Tag: inequality

Why automation is something to worry about

Why automation is something to worry about

The viewpoint of automation has always been recipient to serious worries regarding employments, from the beginning of the 19th century’s Luddite movement, to the publishings, put forward generations later of renowned economists such as Wassily Leontief and John Maynard Keynes. Both John Maynard Keynes and Wassily Leontief were unsure if there would be an optimum number of jobs for employees to do. So many people have started sharing the same view, seeing the approaching era of digital automation.

The labor market is being affected by the digital technologies of the present day. In response to this phenomenon, three queries are […]

Infographic: The Global Decline Of Manufacturing

Infographic: The Global Decline Of Manufacturing

This chart shows the manufacturing value added as a percentage of GDP in selected countries.

Emerging and advanced economies alike are experiencing a decline of their manufacturing sectors, which are becoming less and less important for national incomes. In the 1980s, industrial production made up a quarter or more of national GDPs around the world, but that share has been in ongoing decline. This is according to data from the World Bank and the United Nations.

As the IMF notes, the loss of manufacturing jobs has been a source of anxiety across developed countries, as many fear the disappearance of […]

Why Worry About Automation?

Why Worry About Automation?

UnitoneVector/Getty Images In previous periods of technological displacement of workers, economists like John Maynard Keynes and Wassily Leontief worried that too few new jobs would be created to prevent higher long-term unemployment. Today, facing an onrushing wave of digital automation, many share their misplaced unease.

LONDON – From the Luddite movement in the early nineteenth century to the writings of prominent economists like John Maynard Keynes and Wassily Leontief generations later, the prospect of automation has always raised serious concerns about jobs. Keynes and Leontief doubted there would be enough jobs left for workers to do. Today, facing an onrushing […]

Letters to the Editor: Saving jobs in the digital world

Letters to the Editor: Saving jobs in the digital world

Beaven Dhliwayo

It is becoming more apparent that today’s jobs will be replaced by machines.

Many people are wondering if robots can do their jobs at a time the world economy is already facing major employment crisis.In the recent past, the discussion about technology in the future of work has tended to centre on the issues of job creation and destruction and the need for reskilling.Technology is fast evolving, at the same time connecting the digital world with the physical one, resulting in new innovations such as artificial intelligence and self-driving cars.Zimbabwe should not be left behind and should equip […]

Will Smart Machines Kill Jobs or Create Better Ones?

In one vision of the not-too-distant future, robots handle half of all work tasks, leaving legions of humans unemployed, uneasy and restive. In an alternate scenario, those same technologies revolutionize rather than reduce work opportunities for humans, raising living standards with new jobs that aren’t yet imagined. Such are the stakes as a new wave of automation reshapes the workplace.

Advances in artificial intelligence, or the capability of machines to learn by ingesting large amounts of data, are driving a rethink of what jobs only humans can do. A 2018 working paper by the National Bureau of Economic Research found […]

The highest paid jobs will not be safe from automation either | Economy

The highest paid jobs will not be safe from automation either | Economy

Automation creates anguish. Seven out of 10 Americans worry that a robot or computer will take over their jobs and that is why they believe that adoption should be limited. But if so far it was noted that the most vulnerable were the lowest-paid and low-skilled productive jobs, a new study anticipates that artificial intelligence will have a greater effect than previously thought in high-skilled and well-paid office jobs.

No one is immune to the shocks of automation in employment. This is how Mark Mauro, a researcher at the Brookings Institution, expresses himself in presenting a study prepared with a […]

The 2020s are set to be an economic turning point, says global banking giant

The 2020s are set to be an economic turning point, says global banking giant

Bank of America Merrill Lynch says inequality will peak amid the rise of "moral capitalism". The 2020s are set to be a decade of dramatic economic and social upheaval, reversing many of the trends of the past 40 years, according to one of the world’s largest banks. Bank of America Merrill Lynch says the era of globalisation from 1981-2016 has ended and is reversing

The bank’s analysts expect inflation and interest rates to increase from their current 5,000-year lows

The bank is expecting wealth inequality to fall next decade as voters demand redistribution and taxes rise In what it […]

AI and automation will disrupt our world — but only Andrew Yang is warning about it

AI and automation will disrupt our world — but only Andrew Yang is warning about it

AI and automation will disrupt our world — but only Andrew Yang is warning about it Disruption of the job market and the economy from automation and the rise of artificial intelligence (AI) is one of the primary ideas animating ’s surprising campaign for the Democratic presidential nomination. Alone among the candidates, Yang is directly engaging with one of the central forces that will shape our futures.

Over the past ten years, I have written two books on the subject of artificial intelligence and its impact on the job market and the economy. I’ve spoken at dozens of events in […]

Why are we stuck with a 40-hour work week?

Why are we stuck with a 40-hour work week?

Careers Image: © taniasv/Stock.adobe.com Though we have the tools and technology to work less and live better, we have yet to reach this vision for society. Toby Phillips explains why.

In 1930, a year into the Great Depression, John Maynard Keynes sat down to write about the economic possibilities for his grandchildren. Despite widespread gloom as the global economic order fell to its knees, the British economist remained upbeat, saying that the “prevailing world depression … blind[s] us to what is going on under the surface”.

In this essay , Keynes predicted that in 100 years’ time (ie 2030), society would […]

Three ways to solve India’s jobs problem

Three ways to solve India’s jobs problem

Students at a skill development centre run by Maruti Suzuki on the ITI-Meerut campus. Although the data is murky and it is politically difficult to admit, India has a massive and growing challenge educating and creating decent work for her youth. Some 374 million Indians are between 10-24 years old and they constitute a fifth of the world’s young people. They represent extraordinary talent and ambition but face equally extraordinary challenges.

The facts are grim. Half of them drop out before Class X. Nearly a million turn 18 years old every month and start looking for employment. However, jobs are […]