Tag: consumer

The future of American jobs lies with the tech industry

The future of American jobs lies with the tech industry

When Donald Trump won the election, many in Silicon Valley were flummoxed: “How could a bigoted billionaire with no government experience and a twitchy Twitter trigger finger win the U.S. presidential election?” they asked themselves.

Liberal outlets have tried to make sense of the massive divide between “our” (upper-class liberals working in tech) vision of the country and “their” (blue-collar workers) vision of the country. We are facing a collective identity crisis, living in a “ post-truth ” world, utterly perplexed as to how a person so at odds with our Bay Area politics could win the most important […]

In the Automation Debate, Don’t Forget the Job Multiplier Effect

In the Automation Debate, Don’t Forget the Job Multiplier Effect

Emsi Senior Economist/Co-Founder In his 1950s satire Player Piano , author Kurt Vonnegut describes a dark dystopia where automation has led to a world of meager consumption and desperate idleness. The vision of workers displaced by machines predates this though, and is perhaps most associated with the 19 th century Luddite movement where workers sabotaged machinery for fear of losing jobs. In economic thought, the prospect of labor-replacing technology has a still much longer history.

The opinion of most economists has been that “Luddite fears” are misplaced. New technology is economically synonymous with increased efficiency, new and cheaper products, […]

Trump’s TPP pullout could hurt workers more than it helps

Trump's TPP pullout could hurt workers more than it helps

When he signed the executive order formally scrapping a trade deal with 11 Pacific Rim countries, President Donald Trump proclaimed the move a "great thing for the American worker."

But a chorus of trade experts and economists this week have argued that the pulling out of the 12-nation Trans-Pacific Partnership will have exactly the opposite impact.

"Virtually all economic analyses of the proposed TPP … provided empirical arguments that the TPP would raise U.S. workers’ income, both for highly educated and less educated workers," according to Jeffrey Bergstrand, finance professor at the University of Notre Dame and a former Federal Reserve […]

The Gradual Disappearance of Jobs

The Gradual Disappearance of Jobs

Stuck Between Fantasy And Reality
From the very beginning of industrial era, the idea of replacing humans with machines caught on and has persisted, to the point of appearing credible today. Indeed, breakthroughs in artificial intelligence are raising concerns about the significance of humankind in the future. That still far event horizon forecasts a society lead by strong artificial intelligences which may bring us to our obsolescence. Homo sapiens will be at best forced to the margins of active duty like the utopian post-work post-scarcity society in Iain M. Banks’s science-fiction The Culture Series,; and at worse, wiped […]

Half of work activities could be automated by 2055

Half of work activities could be automated by 2055

Fears that accelerating automation is going to eat its lion’s share of jobs continue to plague corporate sectors. However, new research from McKinsey Global Institute may talk folks afflicted with automation phobias down from the ledge.

The research group says that although half of today’s work activities could be automated, it may not happen until 2055. Or 2035. Or even 2075. Where the statistic falls along the S curve depends on various factors, such as breakthroughs in artificial intelligence and economic conditions, says Michael Chui, a McKinsey Global Institute partner and an author of the report . Chuiand other researchers […]

Davos Highlights AI’s Massive PR Problem

Davos Highlights AI's Massive PR Problem

As business, policy, and technology leaders gathered at the annual World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland this year, the rise of populism with Brexit in the UK and the election of Donald Trump in the US drove discussions about the pros and cons of globalization.

While globalization has improved the living conditions of vast swaths of this planet’s population, it has also led to shifting employment patterns, as jobs leave the US for China and other low-wage countries.

However, the Davos cognoscenti believe wage inequality is only part of the problem. Hand-in-hand with globalization is the topic of automation – seen […]

Half of work activities could be automated by 2055

Half of work activities could be automated by 2055

Credit: Thinkstock Fears that accelerating automation is going to eat its lion’s share of jobs continue to plague corporate sectors. However, new research from McKinsey Global Institute may talk folks afflicted with automation phobias down from the ledge.

The research group says that although half of today’s work activities could be automated, it may not happen until 2055. Or 2035. Or even 2075. Where the statistic falls along the S curve depends on various factors, such as breakthroughs in artificial intelligence and economic conditions, says Michael Chui, a McKinsey Global Institute partner and an author of the report . Chuiand […]

Will AI Bless Us With A 15 Hour Work-Week, Or Turn Us Into Paperclips?

Will AI Bless Us With A 15 Hour Work-Week, Or Turn Us Into Paperclips?

Francois Lenoir / Reuters With scaremongers predicting millions of job losses and an increasing divide between the haves and the have-nots, it was interesting to see the results of a recent White House report into AI. Yes, there will be job losses, but the report found that business productivity will rise, which could prompt an increase in average salaries. The benefits for the global workforce should not be ignored.

When you think of the average white-collar office job, it probably doesn’t conjure up images of a room full of whizz kids staring at glistening monitors replete with fancy graphs and […]

Automation for the People: The Public, Technology and Jobs

Automation for the People: The Public, Technology and Jobs

A 2012 research brief by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee at MIT renewed an old debate over the effect of new technologies on employment levels. They argued that, counter to the prevailing belief that new technologies and automation simply shift jobs into new sectors after a period of disruption, instead rapid improvements in technology over the past decades have left some workers completely behind, a trend that will continue to accelerate as computers capabilities expand. But what does the public think? Do Americans see technological threats to employment, and have their views changed since the days when robots first […]

Obama Warns Automation Is a Danger to U.S. Jobs

Obama Warns Automation Is a Danger to U.S. Jobs

leminuit/istock.com In his final interview before leaving office, released Thursday by Pod Save America, President Barack Obama warned that automation is the bigger threat than global trade in taking away jobs in the United States.

“The fact is, and the data just shows this, the jobs that are going away are primarily going away because of automation and that’s going to accelerate,” Obama said. Uber Technology Inc.’s driverless car programs and the “equivalent displacement that’s going to take place in office buildings around the country is going to be scary for folks,” he added.

Uber is currently running pilot programs for […]