Tag: employment

Resisting the rise of the robots

Resisting the rise of the robots

115k

Reactions In a world of growing automation and consequent job losses, what the continued existence of petrol attendants in South Africa shows is that a social contract can exist between business and government to preserve jobs. Surely the trade-off between jobs and mechanisation is up for negotiation.

A strike looms in the banking sector over the loss of jobs as banks close branches, supposedly an inevitable result of the move to internet banking. McDonald’s has introduced self-service kiosks, and Ster-Kinekor has added automated snack ordering to its automated ticket system.This is happening in a country where the […]

Philexport: Create more jobs to boost automation readiness

Philexport: Create more jobs to boost automation readiness

AN EXPORT industry leader has underscored the need for the country to create more employment opportunities especially in the rural areas to prepare itself for Industry 4.0 and foster inclusive national economic development agenda.

Philippine Exporters Confederation Inc. (Philexport) president Sergio Ortiz-Luis Jr. noted the Yonsei University Automation Readiness Index 2017 indicating that low unemployment, labor productivity, income inequality and high gross domestic product (GDP) per capita are the factors affecting automation readiness.

“(These are) areas where the Philippines still needs to work on a lot. However, this does not mean that we should brush this issue aside. We must […]

The future of work will still include plenty of jobs

The future of work will still include plenty of jobs

Canada’s record has been one of modernization and transition and corresponding job obsolescence, without job scarcity Power loom weaving in a cotton mill in Lancashire, U.K., around 1835. Shutterstock (CP) — There is now widespread anxiety over the future of work, often accompanied by calls for a basic income to protect those displaced by automation and other technological changes.

As a labour economist, I am in favour of more efficient redistributive taxation through the application of refundable tax credits, which amounts to an income-tested basic income or negative income tax.

But I am more skeptical about the spectre of a future […]

The future of work will still include plenty of jobs

The future of work will still include plenty of jobs

Canada’s record has been one of modernization and transition and corresponding job obsolescence, without job scarcity Power loom weaving in a cotton mill in Lancashire, U.K., around 1835. Shutterstock (CP) — There is now widespread anxiety over the future of work, often accompanied by calls for a basic income to protect those displaced by automation and other technological changes.

As a labour economist, I am in favour of more efficient redistributive taxation through the application of refundable tax credits, which amounts to an income-tested basic income or negative income tax.

But I am more skeptical about the spectre of a future […]

Mckinsey global institute automation

McKinsey & Company | 1 Digitization of everything . Worlds Fair Nano is a future festival that aims to connect people with the future Across the country, automation is changing the landscape of local labor markets. Jul 06, 2017 · The McKinsey Global Institute has conducted a research about automation technologies and their potential impact. 64% 74% 98% . McKinsey Quarterly. Apr 10, 2019 · McKinsey Global Institute (2019), Globalization in transition: The future of trade and value chains, January. . A new report from the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) looked at 315 cities to identify the ways automation […]

China Will Live Or Die by Its Digital Economy

China Will Live Or Die by Its Digital Economy

Recent research from the International Monetary Fund highlights just how important this growth driver has become in recent years—and how critical keeping up the momentum is for the nation’s prospects.

Technological innovation is key to all economies, but the fate of China’s high-productivity IT sector has taken on outsize importance . One reason is the government’s failure in recent years—partly for ideological reasons—to make many key reforms which could boost the productivity of the rest of the economy and keep growth chugging along.

Created with Highcharts 6.0.4Worker’s Paradise?Chinese gross domestic product and laborproductivity, change from a year earlierChinese gross domestic product […]

Why robots will soon be picking soft fruits and salad

Why robots will soon be picking soft fruits and salad

The Vegebot uses machine learning to identify ripe, immature and diseased lettuce heads. (CNN photo) Fruit picking robots like this one, developed by Fieldwork Robotics, operate for more than 20 hours a day. (CNN photo) LONDON (CNN Business) — It takes a certain nimbleness to pick a strawberry or a salad. While crops like wheat and potatoes have been harvested mechanically for decades, many fruits and vegetables have proved resistant to automation. They are too easily bruised, or too hard for heavy farm machinery to locate.

But recently, technological developments and advances in machine learning have led to successful trials […]

The Coming Manufacturing Giant: The United States of America

The Coming Manufacturing Giant: The United States of America

One of the positive externalities of the U.S.-China trade war will be the re-emergence of the United States as one of the two dominant manufacturing powers in the world. While China enjoys a labor advantage due to its large population, it also is constrained by the poverty of its population which forces the Chinese Communist Party to seek overseas markets to finance the state-owned enterprises (SOE) which provide employment for almost 50 percent of the Chinese working population. SOEs consume 70 percent of the financial resources of China , yet only contribute 30 percent of China’s GDP.

With the rise […]

AI Weekly: Automation in the workplace could disproportionately affect women

AI Weekly: Automation in the workplace could disproportionately affect women

Image Credit: ktsdesign/Shutterstock As AI and machine learning transform industries by automating much of the work currently done by humans, women’s careers will be disproportionately affected. That’s according to a McKinsey Global Institute report published earlier this year (“ The future of women at work: Transitions in the age of automation “), which found that in the 10 economies (Canada, France, Germany, Japan, the U.K., the U.S., China, India, Mexico, and South America) contributing over 60% of GDP collectively, an average of 20% of women working today (107 million) could find their jobs displaced by 2030. That’s compared with […]

The Future Of Humans, Taxes and Work

The Future Of Humans, Taxes and Work

It was a day like all others biking down the West Side Highway to work. Then BAM! Right out of nowhere a spandex-clad cyclist slammed into me from behind. I quickly grabbed his handlebars to protect the biker’s cranium from hitting the pavement. He reciprocated with loud shouts questioning my intelligence. When the disturbed human pedaled off, I noticed in his backpack two miniature dogs. Looking down at my bloodied hands, hearing the sad barks in the distance, I pondered the future of society as it races towards automation.

In the recent Democratic debate there was little discussion about the […]