Category: Automation Impact on Jobs

Automation: Almost 50% of American jobs to dissappear

Automation: Almost 50% of American jobs to dissappear

Big Think | Aidan Quinn, Editor in Chief

A key platform for President Elect Donald Trump is to “bring the jobs back from China”. But what happens when the Chinese are already giving those jobs to machines? The jobs aren’t coming back:

One of the key drivers for Donald Trump’s shock victory during the U.S. election has been an anxiety about job security and the changes that the globalized economy has made across the globe. President Elect Trump capitalized on a ground-swell of dissatisfaction that middle-class Americans felt about stagnating wages and rapidly shrinking job opportunities, stoking anger […]

Ford CEO downplays Trump’s role in nixing Mexican plant, weighs in on tech, globalization and jobs

Ford CEO downplays Trump’s role in nixing Mexican plant, weighs in on tech, globalization and jobs

Alan Murray of Time Inc. interviews Ford CEO Mark Fields, Intel CEO Brian Krzanich and Flex CEO Mike McNamara at CES today. (GeekWire Photo / Todd Bishop) LAS VEGAS — Ford was the latest company to find itself in the spotlight over issues of jobs and globalization this week, as the automaker canceled plans for a Mexican factory that would have employed nearly 3,000 people.

President-elect Donald Trump is getting the blame, but Ford CEO Mark Fields, speaking today the Consumer Electronics Show, insisted that the company made the decision for its own r Ford CEO Mark Fields at CES […]

US Manufacturers Add 17,000 Jobs in December

US Manufacturers Add 17,000 Jobs in December

By Bill Koenig Manufacturers added 17,000 jobs in December, ending a mostly down year on an upswing.

Durable goods manufacturers generated the bulk of the monthly gain. Such companies increased employment by 15,000 jobs last month, according to a breakdown by industry issued by the Bureau of Labor Statistics today. Non-durable goods added another 2000 jobs.

Within durable goods, the biggest gainer was fabricated metal products, up 5800 jobs. Other sectors posting job increases included motorized vehicles and parts (up 2900), primary metals (up 2200) and furniture (up 2300).Computers and electronic parts lost 900 jobs. The transportation equipment category, which includes […]

America Is Still Making Things

America Is Still Making Things

A manufacturing worker at an Eli Lilly facility in Indiana COLUMBIA CITY, Ind.—Big companies such as Rexnord and Carrier are closing down plants in this Rust Belt state and moving their factories to Mexico. But in some corners, including this rural patch of the state’s northeast, manufacturing is growing.

In a nondescript building set among the icy cornfields of Columbia City, Brian Emerick, the CEO and owner of Micropulse, employs 306 people who make millions of dollars worth of specialized medical equipment such as orthopedic implants and the surgical tools used to install them. That’s up from the 190 he […]

GARY MACDOUGALL: Society’s right to work

GARY MACDOUGALL: Society’s right to work

A typical auto manufacturing production floor will have thousands of industrial robots lined up doing multiple tasks. ©(Submitted photo)

Many years ago as a young reporter I felt underpaid and overworked. I had a crisis of faith in terms of my chosen field of employment.

Looking back, I was likely being paid about what I should have earned, given my education and experience.Unlike myself, many young people in the 1960s had chosen the booming economy of southern Ontario to find employment. The cars they drove when they returned home for summer vacations made me chafe at my lot in […]

America Is Still Making Things

America Is Still Making Things

A manufacturing worker at an Eli Lilly facility in Indiana COLUMBIA CITY, Ind.—Big companies such as Rexnord and Carrier are closing down plants in this Rust Belt state and moving their factories to Mexico. But in some corners, including this rural patch of the state’s northeast, manufacturing is growing.

In a nondescript building set among the icy cornfields of Columbia City, Brian Emerick, the CEO and owner of Micropulse, employs 306 people who make millions of dollars worth of specialized medical equipment such as orthopedic implants and the surgical tools used to install them. That’s up from the 190 he […]

When it Comes to ‘Saving Globalization’ World Leaders are Still Missing the Point

When it Comes to ‘Saving Globalization’ World Leaders are Still Missing the Point

“Philosophers have only interpreted the world, in various ways. The point, however, is to change it,” or so Karl Marx once wrote. As trade liberalization and globalization more broadly are called into question, G20 leaders could do with both interpreting the situation and changing it.

It is not an easy task for the G20, which is a diverse group of developed and emerging economies, accounting for around 80% of GDP. In spite of their great success in launching a trade and investment working group and agreeing on guiding principles of investment policy-making, G20 leaders failed to address the emergence of […]

Road to robo-car future filled with costly potholes

Road to robo-car future filled with costly potholes

QNX (BlackBerry) concept vehicle. (Handout) Every week it seems another news item heralds the imminent demise of the human-operated automobile. Latest to the party is Canada’s BlackBerry, which aims to recast itself as a maker of software for autonomous cars. That’s fine.

But why the rush to robo-cars? Surely it can’t be consumer demand. Surely it can’t be economic or political necessity. Surely it can’t be driver and pedestrian safety. Oh wait: Maybe it’s corporate greed.

I enjoy driving. I can’t imagine feeling anything but terrified in an autonomous bubble car, piloted through rush-hour traffic by circuitry, a sensor array and […]

Automation: The Real Job Killer of American Manufacturing, Part Two.

Automation: The Real Job Killer of American Manufacturing, Part Two.

In Part 1 , I stated that the real job killer of American manufacturing is robots, not the Chinese or Hispanics. Manufacturing is a good starting point to look at the impact of technology because manufacturing accounts for 12.5 percent of total U.S. GDP and nearly 9 percent of U.S. employment according to the most recent report from the Economic Policy Institute.

As innovation in automation and technology continues to develop, robotics will become cheaper, artificial intelligence will improve, and more sectors of our economy will experience similar transformations to those in manufacturing. A well-cited study from Oxford University analyzed […]

‘Routine’ jobs in U.S. are disappearing, hurting middle class: report

'Routine' jobs in U.S. are disappearing, hurting middle class: report

"Routine" jobs that have been the backbone of the middle class, such as welding, are disappearing. (File)

"Routine" jobs — those based on a relatively narrow set of repeated tasks — have long been a driver of middle-class employment. Think bank teller, factory worker or welding-machine operator.

Those jobs, according to research from a trio of economists, have been disappearing over the past few decades , prompting many displaced workers to either accept lower-paying low-skill manual work or simply drop out of the workforce. It’s one of the country’s most worrying economic trends, writes The Wall Street Journal , and […]