Essay Sample: How Effects of Automation May Help or Hurt Your Future Job Prospects

The impact of technological advancement on society have been a significant issue of discussion among many experts across the world. One such development is the automation. When people think about automation, they often imagine things such as robots working or operating within manufacturing premises. An important thing to understand in this case is that automation and robotics are two distinct things. Fundamentally, automation is a term used to describe a process or task performed by a machine or software that is usually undertaken by the human being. Ideally, it can be mechanical or virtual, complicated and straightforward. As such, therefore, there has been debate regarding how the effects of automation may help or hurt future job prospects of individuals. Studies have shown that automation will increasingly impact on the world in the next few years. This is already felt in given industries, and different nations are experiencing the impacts in different capacities than others.

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What will happen to the Future Jobs Prospects?

Various studies highlight various degrees of job losses on job creation among the employed groups. However, the situation is well determined on the factors that will facilitate positive and negative change among the employment sector. The impact, in this case, is not a simple case of the jobs we have now experience gain or loss either. Ideally, the automation in the work environment will establish a strong demand for the existing goods and services but may also promote new gains and losses. According to Manyika et al. (2017), automation will lead to a tremendous loss of jobs in various companies by 2030. In the view of Manyika et al., there is even a greater possibility that with a potential change and displacement, more jobs openings would be created by not yet conceived jobs. It implies that the majority of the nations affected will have been dominated by technological advancement while the developing nations with little or no development will see practically any of this impact.

The findings of the World Economic Forum further stresses on the job loss in future about the development of automation (The Future of Jobs Report, 2018). Through a research finding in the organization's yearly "Future of Jobs Report", it is anticipated that the significant changes are expected in the coming years to the job markets automation. Ideally, the organizations will embrace automation to speed up their productivity and to catch up with the already development competitors, and this will result in the cutting of job opportunities. It is further expected that by 2022, there will be an 11 per cent increase in the jobs because of the automation and a 10 per cent decrease in jobs for the same reasons.

What will lead to job Loss?

The current market systems are affected by factors such as product and market competition, increased productivity and efficient means of production. Fundamentally, these factors have been closely associated with rapid technological development currently experienced across the globe. The adoption of automation by the companies is therefore believed to be an effective mechanism through which companies can emerge winners in the market. Ideally, studies have shown that automation will increase the incidences of job loss shortly. However, the most interesting question that the majority of people ask themselves is how? Notably, there are various catalysts that could significantly increase the demand for human labour if not those that will be automated.

Firstly, the rising incomes or rising prosperity around the world is a major catalyst of automation and which will lead to the massive loss of jobs. The world will experience another one billion people entering the consuming class during the next couple of decades. The increase in the consumption demand for goods and services will increase the need to enhance the existing production processes to increase the number of goods generated to meet the demands of goods. For efficiency, human labour will be lost, and automated labour will be adopted (Frey and Osborne, 2013). Another important factor to note in this case is the ageing around the world. Ideally, this factor will drive the need for additional labour in the healthcare and manufacturing sectors for instance. The ageing as a factor will lead to the loss of the skilled workforce that previously met all the production requirements and with the urgent need to replace and maintain or enhance the production, there will be the need to adopt automated means of production.

The need to develop and deploy technologies and decreasing the amounts of unpaid labour in the global workforce lead to massive job loss in future. Ideally, the digitization, robotics, and artificial intelligence will need people to conduct deployment and development (Vermeulen et al. 2018). However, an enormous loss of job opening will be lost because of the need for the scrapping of the individuals who are skilled in specific areas, but the automated machines have taken their positions. Additionally, the efforts to reduce the incidences of the unpaid workforces will lead to the loss of jobs. In most cases, these could be the domestic work done by women.

What more useful are the studies that adopt the nuanced view of the job components and how they will be affected. A study by Arntz, Gregory and Zierahn (2016), takes into consideration the impacts across 32 nations. While the study claims that two jibs are likely to be influenced by the automation, the risks of replacement depend on various factors, with only about 65 million workers being highly automatable. Contrary, more than 70 per cent of the jobs will risk being changed due to automation although all jobs present both the technical potential to become automated considering the currently available technologies based on the social, economic and technological factors (Walsh et al. 2016). The degree of adoption has therefore varied tremendously.

Conclusion

In sum, it is evident that automation will likely to affect the future jobs prospect negatively. Ideally, the automation in the work environment will establish a strong demand for the existing goods and services that will ultimately lead to losses in terms of the lost human labour. It is likely to lead to a loss of jobs in various companies by 2030. There is, therefore, an urgent need to prepare the currently available global workforce on the skills and knowledge that will enable them to fit for the production activities and processes that are supposed to be conducted by the automated systems. Nevertheless, employers should further identify some of the areas and tasks that cannot be handled through human labour and assign automated systems but not all tasks.

References

Arntz, M., T. Gregory and U. Zierahn (2016), "The Risk of Automation for Jobs in OECD Countries: A Comparative Analysis", OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers, No. 189, OECD Publishing, Paris. dx.doi.org/10.1787/5jlz9h56dvq7-en

"Cities Outlook 2018", Centre for Cities, January 29 2018, centreforcities.org/publication /cities-outlook-2018

Frey, Carl and Osborne, Michael. "The Future of Employment: How Susceptible are Jobs to Computerisation?", Oxford Martin School, January 17 2013, oxfordmartin.ox.ac.uk/downloads/academic/The_Future_of_Employment.pdf

The Future of Jobs Report 2018", Geneva: World Economic Forum, 2018, www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_Future_of_Jobs_2018.pdf

Gownder, J.P., "Predictions 2019: Automation Will Become Central To Business Strategy And Operations", Forrester, November 6 2018, go.forrester.com/blogs/predictions-2019-automation-will-become-central-to-business-strategy-and-operations/

Manyika, James en at. "Jobs lost, jobs gained: What the future of work will mean for jobs, skills, and wages", McKinsey, McKinsey & Company, November 2017, www.mckinsey.com/featured-insights/future-of-work/jobs-lost-jobs-gained-what-the-future-of-work-will-mean-for-jobs-skills-and-wagesVermeulen, Ben en at. "The Impact of Automation on Employment: Just the Usual Structural Change?", Sustainability, vol. 10, no. 5, 2018, 1661. MDPI, doi:10.3390/su10051661

Walsh, Dustin. "Metro Detroit at less risk for job loss from automation." Crain's Detroit Business, 28 Jan. 2019, p. 0006. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A571865033/ITOF?u=utahvalley&sid=ITOF&xid=3ec044d0