Tag: manufactur

A different dystopia: July 2030

A different dystopia: July 2030

IT IS HARD to believe now, but a little more than a decade ago people were seriously worried about robots taking all the jobs. Back in 2018 the chief economist of the Bank of England, Andy Haldane, gave a warning that “large swathes” of the population would become “technologically unemployed”. He argued that the “fourth industrial revolution” of automation and artificial intelligence (AI) would create even more disruption to people’s working lives than the previous three. Robots would do everything. There would be universal leisure but mass unemployment. Similar warnings were a fixture at the World Economic Forum’s annual […]

4IR: The good, the bad and the inequality gap

4IR: The good, the bad and the inequality gap

On the brighter side, the Fourth Industrial Revolution will create many new jobs that do not exist today, says the writer. (Image: Franck V. / Unsplash) The Fourth Industrial Revolution is an unstoppable force that will have a profound impact on the world. While it will undoubtedly bring many benefits, we must beware it does not increase the already huge gulf between South Africa’s haves and have-nots.

Whether for good or bad, we are on the path of a technological revolution that is radically shaping the way in which we relate to the world and to one another. […]

In Praise of Demographic Decline

In Praise of Demographic Decline

Getty Images Our expanding ability to automate human work across all sectors – agriculture, industry, and services – makes an ever-growing workforce increasingly irrelevant to improvements in human welfare. That’s good news for most of the world, but not for Africa.

LONDON – Every two years, the United Nations issues its latest estimate of future population trends. Its 2019 projection reveals a stark divide. Across all of Asia, Europe, and the Americas, population stability has already been achieved or soon will be, with the median projection suggesting an increase from 6.4 billion today to 6.5 billion in 2100, a rise […]

Robots Will Take Jobs—Lots of Them—But May Not Be A Bogeymen

Robots Will Take Jobs—Lots of Them—But May Not Be A Bogeymen

It’s human nature for people to over-react to reports on trends, particularly in a divided time in America when everyone is looking for political or at least polemic fodder in every new study that comes out about how quickly life is changing.

Count reactions to the “robot revolution” among these extreme responses. Every week or so, it seems, an estimable think tank comes forth with a new prognostication about how the rise of robotics, artificial intelligence, the Internet of Things and other technological disruptions in manufacturing are going to ravage the global work force and unleash millions of new panhandlers […]

State sees dramatic jobs switch

State sees dramatic jobs switch

Illinois has experienced a dramatic decline in manufacturing jobs since the 1940s, according to a new report from the Georgetown University Center on Education and the Workforce.

The report documents the shifting landscape of manufacturing over the past 70 years and the impact on the sector in Illinois and other states.

According to the findings, nearly one in four workers in the country in 1940 was employed in manufacturing. That share fell to 15% in 2000 and then to about 10% in 2016, said report co-author Neil Ridley, state initiative director at the Georgetown Center.“And it’s been in relative decline […]

Manufacturing Job Losses are from Trade not Automation

Manufacturing Job Losses are from Trade not Automation

Many people today are concerned about automation. And not without good reason – automation has been blamed for the dramatic job losses seen in manufacturing over the last few decades. And we are warned that automation will soon come for a wider range of jobs – which some think could cause "Depression-level" unemployment .

However, last year an paper was published which overturned the consensus narrative on what exactly is responsible for the job losses the U.S. has seen in the manufacturing sector. Many experts and economists have argued for decades that automation, not foreign trade is responsible for the […]

Oxford Economics: Robots are here and they are after your job

Oxford Economics: Robots are here and they are after your job

Although robots and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies have boosted global productivity and economic growth, more than 2,030 manufacturing jobs now performed by humans will be lost to innovation in the coming decade, according to a new report released Wednesday (June 26) by United Kingdom’s Oxford Economics.

In a 64-page report entitled “How Robots Change the World,” Oxford CEO and Chief Economist Adrian Cooper said the robotics revolution is rapidly accelerating, as fast-paced technological advances in automation, engineering, energy storage, artificial intelligence, and machine learning converge. The result, Cooper concludes, will transform the capabilities of robots and their ability to take […]

By 2030, 20 million workers will lose their jobs to robots

By 2030, 20 million workers will lose their jobs to robots

A new study from analysis firm Oxford Economics predicts that by 2030, over 20 million workers in the manufacturing industry will lose their jobs to robots.

“As machines become cheaper to build and artificial intelligence technology becomes more comprehensive and affordable, many industries are going to become robot-centric,” says Rob Wilson. “Just look at the automotive industry: Starting in the 1980s, companies were spending billions of dollars to create robots to perform basic tasks in their automobile factories. Now, 43 percent of the world’s robots are used by the automotive industry. We should expect to see a similar trend in […]

The robots are definitely coming and will make the world a more unequal place

The robots are definitely coming and will make the world a more unequal place

So the robots are coming for our jobs, are they? Yawn. That’s such an old story. Goes back to Elizabeth I and the stocking frame, if my memory serves me right. Machines have been taking our jobs forever. But economists, despite their reputation as practitioners of the “dismal science”, have always been upbeat about that. Sure, machines destroy jobs, they say. But hey, the new industries that new technology enables create even more new jobs. Granted, there may be a bit of “disruption” between destruction and creation, but that’s just capitalist business as usual. Besides, it’s progress, innit?

We have […]

By 2030, 20 Million Workers Will Lose their Jobs to Robots

By 2030, 20 Million Workers Will Lose their Jobs to Robots

A new study from analysis firm Oxford Economics predicts that by 2030, over 20 million workers in the manufacturing industry will lose their jobs to robots.

At last nights Democratic Debate for the 2020 Nominee for President Andrew Yang presented his key signature plan of $ 1000 a month guaranteed income for every American. The reason for the automatic income for everyone is the rise of Robots. He argues that it’s going to happen very soon and we will NOT be able to replace those jobs replaced by robots. Thus we will need this income to make our economy […]