on Jean Kendrick’s mind Thursday as she listened to panelists at a Philly Tech Week event titled "Robot City: Automation and Low […]

Do You Live On The Front Lines Of Automation?

Do You Live On The Front Lines Of Automation?

If you live in Las Vegas, El Paso, or Louisville, there’s a particularly good chance that your job could be taken by a robot in the next two decades.

Using data from a 2013 Oxford study that found that nearly half of American jobs are at risk from automation–from truck driving and telemarketing to legal assistants–a new study maps out which cities are likely to lose the most jobs. (The next phase of the research will look at how the risk affects people differently based on age, race, educational level, and other demographic factors, and will break down data further […]

The RBA is flagging a new challenge for Australia – growth, with less jobs

The RBA is flagging a new challenge for Australia - growth, with less jobs

Youth unemployment. Photo: Getty Images The Reserve Bank of Australia lifted its economic growth and inflation expectations but left jobs growth forecast pretty much intact, pointing to an emerging challenge for the the nation: jobless growth.

The central bank in its quarterly statement on monetary policy (SoMP) forecasts gross domestic product to rise between 2.75% to 3.75% in 2018, up from 2.5% to 3.5% previously and the underlying inflation to be around 2% in early 2018. It, however, continues to see the unemployment rate to continue to tread at 5%-6%.

Australia’s unemployment rate held at a one-year high of 5.9% in […]

Column: Robots changing employment patterns across America

Column: Robots changing employment patterns across America

AS IF there were not enough uncertainty surrounding the slow-growth economy in the United States, robots now threaten to replace four in 10 jobs within the next 15 years or so.

At least, that is, according to the latest estimate by Price Waterhouse Coopers consulting. Asked about robots’ impact on the workforce, U.S. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said he isn’t worried, and that the problem isn’t even on his radar, at least for now.

Will we be displaced by robots? The short answer is: yes and no.According to the Association for Advancing Automation, 136,748 robots were shipped to U.S. customers between […]

Should we intentionally slow the pace of technological change to help workers?

So another, shall we say, “soft” productivity report. Hourly output per worker decreased at a 0.6% annualized rate in the first quarter. Nothing new there. Productivity has been increasing at just a 0.6% annual pace over the past five years vs. 2.2% from 1947 through 2007. Yet at the same time, many people are worried robots will soon make humans so productive that we will need far fewer carbon-based workers in the future. (“It’s No Myth: Robots and Artificial Intelligence Will Erase Jobs in Nearly Every Industry.”)

Of course maybe one day the worriers will be proven correct, and […]

Job-Stealing Robots? Millennials See Hope, Fear in Automation

Job-Stealing Robots? Millennials See Hope, Fear in Automation

As workplace automation enters the mainstream, Cathy Engelbert, CEO of Deloitte, shares her perspective on millennials, automation, and preparing the next generation of employees for the work of the future. Cathy Engelbert As the old French adage goes, “plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose”—the more things change, the more they stay the same. But that was before the physical, biological, and digital worlds began merging to give us what I refer to as the “Fusion Revolution,” disrupting whole industries and giving rise to a new mantra—the more things change, the faster they change.

Take life sciences. When I […]