By enabling society to produce more with the same workers, automation is a major driver of rising standards of living. Is it different now that technological change is so fast? Will millions of workers will end up consigned to menial, minimum-wage jobs? Monthly job creation averaged 185,000 this year. This has driven unemployment down to 4.4%, a 10-year low and below most estimates of “full employment.” If automation were rapidly displacing workers, the productivity of the remaining workers ought to be growing rapidly. Instead, growth in productivity—worker output per hour—has been dismal in almost every sector, including manufacturing.
OM in the News: Robots Aren’t Destroying Enough Jobs
May 15, 2017
Will millions of individuals be thrown out of work by the rapid advance of automation and artificial intelligence? This idea is certainly chilling, but is also misguided. “Robots aren’t destroying enough jobs,” writes The Wall Street Journal (May 11, 2017). “Too many sectors, such as health care or personal services, are so resistant to automation that they are holding back the entire country’s standard of living.”
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