Tag: academic

The Siren of Universal Basic Income

The Siren of Universal Basic Income

Word on the street is that Andrew Yang—a Democratic presidential hopeful—has a fat bag of cash that he’s willing to give out to all American citizens if he becomes president. Traveling with my staff, I told someone to secure the bag. — Andrew Yang (@AndrewYang) March 15, 2019 Although I have yet to see the bag, I trust Andrew Yang without reservation. The bag is secure and stuffed with paper. We can all look forward to getting a universal basic income (UBI) of $1,000 per month if he wins.

Scratch that— when he wins. Who doesn’t want $1,000 a month? […]

Technical change has probably meant loss of more unskilled jobs than globalisation

Technical change has probably meant loss of more unskilled jobs than globalisation

The long-term solution to loss of unskilled jobs is to ensure that those leaving education have the skills to work in a modern economy

Wherever manufacturing takes place, automation and computerisation have led to job losses among the least skilled, whose jobs are most easily automated In the week before Emmanuel Macron was elected president of France, he visited a factory near Lille which was closing, and, at the gates of the factory, he met the workers who were losing their jobs. Naturally many of them were angry, blaming globalisation for their pain.

Macron acknowledged that their factory was […]

For a Denla School vet, everything’s academic

For a Denla School vet, everything's academic

Former lecturer Temyos Pandejpong is helping his family manage the education empire that began in his own childhood home. Though he enjoyed his time in America, Mr Temyos says he has no regrets about coming back to Thailand to help his family run schools. Not many educators can say they spent their whole life devoted to education. Temyos Pandejpong grew up with education not only at the centre of his life, but as the entirety of his surroundings.

As a child he lived in the school his family ran, the Denla Kindergarten on Phetkasem Road. The youngest of three siblings, […]

Globalisation 4.0 and proliferation of AI: Are we ready for this?

Globalisation 4.0 and proliferation of AI: Are we ready for this?

In the last two centuries, globalisation has been interpreted as being about the things that we make and send across borders via air, land and sea.

As the numbers of buyers and suppliers rise, the network becomes more attractive to the new traders. By Soumyatanu Mukherjee

In the last two centuries, globalisation has been interpreted as being about the things that we make and send across borders via air, land and sea. Without reducing the importance of this usual notion of trade, future globalisation is also going to be concerned about the stuff that we do (services), not just the […]

10 jobs that won’t exist 20 years from now

10 jobs that won't exist 20 years from now

The truth is, no industry is 100% safeguarded against the influence of technology.

Some workers, such as dispatchers, are more at risk of seeing their jobs become computerised than others.

Occupations that tend to be more routine and repetitive will likely cease to exist in 20 years. Out with the old, in with the robots! These days, new technological advances happen all the time – and while some industries have flourished in the changing landscape, others have fallen prey to automation .Here’s the good news: automation isn’t necessarily synonymous with job loss . In fact, many […]

Understanding India’s labour pain

Understanding India’s labour pain

Title: Jobonomics Author: Goutam Das Publisher: Hachette India Price: Rs 599 The book, peppered with anecdotes, says that the jobs situation is more in the nature of an emerging crisis

Because the book begins with a line from Prime Minister Modi’s speech on employment, I thought it was essentially another Modi-basher, perhaps one that bemoaned how poorly the government fared in creating jobs. There are many such books floating around and I overcame the ‘oh, no, not one more’ feeling only because I had committed to sending in this review.

Just a few pages into the book I realised […]

Call $15 minimum wage what it is: the robot full employment act

Call $15 minimum wage what it is: the robot full employment act

The Cloud Pepper robot, which can speak multiple languages, appears at a tech conference in Barcelona on Monday. (Getty Images) Thirty-plus years ago, I became (nerd alert) fascinated with economics and read up on libertarian-conservatives like Milton Friedman and Thomas Sowell and liberals like John Kenneth Galbraith and Paul Samuelson. It was captivating to see how they marshaled seemingly powerful evidence for and against policy proposals, only starting with whether heavy government spending could spur growth of the economy. I would read academics on one side and think of course they’re right, then read the other side and reach […]

Are Robots Competing for Your Job?

Are Robots Competing for Your Job?

Doomsayers insist that this time the employment apocalypse is really nigh. The robots are coming. Hide the WD-40. Lock up your nine-volt batteries. Build a booby trap out of giant magnets; dig a moat as deep as a grave. “Ever since a study by the University of Oxford predicted that 47 percent of U.S. jobs are at risk of being replaced by robots and artificial intelligence over the next fifteen to twenty years, I haven’t been able to stop thinking about the future of work,” Andrés Oppenheimer writes, in “The Robots Are Coming: The Future of Jobs in the […]

Bentham, Hobbes, and The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence

Bentham, Hobbes, and The Ethics of Artificial Intelligence

If you’ve been paying attention to the news at all, you would think that the coming artificial intelligence revolution was a foregone conclusion, but many of these pronouncements tend to give a cursory acknowledgment of the ethics of artificial intelligence as if these are simply academic exercises that have no real bearing on the development of AI.

Those on the cutting edge of AI development know better. Autonomous vehicle makers are carefully managing the roll-out of autonomous vehicles knowing full well that a hasty introduction of these systems could lead to a public backlash that can shut the whole thing […]

The Great Myth of the AI Skills Gap

The Great Myth of the AI Skills Gap

One of the most contentious debates in technology is around the question of automation and jobs . At issue is whether advances in automation, specifically with regards to artificial intelligence and robotics, will spell trouble for today’s workers. This debate is played out in the media daily, and passions run deep on both sides of the issue. In the past, however, automation has created jobs and increased real wages.

A widespread concern with the current scenario is that the workers most likely to be displaced by technology lack the skills needed to do the new jobs that same technology will […]