Tag: Technical

These tech jobs may disappear in the face of automation

These tech jobs may disappear in the face of automation

When Dale Wilkinson first set out to launch a website, he had never written a line of code before. His first step as a non-technical founder seemed clear – he needed to find a software developer to build out his vision.

He found one in Los Angeles, but then he discovered on Twitter a company called Bubble , a service that lets users build web applications with a visual editor, without writing any code themselves. For Wilkinson, it was a game changer. In mid-2019, the 37-year-old launched Goodgigs , which connects mission-driven companies with people seeking work. Sign-ups have since […]

The Reality of Automation and the Future of Work

The Reality of Automation and the Future of Work

The threat of automation is not a new thing, nor are the worries that come with it. In the early 19th century, textile artisans in the Luddite movement fought automation for fear of losing their jobs and livelihood. They worried that newly developed automation (think basic machinery) would leave them jobless. While it’s true that changes did occur, by the time the 20th century came along, employment-to-population ratios rose despite these technological advances. The workforce generally is good at adapting to new technology, and while automation will continue to take over new tasks as it evolves, humans don’t have […]

Workforce Education is Vital to Support Growing Robotics Market

Workforce Education is Vital to Support Growing Robotics Market

By 2022, an operational stock of almost 4 million industrial robots are expected to be working in factories worldwide. These robots will play a vital role in automating production to speed up the post-COVID-19 economy. At the same time, robots are driving demand for skilled workers, therefore educational systems must effectively adjust to this demand. That’s according to a new positioning paper, “Robots and the Workplace of the Future,” from the International Federation of Robotics (IFR).

“Governments and companies around the globe now need to focus on providing the right skills necessary to work with robots and intelligent automation systems,” […]

Autonomous Tractors, Excavators and More: Examining the Path Toward a Driverless Tomorrow

Autonomous Tractors, Excavators and More: Examining the Path Toward a Driverless Tomorrow

Autonomous equipment offers significant benefits with respect to efficiency, cost savings and safety. These machines are poised to have a profound impact in the off-road environment, upsetting and defying current models in relation to the size of the equipment and the role of the dealers and OEMs, as well as impacting the individual operator.

Although the equipment sectors that AEM represents have historically been hesitant to adopt innovative technologies, they are set for a significant amount of change, as autonomous vehicles (AV) dramatically alter the nature of the work. Future off-road autonomous equipment will handle the cycle of operation and […]

Federal Regulations Have Forced Lower-Skilled Workers Out of Banking Jobs

Federal Regulations Have Forced Lower-Skilled Workers Out of Banking Jobs

Richard B. Levine/Newscom As the federal government has piled new regulations on the financial system, lower-skilled employees have been forced out of the industry—a tradeoff that hasn’t necessarily helped consumers.

"It’s just raising the costs," Christos Makridis, a scholar with the Mercatus Center, a free market think tank at George Mason University, tells Reason .

Makridis is one of the authors of a new study , along with Alberto Rossi, that investigates an under-acknowledged effect of federal regulations on the financial services sector imposed since the Great Recession. More regulation has brought increased automation, and lower-skilled workers have been pushed out […]

Automated Harvest Is Coming. What Will it Mean for Farmworkers and Rural Communities?

Automated Harvest Is Coming. What Will it Mean for Farmworkers and Rural Communities?

The pandemic is making robots more appealing to farmers and investors. But advocates say not everyone is likely to benefit equally from the shift.

It’s a misty morning near Salinas, California and the TX harvester—a lightweight, driverless tractor covered in canvas—is picking strawberries. Like a dot-matrix printer moving along a page, the harvester’s robotic hands move back and forth along the beds, scanning for signs of red. When it identifies a ripe berry, it dives down, gently plucks it from the plant, and places it in a crate.

At the same time, a crew of about two dozen farmworkers […]

Working With Robots in a Post-Pandemic World

Working With Robots in a Post-Pandemic World

Whether you turn to news outlets, tech magazines, or academic sources for insight, you’re likely to hear that the COVID-19 pandemic is going to drive massive growth in automation, especially via robots. 1 The arguments in favor of this view seem reasonable: Main Street might look dead, but companies that provide shippable goods have been facing double, triple, or even 10 times their previous demand. Robots, the thinking goes, should be able to reliably do that repetitive physical work when many workers aren’t safely able or willing to set foot in the building. What’s more, access to the technology […]

Survey: Half of U.S. job seekers on the hunt because of coronavirus

Survey: Half of U.S. job seekers on the hunt because of coronavirus

Job seekers look at pamphlets during a job and resource expo in Concord, California. Did coronavirus kick start the future of work?

The survey’s more interesting findings inform on how job seekers have been approaching their search. About a third of those surveyed believe their current work did not utilize either their skills or training, and 61 percent are actively looking for work in a different industry. Industries singled out include healthcare and technology.

To stay relevant, these job seekers are also seeking opportunities to gain new skills. The survey found that nearly a third of them believe technical skills […]

The Future Trajectory of Automation

Imagine a catering business which serves 500 meals a day. One day, they seize an opportunity to grow their business. They automate 90% of the cooking process, and with the same number of employees in the kitchen, they can now prepare 2000 meals a day. A huge 4-times gain in the productivity of human effort!

However, there is another side to this productivity gain. Look at it from the resource perspective – it now requires 4 times more resources to keep the same number of people employed. This is a classic example of how automation is increasing the “Resource Intensity” […]

Introducing the K-shaped economic recovery, favouring some sectors and leaving others behind

A woman checks out a jobs advertisement sign during the COVID-19 pandemic in Toronto on April 29, 2020. The Canadian Press Linda Nazareth is host of the Work and the Future podcast and senior fellow for economics and population change at the Macdonald-Laurier Institute in Ottawa.

And today’s recovery is brought to you by the letter ‘K,’ or at least that is how it is beginning to look. Oh sure, some of the indicators are getting us hopeful about a ‘V’ or maybe a ‘U,’ and some pessimists figure we are stuck at ‘L,’ but it would seem that […]