Tag: employment

Loss of Factory Jobs Needn’t Spell Doom for Nations, IMF Says

Loss of Factory Jobs Needn't Spell Doom for Nations, IMF Says

Productivity growth doesn’t necessarily slow, fund says

President Trump has vowed to revive U.S. manufacturing sector

Economies don’t necessarily suffer lower growth or higher income inequality as factory jobs become more scarce, the International Monetary Fund said.Manufacturing’s share of employment has been declining in advanced economies for almost five decades, the IMF said Monday in an analysis that’s part of its latest World Economic Outlook. The full report, including the fund’s updated global economic forecasts, will be released April 17 at the IMF’s annual spring meeting in Washington.The slide in factory employment has worried some economists and […]

Human capabilities will trump robots in the age of automation

Human capabilities will trump robots in the age of automation

Image: Sergey Nivens/Shutterstock To be productive in the age of automation, human skills and social and emotional capabilities will matter more than anything.

The future of work in a world of robots may not be as bleak for humans after all, with a range of human skills pivotal for managing of data and automation.

That’s the view of Rob Curley, managing director of digital consultancy Singlepoint . ‘Deep end-market intimacy will become the space of most demand, not the technology itself’ – ROB CURLEY According to Curley, the pace at which technology changes has always led to skills gaps as organisations […]

Automation risks costing people their health as well as their jobs

Automation risks costing people their health as well as their jobs

Unease over the role of automation-related job losses has risen in recent years, spawning academic conferences, research studies and a host of news stories. To be sure, productivity growth through better automation and work processes should be a welcomed feature of any economy.

There is a justified concern, however, for workers who find themselves unable to work due to obsolete skills. That worry is the basis for significant investments in workforce training and skill enhancements in every state, but what if there’s more to the problem? Does the risk of automation-related job losses effect more than labor market outcomes?

That question […]

Automation risks costing people their health as well as their jobs

Automation risks costing people their health as well as their jobs

© Getty Images Unease over the role of automation-related job losses has risen in recent years, spawning academic conferences, research studies and a host of news stories. To be sure, productivity growth through better automation and work processes should be a welcomed feature of any economy.

There is a justified concern, however, for workers who find themselves unable to work due to obsolete skills. That worry is the basis for significant investments in workforce training and skill enhancements in every state, but what if there’s more to the problem? Does the risk of automation-related job losses effect more than labor […]

Was Trump Elected to Take Revenge on Job-Stealing Robots?: New at Reason

Was Trump Elected to Take Revenge on Job-Stealing Robots?: New at Reason

davincidig/iStockPhoto Daron Acemoglu is no ally of robotkind. The MIT economist is one of the most prominent advocates of the theory that automation depresses employment and wages, at least for low-skilled workers.

In a 2017 paper, Acemoglu and his Boston University colleague Pascual Restrepo produced a series of maps of "robot exposure" and its economic effects in the United States. The results look awfully similar to maps of the districts that tilted Republican in the last election, with a thick red band stretching through the Rust Belt and the Deep South. As Acemoglu later told The New York Times , […]

Was Trump Elected to Take Revenge on Job-Stealing Robots?

Was Trump Elected to Take Revenge on Job-Stealing Robots?

Daron Acemoglu is no ally of robotkind. The MIT economist is one of the most prominent advocates of the theory that automation depresses employment and wages, at least for low-skilled workers.

In a 2017 paper, Acemoglu and his Boston University colleague Pascual Restrepo produced a series of maps of "robot exposure" and its economic effects in the United States. The results look awfully similar to maps of the districts that tilted Republican in the last election, with a thick red band stretching through the Rust Belt and the Deep South. As Acemoglu later told The New York Times , "The […]

Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN) Effect On Economy Very Clear In Latest Jobs Report

Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN) Effect On Economy Very Clear In Latest Jobs Report

Amazon.com, Inc. ( NASDAQ:AMZN ) just keeps on growing and growing.

The retail superpower is adding jobs at a torrid pace, and its effects on the job market have been laid bare in the latest monthly jobs report. MarketWatch has more details: Breaking down the March nonfarm-payrolls report released Friday, truck transportation added 6,700 positions, courier and messenger jobs rose by 5,800, warehousing and storage added 2,500 jobs, and nonstore retail added 4,300 positions. On the flip side, the retail sector continues to hemorrhage positions — department stores slashed 7,900 jobs, warehouse clubs and supercenters cut 4,700 jobs, and clothing […]

Churchill: Self-driving cars will run over workers

Churchill: Self-driving cars will run over workers

Albany

The election of Donald Trump was supposed to be a wake-up call. The shock of his success, we were told, would lead the political establishment to finally start paying attention to working-class Americans and forgotten workers.

Has that happened?Well, an optimist could point out that manufacturing jobs have been roaring back since Trump’s election. A pessimist, though, need only note the attitude among Republicans and Democrats alike toward a big technological change coming our way: self-driving cars.Now, corporate America is thrilled about autonomous vehicles, as they’re also called, and for an obvious reason: Many companies will save gobs […]

Prime-Aged Americans Are Working Less—But That’s Actually Good News for the Economy

Prime-Aged Americans Are Working Less—But That’s Actually Good News for the Economy

Many jobs for prime-aged workers have been replaced by machines and computers in the past two decades. LOIC VENANCE/AFP/Getty Images

Many jobs for prime-aged workers have been replaced by machines and computers in the past two decades. LOIC VENANCE/AFP/Getty Images

Americans between the ages of 25 and 54 are working fewer hours, and the overall workforce participation of this prime-aged group lags behind that in other developed countries, recent studies by the University of Chicago and the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco found.Only 81 percent of prime-aged Americans were employed as of 2015, while the prime-age labor participation rates in […]

Robots threaten Asian jobs

Robots threaten Asian jobs

Automation risks hitting the region’s low-skill industrial posts Can it do your job? © Reuters Cai Fang did not mince his words. Last month the vice president of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences called for drastic measures to slow the spread of automation and ward off a possible new era of technologically driven unemployment.

"We must cap the speed and restrict the direction of robotics’ development to avoid any bad effects on human beings," he said.

Fang, who is also a standing committee member of China’s National People’s Congress, joined a growing line of influential figures demanding protection from machines, […]