Automation, skills and the future of work: what do workers think? by Carlos Mulas-Granados, Richard Varghese, Vizhdan Baranova, Alice de Chalendar and Judith Wallenstein published by IMF (12/2019).
“The fear of automation is turning into the collective angst of our times. The concern of associated job losses has dominated the public debate, both in popular media and in policy discussions. Almost everyone following the news has been exposed to headlines such as “Robots Will Destroy Our Jobs—and We’re Not Ready for It” and endless discussions on what could be the jobs of future. According to a recent review (Winick, 2018), the most commonly cited numbers in such journalistic pieces come from three sources: a 2013 Oxford study that said 47 percent of US jobs are at high risk of automation in the next few decades, an OECD study suggesting that 9 percent of jobs in the organization’s 21 member countries are automatable, and a McKinsey report which affirmed that 400 to 800 million jobs worldwide could be automated by 2030.2 While there is little evidence on the extent of human displacement by robots (Autor and Salomon, 2018; Acemoglu and Restrepo, 2019), such predictions have shaped public perceptions to the point that increasingly large majorities of people believe that robots will be doing much of the work done by humans within 50 years. This in turn is building concerns of how difficult it would be for ordinary people to find jobs and increasing inequality.
There are early signs that perceptions about how automation can affect our future may already be impacting people’s behavior. There is evidence from the US 2016 presidential elections showing that “automation in recent years tilted the electorate into opting for radical political change” (Frey, Berger and Chen, 2018). Concerns about automation are increasingly reflected in policy proposals too. For example, Andrew Yang, a 2020 Democrat Presidential Candidate, is running on a platform that promises to implement universal basic income for every American adult funded by a new tax on the companies benefiting most from automation. Thus, understanding what factors shape public perceptions of automation may provide valuable insights into ongoing economic and political developments…”
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