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Automation: Inevitably there will be Winners and Losers
“Labor shortages are not going away,” said Gad Levanson, senior economist with The Conference Board. A survey by The Conference Board found that as many as 80 percent of companies are having a hard time finding and recruiting qualified workers.
The labor shortage is making a lot of businesses consider how they can use automation to fill their labor gaps. Levanon said that “2021’s severe labor shortage and accelerating wages may incentivize employers.”
But the suggestion of using automation to fill existing labor positions worries many workers about the long-term viability of their jobs.
Tom Kelly, CEO of Automation Alley, argues that automation will remove some of the drudgeries of work, saying that “automation reduces time spent on repetitive tasks, and most factory workers would welcome automation to free up their time to get upskilled to do more meaningful work, or work that involves creativity and strategy. Automation won’t replace people, but will increase flexibility for workers.”
Virgil Wong, chief digital officer for HGS, agrees saying that “automation is not about replacing people. It’s about augmenting our ability to connect with our customers and do our jobs more effectively. These repeatable tasks like data entry and bots should really be doing that. Hopefully, that will let human beings focus on what human beings are good at.” Hopefully,…
But others feel that automation may hit workers hard. Martin Ford, futurist and technology author, wrote in a piece for the Guardian that “the rise of artificial intelligence will require an unprecedented transition in which a large fraction of the workforce will have to find and adapt to roles that are genuinely non-routine. It is unclear whether a sufficient number of these jobs will be created – and, even if they are, many workers will likely lack the inherent talents and personality traits required to take on creative or relationship-based roles.”
Diane Charlton, a professor at Montana State University, summed up the dilemma, saying that “as with most major changes to the economy, there are winners and losers.”
