Tag: manufactur

How Do We Protect Ourselves Against The Rise Of The Machines?

How Do We Protect Ourselves Against The Rise Of The Machines?

​Last month, we heard both Elon Musk and Bill Gates voice concerns over the pace of change within many sections of the labour market, with robots and automation making vast swathes of the workforce redundant. Driverless cars are putting taxi drivers, school bus drivers (accounting for over 660,000 US employees), and truck drivers, which provide work for approximately one million people in the US, at risk.

The concept is not new – the luddite movement in the nineteenth century lasted over five years but it is the speed of change that is surprising many. Over a century ago in the […]

The real reasons behind the fall in America’s manufacturing jobs

The real reasons behind the fall in America's manufacturing jobs

© Getty Images This morning’s employment report shows a healthy increase of 235,000 total (nonfarm) jobs last month, pretty much across the board, in all major categories except for retail services. The manufacturing sector alone gained 28,000 jobs — a stronger showing than we’ve seen in a long time.

But we shouldn’t break out the champagne over one month’s worth of manufacturing jobs. Compared with roughly a year ago, manufacturing has been essentially flat, up just 7,000 jobs. Looking further back it becomes obvious that manufacturing just has not followed the typical storyline of an industry merely living through and […]

Experts: Because of AI, Millions of People Are at Risk of Unemployment

Experts: Because of AI, Millions of People Are at Risk of Unemployment

The Future of Employment

Machines are on the rise. While they aren’t out to get you just yet — and might never be — they are already gunning for one thing: your job. If you work in the transportation industry , manufacturing , some sectors of the information technology industry , and maybe even in insurance , law , or taxation , you may already be obsolete.

The point is, increased automation is expected to dramatically disrupt worldwide employment as early as 2020 . Recent developments in artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics are making this change possible. These developments, of […]

Jobs and the Artificial Intelligence Debate

Jobs and the Artificial Intelligence Debate

One of the best parts of writing the Afternoon Edition each day is that I get to explore all kinds of interesting topics.

Two of those recent topics continue to be all over the news, and they are the issues of robots and automation , and artificial intelligence and the "Singularity."

These topics do materially affect markets, although their effect may not be as acute as, say, a monthly employment report.And speaking of which, we got a new monthly employment report this morning, as February saw 235,000 new non-farm payroll jobs created.That’s good economic news; however, I wonder how many […]

Robots aren’t killing the American Dream. Neither is trade. This is the problem.

Robots aren’t killing the American Dream. Neither is trade. This is the problem.

Robots named Thunderbird and Cyclops lower a Tesla vehicle onto the assembly line at Tesla Motors factory in Fremont, Calif., in 2016. (Joseph White/Reuters) “ No, robots aren’t killing the American Dream ,” argued the New York Times editorial board in February. As evidence, the Times emphasized that labor productivity and capital investment have decelerated in the new century. In theory, that wouldn’t be happening if automation were the main reason that the middle class has been shedding jobs.

Unfortunately, that argument leads many people to conclude that globalization and liberalized international trade must be what’s hurting U.S. manufacturing. That’s […]

Automation is coming for your job!!

Automation is coming for your job!!

We’ve gone through speedy, and at times shocking, technological progress over the past twenty or thirty years.

I’m 30 and remember watching VHS tapes. The tapes were expensive, wore out, were difficult to store, degraded, and weren’t mobile. We can now get much better video quality, on demand, with no storage need, no worries about wear or degradation, virtually any time and anywhere on any modern mobile device. That’s just an example of what twenty years ago would have seemed impossible is now routine.

We’ve already been through a major wave of job loss in manufacturing and other blue collar industries. […]

Technology will destroy millions of American jobs

Technology will destroy millions of American jobs

Bill Pugliano/Getty A significant part of Trump’s campaign centered on the angst of the white middle class and the ongoing loss of jobs in the Rust Belt. And that focus gave him his margin of victory.

Trump promised to bring those jobs back, a sentiment that resonated powerfully with the electorate. The problem is— as we’ve talked about previously— that at least 80–90% of manufacturing jobs were lost not to companies moving factories to China or Mexico but to increased automation.

Those Jobs Are Never “Coming Back” They are gone. And that trend is going to continue and accelerate.I […]

The optimist’s guide to the robot apocalypse

The optimist’s guide to the robot apocalypse

Machines, you may have heard, are coming for all the jobs.

Robots flip burgers and work warehouses . Artificial intelligence handles insurance claims and basic bookkeeping , manages investment portfolios , does legal research , and performs basic HR tasks . Human labor doesn’t stand a chance against them—after the “ automation apocalypse ,” only those with spectacular abilities and the owners of the robots will thrive.

Or at least, that’s one plausible and completely valid theory. But before you start campaigning for a universal basic income and set up a bunker , you might want to also familiarize yourself with […]

Robots are coming, but not for your job, says EU digital chief

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Humans are not going to be usurped in the workplace by robots, according to the European Commission’s digital chief Andrus Ansip, who says, “Despite all the studies, I do not think anybody really knows the degree to which jobs are affected by digital change. I do not believe in the mass unemployment scenario.”

Robots are encroaching on routine work in factories and offices in Europe at a slightly faster rate than other parts of the world.Half of the countries in the top ten league table of most industrial robots per 10,000 employees belong to the EU and their presence is […]

Is technology replacing jobs?

My sixth-grade girlfriend was the best. Her name was Anne. I would never meet anyone else as great as she was. I was already planning to get married to her.

Well, do you know how that ended? I never saw her in high school, or ever again actually. What we believe in when we are young is never what we experience as we age. It’s funny how that happens. Oh my, how things change.

So, automation is 50 years old. Is it mature? Absolutely. And now we have the benefit of hindsight of those 50 years. To me—and don’t forget my […]