by Andre Coelho | Jul 16, 2019 | News
Transportation is not the only sector where automation is eating away jobs. Large commercial ports are also being hit hard, as recent events in Vancouver show. Workers at the Port of Vancouver went on strike last month, due to a pressing issue on automation with the employer Global Containers Terminal (GCT). According to the International Longshore and Warehouse Union (ILWU), pressing automation technology has the capacity “to eliminate 80 to 90 percent of the [human] labour requirements”.
McKinsey & Company consulting firm has studied global port operations and concluded that automated ports are safer, more predictable, much cheaper to operate (25 to 55%) and more productive (10 to 35%). Although significant technical hurdles still exist, it seems only a matter of time until these predictions come true, especially when, actually, a few automation efforts have already been proven successful (e.g.: fully automated port in Los Angeles-Long Beach, semi-automated facilities in New York-New Jersey, and Virginia, USA).
Worker unions in this field naturally oppose any suggestion of automation, for the obvious reason that it might displace their jobs, from which workers extract their livelihood. However, falling costs of automation technologies is quickly shortening the gap to economic implementation, and so human labour is losing ground. This shouldn’t be a problem, of course, if human jobs where not tightly linked to access resources. As Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez has eloquently stated, earlier this year, “our technological advancement as a society has outpaced our system for handling finite resources”, and “we live in a society where if you don’t have a job you are left to die”. Although that reality could be more sharply defined in the United States than, for instance, Finland, the link exists virtually everywhere in the so-called “developed” world, but fortunately is starting to be contested as the global discussion around basic income progresses.
But maybe there should be no content here, between ILWU members and GCT, or any other worker-employer dispute over automation. Maybe jobs should not be the sole vehicle to get the necessary money to access the necessary Earth resources to live on. As Scott Santens has put it, on a by-now famous writing: “It’s time for technology to serve all humankind. Jobs are for machines. Life is for people.”
More information at:
Charlie Smith, “Automation at the heart of labour dispute at Port of Vancouver”, The Georgia Straight, May 26th 2019
Bill Mongelluzzo, “Vancouver, Prince Rupert terminals may consider automation”, JOC.com, June 5th 2019
Daniele Fabbri, “United States: Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on automation”, Basic Income News, March 26th 2019
Scott Santens, “It’s Time for Technology to Serve all Humankind with Unconditional Basic Income”, Medium, April 13th 2018
by Daniele Fabbri | Mar 26, 2019 | News
Picture credit to: Ståle Grut / NRKbeta
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC), during a talk at SXSW, was addressed by a tech entrepreneur with a question about automation (how should we act as a society and how will we be able to find a purpose in life as jobs are appropriate by machines).
AOC’s answer placed automation in the broader context of socio-economic inequality: automation is not the problem, and we shouldn’t be haunted by its specter, but rather be excited about it. The problem, AOC states, is that “(…) we live in a society where if you don’t have a job you are left to die (…)”.
The risk is in the reinforcement of the trends that are already occurring with the “automation of injustice”. Automation accelerates economic inequality, she says, and we should be concerned about fixing the current socio-economic system: we are at the most prosperous time in our history, but many are left behind, thus it is imperative for us to figure out new ways to administrate wealth.
While AOC did not address Universal Basic Income (UBI) directly, her view on the matter seems compatible with those seeing it as the necessary answer to the fourth industrial revolution.
Whether the solution is “taxing robots” as proposed by Bill Gates (which AOC considers a clever, acceptable way to suggest taxing corporations), higher tax rates on top income brackets, or some form of wealth redistribution, we need to entertain ideas that would leave us with the possibility to siphon off the benefits brought by automation. It could give us the potential to focus more on studying, inventing and creating art: “Not all creativity should be bound by wage,” she says.
By entering a time in which scarcity is no longer the only reality known to man, and with capitalism being based on scarcity, “our technological advancement as a society has outpaced our system for handling finite resources”, AOC states.
If the system was not broken, people could already be working less, and focus on activities which are currently not considered work, but that would nonetheless benefit individuals and society. But money is appropriated by corporate greed:
“We’re paid on how little we’re desperate enough to accept. And then the rest is skimmed off and given to a billionaire.”
More information at:
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez | SXSW 2019, YouTube
Adi Robertson, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says ‘we should be excited about automation’, The Verge, March 10th 2019.
by Toru Yamamori | Feb 12, 2019
Gilbert, Richard / Murphy, Nora A. / Stepka, Allison / Barrett, Mark / Worku, Dianne
Would a Basic Income Guarantee Reduce the Motivation to Work? An Analysis of Labor Responses in 16 Trial Programs
Basic Income Studies, Volume 13, Issue 2.
Bruun, Edvard P.G. / Duka, Alban
Artificial Intelligence, Jobs and the Future of Work: Racing with the Machines
Basic Income Studies, Volume 13, Issue 2.
Mann, Stefan
A Mesoeconomic Approach to a Basic Income
Basic Income Studies, Volume 13, Issue 1.
Martin, Josh
Universal Credit to Basic Income: A Politically Feasible Transition?
Basic Income Studies, Volume 11, Issue 2. Pages 97-131
by Micah Kaats | Jan 16, 2018 | News
As many as 375 million people may have to switch jobs as a result of automation by 2030. This is according to a new report published by the McKinsey Global Institute (MGI), a private sector think tank and the business and economics research arm of McKinsey & Company.
According to MGI researchers, “the transitions will be very challenging – matching or even exceeding the scale of shifts of agriculture and manufacturing we have seen in the past.” Such dramatic shifts in the global labor market will demand proportionately dramatic responses from governments, businesses, and individuals. Specifically, the MGI report emphasizes the importance of providing transition and income support to workers.
The report, entitled “Jobs Lost, Jobs Gained: Workforce Transitions in a Time of Automation”, builds on previous MGI research suggesting that 50% of global work activities could theoretically be automated by modifying existing technologies. While only 5% of jobs are at risk of disappearing entirely, 6 in 10 of jobs have 30% of constituent work activities that could be automated. According to MGI researchers, the question is not whether or not automation will alter the nature of work, but how long it will take.
Their analysis model potential net employment changes over 12 years for more than 800 occupations in 46 countries, focusing particularly on China, Germany, India, Japan, Mexico, and the USA. The report also accounts for several factors that could affect the pace of automation including technological and financial feasibility, demographic changes to labor markets, wage dynamics, regulatory responses, and social acceptance.
The report finds that 75 million to 375 million workers, or 3 – 14% of the global workforce, may be displaced by automation by 2030. These effects will be particularly felt in high income countries. In the most extreme scenario, 32% of American workers (166 million people), 33% of German workers (59 million people), and 46% of Japanese workers (37 million people) will be forced out of their jobs by 2030.
However, there may not be any shortage of new jobs available. MGI’s researchers note that new jobs will need to be created to care for aging societies, raise energy efficiency, address challenges posed by climate change, provide goods and services to the growing global middle class, and build new infrastructure.
Automation itself may also have the potential to create at least as many jobs as it destroys. Historically, transformative technological advancements have often led to significant jobs growth across industries.
The real challenge will be to ensure a smooth and stable transition between jobs. According to MGI research, automation is likely to disproportionately affect workers over 40, and sustained investments in retraining programs will be necessary to prepare midcareer workers for new employment opportunities. The report notes that this will require “an initiative on the scale of the Marshall Plan…involving collaboration between the public and private sectors.”
The MGI researchers also emphasize the need for increased financial support during transitions. Workers will need unemployment insurance to compensate for lost wages, as well as supplemental income to offset wage depressions typical in transitioning economies. A universal basic income (UBI) may be capable of satisfying both needs.
The report points to completed UBI trials in Canada and India, which showed no significant reduction in work hours and demonstrated increases in quality of life, healthcare, parental leave, entrepreneurialism, education, and female empowerment. The report also references ongoing and planned UBI experiments in the United States, Uganda, Kenya, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the Netherlands as programs to watch in the years to come.
The worldwide spread of automation may be inevitable, but according to researchers at the McKinsey Global Institute, the demise of human labor is not. Whether or not we can respond effectively to the needs of a changing economy will depend largely on our ability to ensure a secure and stable transition for displaced workers.
More information at:
James Manyika, Susan Lund, Michael Chui, Jacques Bughin, Jonathan Woetzel, Parul Batra, Ryan Ko, and Saurabh Sanghvi, “What the future of work will mean for jobs, skills, and wages”, McKinsey Global Institute, November 2017
by Karl Widerquist | Dec 15, 2017 | Opinion, The Indepentarian
In this one-minute video, I argue that people look at automation and UBI in the wrong way. We must not wait until the predicted day when automation reduces the total number of jobs available. Automation creates two important reasons to introduce UBI right now even if automation is not going to reduce the total number of jobs available any time soon.
