Surprise! The moose population is booming on Isle Royale now that Mother Nature has selected the wolves in that particular environ for extermination (The thick and thin of it, Feb. 5). With the proposal to pluck healthy wolves from a stable environment and reintroduce them to an apparently non-wolf-friendly island, the never-ending, (taxpayer funded?) wolf study/camping trip continues. Dare we fathom a guess as to what fate looms for the moose? Lets just say theyd better sleep with one eye open. Nature will deal with the moose if the island cant sustain them. Some random winter, the lake will experience another total freeze, the wolves will cross to the island and the eternal moose/wolf dynamic will play out, as it has for thousands of years.

Let it happen.

Tim Anderson, Walker, Minn.

Ron Schara shares his opinion in his Feb. 5 commentary The thick and thin of it by comparing the relationship between wolves and moose in Minnesota and Isle Royale. He wants the reader to accept the premise that wolves appear to be a major cause in the decline of the moose population in Minnesota. He states: While Minnesotas case is more complex, the states moose are prey to a historically high wolf population. In one Minnesota wolf study area, the number of wolves roaming the north is the highest its been in 40 years.

I would ask Mr. Schara to dig a bit deeper into the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) statistics on the historic wolf and moose populations. These reports are readily available and easily found.

The DNR wolf population survey clearly indicates the Minnesota wolf population peaked in 2003-04 at 3,020 wolves. Yet in 2006, the moose population peaked at 8,840. This would not support his point.

In addition, DNR statistics show, the wolf population has dropped nearly 27 percent since the peak. This fact places in doubt Scharas statement saying that the number of wolves roaming the north is the highest its been in 40 years.

Schara asks: So is that part of the answer to Minnesotas moose mystery? Thin out a few wolf packs?

The answer to that question is that, no, the wolf population is already down 27 percent from its peak, and the moose continues to be at risk. Thinning out or killing a few more wolves will not bring back the moose. Stop wasting time blaming the wolf and concentrate your efforts on a real solution.

Duaine Morphew, Maple Grove

HEALTH CARE

Privatization, it increasingly seems, is problem, not solution

The Feb. 5 commentary A reasonable path for GOP toward universal coverage ignored some key points. Our common goal is high-quality, affordable health care for all Americans. Thats quite a bit different from insurance coverage or access to insurance coverage. Remember that insurance companies operate in the free market. They seek a large number of subscribers, betting that most subscribers will make few or inexpensive claims for medical services. That provides enough money to pay for the large claims coming from a hopefully small number of subscribers for chronic illness or end-of-life care.

If the number of subscribers gets smaller, if the number of expensive claims increases and/or if the costs of medical services increase, the insurance companies dont have enough income to cover the claims. Companies can and do respond in several ways. Being in a free market, they may stop offering health insurance altogether. They can raise premiums. They can reduce coverage and increase copays and deductibles. All of these responses are happening today in Minnesota.

The Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare) attempted to address these problems by making insurance mandatory (or be penalized) but still relying on private insurance companies to provide health care. (Mandatory insurance is not new; everyone in Minnesota who owns a car must have auto insurance.) Premiums went up anyway, forcing people to pay the penalty for insurance they couldnt afford.

It is ironic that much of the rest of the world has universal health care for all citizens, including places like Thailand, Rwanda and Bangladesh, that is affordable or free and of high-quality.

I can only conclude that privatization is the problem, not the solution, as is becoming more apparent in many things that are public goods that benefit all.

David Ruch, Stillwater

JOBS

Issues with employer size, automation are obstacles

The Feb. 5 story Start-up accelerator scene heating up claimed the number of start-ups in the Twin Cities has been exploding amid the ubiquity of the tech economy. However, this popular myth masks for readers a much more discouraging reality that threatens economic dynamism, innovation and jobs.

Since 1977, start-up companies in the Twin Cities metro have created a net majority of new jobs, but the rate of new businesses during that time has declined nearly 60 percent. This decline has coincided with a slow consolidation of the Twin Cities economy. The share of jobs in the metro at companies with 10,000 or more workers has increased over 11 percent; creating a dynamic where the firms most responsible for job loss over the long term control an increased share of our local economy.

More accelerators in the Twin Cities is a positive sign for the regions start-up ecosystem, but it should not distract readers or policymakers from the challenges faced by entrepreneurs in an economy where the playing field has been tilted to large corporate incumbents.

Justin Stofferahn, St. Paul

Lee Schafers Feb. 5 column (Jobs are plentiful, at least for machines) is a reminder that automation is gradually eliminating the blue-collar middle class. Automation in the form of computers is likewise eliminating the white-collar middle class. The pace is accelerating, with the result that there will be a huge number of permanently unemployed workers.

The U.S. is moving toward the greatest glut of unemployed middle-class workers since the Great Depression. Perhaps FDR has shown us how to cope with it. He looked at the infrastructure needs of the nation and set up special federal agencies to address them: WPA, PWA, CCC, etc. Yes, they were clumsy and inefficient, and they ran up the deficit. But today we have Hoover Dam, the Minneapolis post office, the St. Paul/Ramsey government center and countless other worthy infrastructure improvements across the country.

Everybody who wants to work should have the opportunity. Some of the profits from automation should be taxed to offset the cost of paying a living wage to displaced white- and blue-collar workers. Everybody will benefit from the repairs and additions to the nations infrastructure.

William Soules, Minnetonka

THE FUNNY PAGES

Diversity and letting go

A Feb. 5 letter writer was upset that were no minority comics in the Star Tribune. I would like to point out that the paper has published comics by minorities in the past.

They included The Boondocks, The Knight Life and La Cucaracha. (Another comic called Prickly City also featured a minority character, but this was a political strip written by a white conservative commentator, so I feel the character was a political statement more than anything else.)

However, these comics either retired or were not very popular and were dropped. The Star Tribune still publishes Jump Start on the weekdays.

There are other minority strips like Baldo and Curtis, but room would have to be made by cutting another strip.

Still, the bigger problem is to get fickle readers who enjoy reading comic reruns or comics who have been in print for more than 60 years to support new and diverse comics. (I actually do not mind the older comics as long as new comics are made every day.) Except that might be easier said than done.

William Cory Labovitch, South St. Paul

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Readers Write (Feb. 12): The moose population; jobs, start-ups and automation; diversity in the funny pages - Minneapolis Star Tribune

In the face of growing workplace automation, a number of commentators have painted a grim future for American workers. But most human capital leaders see a much brighter future one where automation helps revitalize U.S. manufacturing and increases the demand for skilled workers.

According to global talent management firm Randstad Sourcerights survey of over 400 corporate HR leaders, automation and robotics are likely to have a positive impact on U.S. business growth in 2017, and will be one of the driving forces behind new hiring trends over the next several years.

Regardless of how you feel about robots, the move toward automation and artificial intelligence cannot be stopped. About 15 percent of global HR leaders say that robotics completely transformed their businesses in 2016, and more than double (31%) expect automation to have an even greater influence in 2017.

Rather than feeling threatened by this new technology, nearly two-thirds (65%) of the HR leaders we spoke with said they see artificial intelligence and robotics having a positive impact on their businesses over the next three to five years. Across all the major industry sectors surveyed, respondents were optimistic about technologys ability to reduce costs, improve quality and increase output.

It is easy to assume that these productivity gains are made at the expense of workers. In reality, this technology actually has increased demand for flexible, mobile workers with skills and agility that machines are not even close to matching. While 26 percent of those surveyed said their businesses increased the use of automation and robotics in 2016, over 34 percent said they hired extensively over the same period just to keep up with company growth.

In fact, the HR leaders we surveyed indicated that a scarcity of skilled workers was driving employment demands in certain areaslike marketing, sales and IT/technicalwhere robotics will likely never displace the advantage of human intelligence. Indeed, well over one-third of respondents anticipate hiring more workers in these areas over the next year.

But workers with the right combination of skills and experience are hard to come by. Many workers are structuring their work hours in ways that allow them to work many different jobs, across several geographical locations. As a result, more companies are rethinking their talent management to account for more short-term, offsite workers. Of the HR leaders we surveyed, more than two-thirds (66%) said they are considering moving toward a talent management model that would more easily integrate contingent workers. They see the shift toward flexible talent as a sound strategy that can help companies access a larger pool of talent, such as parents with young children and retirees who may not want a traditional 9-to-5 job.

For some commentators, the investment in automation and contingent employees signals an upheaval in the economy that will not benefit American workers. But that perspective may be short-sited. In fact, automation and robotics can make U.S. manufacturing more cost-competitive, while increasing the number of high-paying, skilled jobs available for humans. Instead of 50 foreign workers being paid rock bottom wages to complete a job by hand, the same job will be accomplished by one skilled U.S. worker running a robot and earning a middle-class salary. This combination of increased automation and a more mobile, contingent workforce can reduce manufacturing costs and make it easier for companies to build their factories in the U.S. The end result is a better educated, higher paid American workforce.

Change can be difficult. We are witnessing a major shift in the way business does business. But most HR leaders see technology as providing workers with new opportunities (and also with new priorities). These recent changes in workforce management need not be seen as the catastrophe some suggest. If Randstad Sourcerights 2017 Talent Trends Report is any indication, robots are far more likely to benefit American workers than replace them.

Rebecca Henderson is the CEO of Randstad Sourceright, one of the worlds leading human resources providers.

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Automation can revitalize the US workforce - Fox News

Recently, a conference on artificial intelligence, tantalizingly titled Superintelligence: Science or Fiction?, was hosted by the Future of Life Institute, which works to promote optimistic visions of the future.

The conference offered a range of opinions on the subject from a variety of experts, including Elon Musk of Tesla Motors and SpaceX, futurist Ray Kurzweil, Demis Hassabis of MITs DeepMind, neuroscientist and author Sam Harris, philosopher Nick Bostrom, philosopher and cognitive scientist David Chalmers, Skype co-founder Jaan Tallinn, as well as computer scientists Stuart Russell and Bart Selman. The discussion was led by MIT cosmologist Max Tegmark.

The conversation's topics centered on the future benefits and risks of artificial superintelligence, with everyone generally agreeing that its only a matter of time before AI becomes paramount in our lives. Eventually, AI will surpass human intelligence, with the ensuing risks and transformations. And Elon Musk, for one, thinks its rather pointless to be concerned as we are already cyborgs, considering all the technological extensions of ourselves that we depend on a daily basis.

A worry for Australian philosopher and cognitive scientist David Chalmers is creating a world devoid of consciousness. He sees the discussion of future superintelligences often presume that eventually AIs will become conscious. But what if that kind of sci-fi possibility that we will create completely artificial humans is not going to come to fruition? Instead, we could be creating a world endowed with artificial intelligence but not actual consciousness.

David Chalmers speaking. Credit: Future of Life Institute.

Heres how Chalmers describes this vision (starting at 22:27 in Youtube video below):

For me, that raising the possibility of a massive failure mode in the future, the possibility that we create human or super human level AGI and we've got a whole world populated by super human level AGIs, none of whom is conscious. And that would be a world, could potentially be a world of great intelligence, no consciousness no subjective experience at all. Now, I think many many people, with a wide variety of views, take the view that basically subjective experience or consciousness is required in order to have any meaning or value in your life at all. So therefore, a world without consciousness could not possibly a positive outcome. maybe it wouldn't be a terribly negative outcome, it would just be a 0 outcome, and among the worst possible outcomes.

Chalmers is known for his work on the philosophy of mind and has delved particularly into the nature of consciousness. He famously formulated the idea of a hard problem of consciousness which he describes in his 1995 paper Facing up to the problem of consciousness as the question of why does the feeling which accompanies awareness of sensory information exist at all?"

His solution to this issue of an AI-run world without consciousness? Create a world of AIs with human-like consciousness:

I mean, one thing we ought to at least consider doing there is making, given that we don't understand consciousness, we don't have a complete theory of consciousness, maybe we can be most confident about consciousness when it's similar to the case that we know about the best, namely human human consciousness... So, therefore maybe there is an imperative to create human-like AGI in order that we can be maximally confident that there is going to be consciousness, says Chalmers (starting at 23:51).

By making it our clear goal to fully recreate ourselves in all of our human characteristics, we may be able to avoid a soulless world of machines becoming our destiny. A warning and an objective worth considering while we can. Yet it sounds from Chalmerss words that as we dont understand consciousness, perhaps this is a goal doomed to failure.

Please check out the excellent conference in full here:

Cover photo:

Robots ready to produce the new Mini Cooper are pictured during a tour of the BMW's plant at Cowley in Oxford, central England, on November 18, 2013. (Photo credit: ANDREW COWIE/AFP/Getty Images)

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Automation Nightmare: Philosopher Warns We Are Creating a World Without Consciousness - Big Think

John Breeden II is an award-winning journalist and reviewer with over 20 years of experience covering technology and government. He is currently the CEO of theTech Writers Bureau,a group that creates technological thought leadership content for organizations of all sizes. Twitter: @LabGuys

Over the past few months, I was fortunate enough to be asked to evaluate several cutting-edge technologies designed to make government networks more secure. Some of these were more advanced than others, and a few were hindered by newer technologies like cloud computing. But they all showed a great deal of promise for the federal government if deployed correctly.

One of the most interesting possibilities is creating an event-driven architecture to add automation to the federal defensive arsenal. Given a single router can generate over 100,000 data points every few seconds, any network of any size quickly grows beyond the ability for even teams of humans to protect 100 percent effectively. There is just too much dataand not enough analysts.

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Attackers know this, and use all that data as cover to remain undetected once they breach a network. That is why the latest Mandiant M-Trends 2016 Report found most organizations were breached for 146 days before the successful attack was discovered. The government is no exception to this rule.

Automation could be the answer, reducing the time from detection to remediation from months to seconds. The basic concept is simple enough. It uses the power of the network itself to counter threats, making it a machine versus machine affair. Thats not unlike the classic "WarGames" movie, where a young Matthew Broderick gets the WOPR computer to play itself in a game to teach it futility.

The concept of automation in cybersecurity can be broken down into three basic levels. At the first and most-basic level is human-driven automation. A human operator needs to do something, like check a series of network devices for compliance issues, so they activate a script to do the heavy lifting. This can cut down on operator workload and help with odorous chores like patch management, but doesnt improve breach response times.

At the second level, which makes the most sense for federal agencies, there is event-driven automation. At level two, humans teach computers their various processes. If a computer goes down, they open a trouble ticket, or if a virus is detected, they wipe the system and restore the core operating system.

Humans set those event triggers and program what responses to automatically take. Then, they can remove themselves from the loop, though they can also keep a hand in things, such as having a computer notify a supervisor about a particularly dangerous trigger.

Computers are never actually doing anything beyond what they are taught, but can respond to security events at machine speed, automating the remediation of many threats, especially low-level ones, and freeing up analysts to work on larger projects or trickier situations.

The final level is almost science fiction at this point, though there have been glimpses of what could one day be possible in things like IBMs Watson and Googles AlphaGo software. At that level, computers still respond to events, but also program their own triggers and responses, possibility making processes even more efficient than the original human-driven plan.

So why dont we see more automation in federal networks, even at level two?

The answer is to get there requires both hardware and software. The software is available, but you also really need to have event-driven hardware in your network to take advantage of all of automations benefits. That is ready too, but installing it piece by piece could be a slow process. In an event-driven network, devices should be built so they can interface with one another to open the doorway to true automation. Specifically, they should all have:

Once the hardware is in place, and several companies do offer automation-ready gear, the triggers and responses can be programmed to help fight cybersecurity threats at machine speed. The computers can do everything an analyst does without getting tired,hungry or bored.

Beyond just cybersecurity, having an event-driven architecture in place also opens new efficiencies. Automation can, for example, be used in data centers for the automatic provisioning of software-defined networks based on customer needs, establishing micro-segments or automating the application of services by applying service-chaining.

There are some impressive capabilities in this field, but the first benefits of automation for most agencies will most certainly be in cybersecurity. Especially now with a critical shortage of analysts and the government not hiring anyone new, technologies like automation need to be quickly deployed before agencies start to get steamrolled under the next wave of advanced attacks.

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Why Don't We See More Automation in Federal Networks? - Nextgov

When we learn of, or experience a school bus accident with passenger injuries, we all sit back and ask what caused it, how can we prevent it from happening again, and what now?

The resulting outcome of the accident investigation shows us that most all crashes are often the result of operational or behavioral failure. As regulators converge on the details of the accident, we eventually learn what contributed to the failure in behavior and the severity of the accident. It may have resulted from an equipment related issue, or a lack of defined and implemented safety management practices, or maintenance practice, or driver training, or lack of refresher training, or driver road supervision monitoring, or driver error. The list goes on.

From the investigative final report, we learn what we can do to help prevent such an accident from happening again.

We would all agree that the most critical element of a safely operated school bus is driver behavior. Most operators focus on safety and behavior management by developing a rigorous driver refresher training program with up-to-date training material that compliments the initial classroom and behind-the-wheel training a new driver receives. Also, having all training supported by a record monitoring system to ensure 100-percent driver compliance. However, we still have accidents.

We are in a new period of technological aides that could form the basis for fully automated, not autonomous, driver assist in school buses. Modern automotive driver assistance systems help drivers reach their destination in a safer, more relaxed manner. They keep the vehicle in the lane, maintain stability within the laws of physics, regulate speed and distance from other vehicles, warn of traffic jams, detect objects within a 360-degree area around the vehicle. They can even, if required, automatically initiate full braking to help prevent severe rear collisions.

The technical basis for fully automated driving assist has already been formed by the introduction of the following driver assist technologies: Antilock braking systems (ABS 1978); Traction Control System (TSC 1986); Parking Aid (1993); Electronic stability control (ESP 1996); Adaptive Cruise Control (ACC 2000); Parking Assist (2008); predictive emergency braking system (2010); Lane keeping support (2012); Traffic jam assist (2015), and; Remote park assist (2015); Some but not all are available to the school bus industry.

As the automotive industry continues to develop these automated technologies and include them in the passenger vehicles we buy, I wonder how long will it take the school bus industry to begin to introduce the additional proven driver aides that no doubt would contribute to behavior modification and safety. Granted, much of the automated technology is new, so new that the regulators have had to agree on how to classify it.

A classification system based on six different levels (ranging from driver assistance to fully automated systems) was published in 2014 by SAE International, formerly known as the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE). This classification system is based on the amount of driver intervention and attentiveness required, rather than the vehicle capabilities, although these are veryclosely related. In the United States, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) released in 2013 a formal classification system. NHTSA abandoned this system when it adopted the SAE standard last September.

As we begin the New Year, our school bus supplier industry is most likely planning to solicit ideas for the next generation of school buses. By collectively gathering their customers and dealers as advisory groups, ideas will be debated that begin with the customers input as well as the dealers, these ideas then end at the equipment manufacturers engineering department. It is they who ultimately study the viability of an idea.

Just think if we could help driver behavior through the Level 2 automation of control over severe rear end collisions, roll overs, and danger zone incidents, just to name a few!

Pudlewski is STNs technical editor with more than 40 years of experience in the school bus industry. He is the retired vice president of fleet operations, procurement and maintenance for Laidlaw and is a member of the National School Transportation Association Hall of Fame.

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Improving Behavior Through Automation of Vehicle Systems - School Transportation News (blog)

Technobabble is our look at the weird, wonderful and wildly creative aspects of technology and the tech industry. If you have any babble, feel free to emaildirectly or reach out on Twitter.

For decades, pundits have discussed the plight of the American worker. Without fail, as technology has advanced and become more automated, some workers have been displaced.

Take the assembly line, for example. Workers en masse were employed to ensure every part of the manufacturing process kept up with industry standards. But as machines entered into the assembly line, work became automated and fewer employees were required, leading to layoffs and worker displacement.

Today, grim forecasts about the rise of automation and workforce losses abound. Forrester recently predicted the net loss of 6% of U.S. jobs by 2021, which could impact more than 7.5 million workers. But beyond transportation and logistics areas that were previously predicted to become more automated with self-driving cars automation is also expected to impact customer and consumer services areas.

In Japan, IBM Watson's artificial intelligence-based systems is helping a life insurance company replace human insurance claim workers. And another recent study from Oxford University anticipates that insurance underwriters, real estate brokers and loan officers could be replaced by automation within 10 years.

Through it all, man has an unparalleled ability to survive and thrive. Some thought tractors would kill the workforce, yet here we are. With the rise of machines, it is still necessary to program, build and fix them. As it turns out, humans are pretty good resources for that.

The forecasts do seem a bit dismal, but the rise of automation is leading to a new kind of worker. Technology is supposed to make tasks easier, so companies are rolling out innovative solutions and approaches to filling both the tech talent gap as well as solutions to make life easier for the average worker.

In a recent article, Wired declared coders the next blue-collar worker. These are the workers who will not become fantastically rich from their app-making prowess. Rather than plugging away at manufacturing work, these blue-collar workers can add code into the product assembly line at any company, whether that's a bank or an insurance company.

As Wired notes, "these sorts of coders won't have the deep knowledge to craft wild new algorithms for flash trading or neural networks. Why would they need to? That level of expertise is rarely necessary at a job."

Not only does the work pay well, but it also offers outlets for creativity and a steady, in-demand employment.

Sure, the average coding job does not seem glamorous. But for an employee looking for a well-paying job and a work-life balance, coding jobs may be the perfect fit.

Technology related jobs don't always require a four-year degree. Students can pick up programming skills from tinkering with the home computer or attending bootcamps.

To learn technology skills, emphasis has been placed on starting students early, rather than waiting for higher education. And with a glaring tech talent gap, with technology workers in high demand across sectors, this is more important than ever before.

Some nonprofits are working to introduce coding into high schools. The nonprofit ScriptEd is working with 31 high schools in New York City to teach students how to code, Fortune reports. With the help of professional software developers, students learn real-world engineering skills and receive assistance finding summer internships.

Nonprofits like ScriptEd also produces future technology talent for the workforce at any level, from assembly-line style coders to the innovative experts creating the companies of tomorrow.

Fear of worker displacement aside, technology can be pretty dang cool and help make our daily lives just a tad simpler.

Now, Microsoft's Cortana is making sure our scattered brains aren't forgetful. It sure beats tying a string around your finger, hoping you remember.

Cortana will now remind you of things you have promised to do in your emails by highlighting portions of an email and saying "don't forget you mentioned this," The Verge reports.

Whether that's a reminder to include an attachment or providing information to your boss, Cortana won't let you forget, thanks to machine learning. We can all celebrate the end of forgetfulness.

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Technobabble: Automation and the modern worker - CIO Dive

Image: Getty Images/iStockphoto

There's lots of prognosticating about what impact robotics and automation will have on the future of work -- with mostly dystopian depictions predicting displaced workers and increasing unemployment. But new social data from Adobe Digital Insights suggests that the average worker is far less cynical when it comes to welcoming robots into the workplace.

According to Adobe, most people are talking (on social media) about how robots are helping their work, not taking it away. Workers are also upbeat about being able to hand over mundane tasks to robots so human workers can do more meaningful jobs. Machine learning, artificial intelligence, and robots were the most discussed FOW topics.

Adobe's report is based on roughly 3 million social mentions captured from Twitter, news, blogs, and forums between January 2016 and January 2017. Interestingly, the FOW hashtag was mentioned twice as many times on Twitter than on workplace-focused LinkedIn.

Across social media, Future of Work (FOW) mentions are up 40 percent year over year, automation mentions have doubled year over year and average daily mentions of robots and jobs have increased 70 percent year over year.

"Overall, people seem to believe the FOW is promising, particularly when it comes to the automation of traditionally mundane tasks," wrote Joe Martin, head of social insights for Adobe, in a blog post. "Automating document and signature processes, for example, could open up new possibilities for people as the tech revolution advances. Work environments should continue to improve as employees demand more from their space."

How to Implement AI and Machine Learning

The next wave of IT innovation will be powered by artificial intelligence and machine learning. We look at the ways companies can take advantage of it and how to get started.

VIDEO: Trump may bring jobs back to the US, but robots will get them

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Most people are optimistic about workplace automation, social data suggests - ZDNet

It may not be obvious, but the U.S. presidential election offers critical lessons about how policy and technology leaders should think about the future of artificial intelligence. In fact, just days before Donald TrumpDonald TrumpEx-NH GOP chair calls Trump's voter fraud bluff with ,000 bet Assad: Trump's plan for safe zones in Syria 'not a realistic idea' Trump on report that Flynn talked sanctions with Russia: 'I don't know about that' MORE was sworn into office, these lessons were a focus of the Davos meeting of the global elite.

Technology executives expressed concern over a growing fear throughout the world that robots destroy jobs and discussed the possibility of a backlash against innovation. It was this same fear of job loss that has contributed to the recent backlash against trade agreements.

After all, proponents of trade agreements won every argument except one: that trade increases employment. That made killing the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) a central message of candidate Trumps campaign. It was one of the first things President Trump did after taking office.

The opportunity of automation is enormous. Consider that, as autonomous vehicles become the primary means of transportation, accidents will decline by 90 percent, saving lives and billions of dollars. Furthermore, automation will actually return jobs to the United States. One-quarter of the decline in U.S. manufacturing jobs is due to competition from China, driven largely by lower labor costs. But this offshoring is a station on the way to the new globally-competitive automated U.S. factories that are creating good paying jobs for skilled workers.

Of course, computer technology does affect the nature of work. It has eliminated some tasks and lowered demand for some workers. A recent study by McKinsey & Company estimates that almost half of all current tasks are subject to automation, providing fodder for arguments that widespread technological unemployment is near. But the story is more complex. Computers can eliminate all job-required tasks in only 5 percent of occupations, and there will still be plenty of tasks to perform in existing occupations, while many new tasks will be created.

Weve already seen the way automation creates efficiencies that lower production costs, thereby stimulating demand and creating more jobs. Recent history is filled with examples of lowering operating costs. ATM machines led to increased bank teller employment, and cost savings created by robots have actually increased human employment in warehouses. In the overall economy, automation has led to a greater need for non-routine, high-skill work that pays high wages and for low-skill work that pays lower wages.

While all this may be true, the reality is that the world is focused on bridging income divides and spreading economic opportunity. We have a responsibility to make certain that the bounty of automation can benefit everyone.

An important step is to match computers with human skills. On the computer side, this means creating programs that augment human skills. As described by IBM data scientists, humans and machines will need to collaborate to produce better results, each bringing their own superior skills to the partnership.

On the human side, people need to be trained for tasks computers cannot perform. This means prioritizing science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) education. But thats not the only solution. Our computer-intensive work environment is creating high-paying jobs for those with credentialed skills from quality technical schools or training programs. Reauthorizing the career and technical education program with adequate funding will jump-start the programs that can match human skills with the new workplace, which has many unfilled jobs waiting for skilled workers.

Even with these efforts, some workers will not be able to gain the skills needed to flourish. A late-career truck driver without a college education cant be expected to become a coder. For many of these workers, a social safety net is essential, and that net can be supported by the wealth that technology generates. Policy and technology leaders must work together on programs that support the collective good.

Ultimately, technology can continue to create more jobs than it displaces, while driving U.S. economic gains. But the only way to achieve the full measure of this opportunity is to ensure that the benefits are clearly realized by those who see technology as more of a foe than a friend.

Mark M. MacCarthy is senior vice president of public policy at the Software & Information Industry Association. He has been a consultant on technology policy issues for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development and the Aspen Institute. He is an adjunct professor of communication and technology at Georgetown University, where he teaches courses on artificial intelligence and the future of work.

The views of contributors are their own and are not the views of The Hill.

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Yes, there's a job creation argument for automation and technology ... - The Hill (blog)

"Closing the lead to revenue loop and creating a true end-to-end field service management solution is a game changer for us and our customers," said Chris Sullens, president and CEO of WorkWave. "Since acquiring Refgo and ContactUs.com in 2015, we have been hard at work building a set of integrated tools to allow WorkWave customers to tightly manage the sales process, automate marketing and drip email campaigns and to gain full visibility into the growth engine of their businesses. With these tools, WorkWave's PestPac customers can now calculate the true ROI of all marketing campaigns, both offline or online, without the spreadsheet gymnastics and guessing currently required by third party packages today."

WorkWave sees the new release as a way for their clients to effortlessly generate business from customers and prospects. Clients can do this by aligning with customer goals to bring complete and total efficiency to the markets they serve.

"Adding Lead Management and Marketing Automation provides a single vendor solution that eliminates third-party integration headaches for our customers and makes it far easier for them to track and manage key performance metrics across their entire business," said Malcolm Lewis, senior vice president of WorkWave's Marketing Solutions.

View more information about Lead Management at bit.ly/PestPacLM and Marketing Automation at bit.ly/PestPacMA. In conjunction with this release, WorkWave will also be hosting a roadshow series, led by their lead management experts, to demonstrate and consult on the product. Visit workwave.com/events for the future roadshow series schedule.

About WorkWave WorkWave is a fast-growing leader in field service and "last mile" delivery software a $45+ billion market worldwide. The company connects all aspects of its clients' businesses through its tightly integrated, mobile-first suite of software solutions, which include PestPac, WorkWave Service, ServiceCEO, WorkWave Route Manager, WorkWave GPS, WorkWave Marketing and ContactUs. WorkWave's solutions provide its 9,000+ clients with an unprecedented level of business insight and information, enabling them to increase revenue per employee and provide a five-star customer experience. Founded in 1984, WorkWave has been recognized with multiple awards for its outstanding growth and culture, including the Inc. 5000, SmartCEO Future 50, and Best Places to Work in New Jersey. For more information, visit http://www.workwave.com.

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/workwave-releases-new-lead-management-and-marketing-automation-tools-300405597.html

SOURCE WorkWave

http://workwave.com

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WorkWave Releases New Lead Management And Marketing ... - PR Newswire (press release)

Chennai: Over a year back, Kris Canekeratne struck a deal with Arun Jain, founder, Polaris to take over his company with a view to synergise his company Virtusa's tech strength with Polaris' banking expertise. As the integration efforts come to a close, Canekeratne talks to TOI about the progress the joint entity has made, the changes that the IT industry is going through and automation. Excerpts:

Citibank has been one of your largest accounts. How has the relationship progressed since the integration announcement.

When we did the Polaris integration, we had guided to a spend reduction for Citibank. Since then, we have seen good momentum with Citibank. While addressing spend reduction goals, we have also built a much stronger relationship. Citigroup has also seen the benefits of the combined entity, VirtusaPolaris.

The IT industry is facing headwind, not just from macro-economic factors. Can you give some perspective?

There is an evolution taking place in IT services, primarily because of the changes clients are going through as a result of 4th industrial revolution. There are multiple forces at work. Advanced technologies like cloud computing, big data, artificial intelligence and blockchain may have been around but have now reached a point where startups or companies are using them to disrupt the industry. We are also dealing with a much larger percentage of millennials within and outside of our organisations. Digital natives are driving a behavioural shift and everybody else is only a digital immigrant. We can live with and without digital technologies but natives need an advanced user experience. Over the last three years, over $50 billion has been invested towards fin-tech. Significant investment has been pumped into areas like fin-tech, insure-tech, health tech and media tech. What is interesting to note is that none of these factors are based on pure cost arbitrage. For an industry that has largely been built around this cost arbitrage, change is inevitable. Hence, while we are happy, there is significant work to be done

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'We employ insane levels of automation' Kris Canekeratne - Times of India

Kornchanok was one of more than 200 students from five Thai universities who recently took part in a training programme organised by Delta Electronics (Thailand)s Automation Academy, designed to familiarise third- and fourth-year students with the latest technology used in factories.

Besides KMUT North Bangkok, students from Chulongkorn University, Kasetsart University, KMUT Ladkrabang and KMUT Thonburi also participated in the training programme.

An increasing number of automation systems and industrial robots have been used in the automotive, electronics, food-processing and other industries in Thailand over recent years.

According to Kornchanok, automation technology will play a key role in advancing Thai factories towards the so-called Industry 4.0 era, with benefits including increased efficiency and productivity, environmental friendliness and higher national income.

Overall, this Thailand 4.0 modernisation programme is like a national development effort for all stakeholders to join forces to achieve results.

The modernisation will increase the competitiveness of Thai industries as it means we will use more advanced technology in the manufacturing sector to boost efficiency and competitiveness.

Automation and robots should be viewed positively, even though manual labour will be affected because routine and basic work in factories can be better done by robots and automation systems.

As a result, human workers need additional skills so that they can work alongside robots and supervise the machines.

In my opinion, Thailand is now quite ready to adopt more advanced technology, as evidenced by the growing partnership between the government and private sector.

For example, companies like Delta Electronics have helped Thai universities better educate students in the technology field, by providing advanced equipment and personnel to prepare students to use the new technology.

In my opinion, the Thailand 4.0 concept is an important national focus to drive the country forward. Previously, we started out from 1.0, which basically meant the development of the agricultural sector many decades ago. Then it was 2.0, or the era of light industries, and later 3.0, which meant more complicated and heavy industries.

Now, we aspire to use more advanced technology in the manufacturing and other sectors, which could be called the 4.0 era. Industry 4.0 means machines will be more autonomous and interconnected.

In fact, more intelligent machines or industrial robots are similar to humans in the sense that they have power from electricity, have sensors like our eyes, and have controller-software [which is the brain] written by humans.

If the private sector works closely with the government and educational institutes, we will be able to achieve progress in upgrading Thai industries under the Thailand 4.0 programme.

One of the highlights is the automotive industrys move into the era of electric cars, which is considered one of the new growth industries for Thailand, which already has the largest production capacity for automobiles among all Asean countries.

In agriculture, we have also seen more automation for seed planting, watering, and harvesting etc to boost efficiency while reducing manual labour and saving time.

In fact, the digital revolution makes available a huge amount of data on the Internet so we can focus on making sense out of the vast data and create new and innovative things in virtually all sectors.

Link:

Automation 'key' to advancing Thai production - The Nation

The Global Medical Automation Market is poised to grow at a CAGR of around 8.7% over the next decade to reach approximately $75.6 billion by 2025.

This industry report analyzes the global markets for Medical Automation across all the given segments on global as well as regional levels presented in the research scope. The study focuses on market trends, leading players, supply chain trends, technological innovations, key developments, and future strategies.

With comprehensive market assessment across the major geographies such as North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East, Latin America and Rest of the world the report is a valuable asset for the existing players, new entrants and the future investors. Report Highlights:

Companies Mentioned:

Key Topics Covered:

1 Market Outline

2 Executive Summary

3 Market Overview

4 Medical Automation Market, By End User

5 Medical Automation Market, By Application

6 Medical Automation Market, By Geography

7 Leading Companies

For more information about this report visit http://www.researchandmarkets.com/research/dm75rw/global_medical

Media Contact:

Research and Markets Laura Wood, Senior Manager press@researchandmarkets.com

For E.S.T Office Hours Call +1-917-300-0470 For U.S./CAN Toll Free Call +1-800-526-8630 For GMT Office Hours Call +353-1-416-8900

U.S. Fax: 646-607-1907 Fax (outside U.S.): +353-1-481-1716

To view the original version on PR Newswire, visit:http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/global-medical-automation-market-to-reach-approximately-756-billion-by-2025---by-end-user-application--geography---research-and-markets-300405652.html

SOURCE Research and Markets

http://www.researchandmarkets.com

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Global Medical Automation Market to Reach Approximately $75.6 Billion by 2025 - By End User, Application ... - PR Newswire (press release)

Could domestic manufacturing equipment become a hot business if trade barriers suddenly pop up around the world? What happened

Shares of Rockwell Automation (NYSE:ROK) jumped 10.1% in January, according to data provided by S&P Global Market Intelligence, after an impressive earnings report and improved guidance gave investors a bullish outlook on the future.

Fiscal first-quarter 2017 revenue was up 4.5% from a year ago to $1.49 billion, and net income jumped from $185.5 million a year ago to $214.7 million, or $1.65 per share. But it was really full-year guidance that got investors' attention. Management increased growth guidance by a full percentage point, and now expects reported and organic growth of 1% to 5%. On the bottom line, guidance was increased by $0.10 to $5.56 to $5.96 per share.

Image source: Getty Images.

Automation equipment is going to be a key growth driver of efficiency in the economy, and may be even more necessary if trade barriers start going up around the world. When financials start matching up with that bullish investment thesis, it could be a big driver of stocks like Rockwell long-term. I don't think this will suddenly be a double-digit growth company in the near future, but with these tailwinds and a 2% dividend yield, I think Rockwell Automation is a well positioned stock for the economic trends of the next decade.

Travis Hoium has no position in any stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy.

Travis Hoium has been writing for fool.com since July 2010 and covers the solar industry, renewable energy, and gaming stocks among other things.

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Rockwell Automation Surged 10% in January as Growth Picked Up Steam - Motley Fool

When it comes to robots displacing humans from the job market, government bureaucrats are generally not what springs to mind. The recent McKinsey report on the future of jobs estimates the automation potential of administrative jobs at just 39 per cent, far less than the 73 per cent potential for accommodation and food services.

And yet the public sector is one of the biggest potential arenas for such displacement and one in which most people wouldnt mind seeing more automation. The reason its barely happening now is largely, and predictably, an absence of political will.

Since 2013, Oxford University academics Carl Frey and Michael Osborne have done seminal work on automation risks for jobs, quoted by most studies on the subject. Their 2016 work with Craig Holmes and a team of Citibank employees listed some of the most automation-endangered professions:

In some countries, some of the people in these jobs such as postal employees are public sector workers. But government clerks who do predictable, rule-based, often mechanical work also are in danger of displacement by machines.

In a recent collaboration with Deloitte U.K., Profs. Osborne and Frey estimated that about a quarter of public sector workers are employed in administrative and operative roles which have a high probability of automation.

In the U.K., they estimated some 861,000 such jobs could be eliminated by 2030, creating 17 billion pounds (US$21.4 billion) in savings for the taxpayer. These would include people like underground train operators but mainly local government paper pushers.

This week, Reform, the London-based think tank dedicated to improving public service efficiency, published a paper on automating the public sector. It applied methodology developed by Osborne and Frey to the U.K.s central government departments and calculated that almost 132,000 workers could be replaced by machines in the next 10 to 15 years, using currently known automation methods.

Only 20 per cent of government employees do strategic, cognitive work that requires human thinking at least for now, while artificial intelligence is as imperfect as it is. Most of the rest are what the Reform report calls the frozen middle levels of hierarchy where bureaucrats wont budge without approval from above.

Almost all British government departments have 10 employee grades or more. The department for environment, food and rural affairs has 13. Most of the middle-level tasks are routine and rigidly regulated and motivation is low: Only 38 percent of middle-level bureaucrats say they feel good about what they do. In the U.K., the average civil servant takes 8 sick days a year, while a private sector worker takes 5. In the last two decades public sector spending rose by an average 3.1 percent a year, about 16 times faster than productivity.

The Reform report discusses how this frozen middle could be thawed. The general idea is to automate information flows and organize remaining employees into project teams that may not even need to be managed. Thats not necessarily a good idea, though many companies in the tech sector Netflix, GitHub, Zappos work like this: Informal hierarchies that arise in such an environment can be even more stifling than formal ones. But if work creation is not the goal and efficiency is, the optimal organizational forms will suggest themselves as routine tasks are automated away.

Theres also automation potential for so-called front line jobs where bureaucrats interact with the public. Many people dont want any human contact in these situations, most people want less of it, and nobody enjoys dealing with government services.

The U.K. has one of the biggest public sectors in the developed world relative to population because health care is socialized. A third of U.K. residents say theyd like to book doctor appointments online, but fewer than 7 percent actually do it because the service is either inconvenient or unavailable. Brits often complain of long waiting times for doctor appointments, yet at the same time, a private-sector service called Babylon provides instant online contact with doctors for a 5 pound monthly fee. With some ingenuity, which is lacking today, the British National Health Service could have put it out of business.

Perhaps because Frey and Osborne work in the U.K., their kind of analysis hasnt been applied to other countries bureaucracies. It should be applicable almost everywhere, though. Unfortunately, bureaucratic hierarchies are famously resistant to change. To seriously entertain such a major shift in the structure of the labor market, governments will first have to promise training or reskilling for soon-to-be-unemployed bureaucrats. That is likely to be an up-front cost that eats into savings made, at least for a while.

Still, some labor substitution of this kind may be inevitable. Shock events like Donald Trumps arrival in the White House could catalyze the change. When a department is plunged into chaos by a lack of senior appointments or a sudden need to prove that its actually needed, automation is suddenly not suicide but self-preservation.

Bloomberg News

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Robots versus bureaucrats: Why public sector work is ripe for automation - Financial Post

By Michael Cabanatuan, San Francisco Chronicle

Photo: Tony Dejak, Associated Press

New legislationwould allow San Francisco and San Jose to install cameras that detect when someone is speeding and ensure that a ticket is issued.

New legislationwould allow San Francisco and San Jose to install cameras that detect when someone is speeding and ensure that a ticket is issued.

In addition to hours spent in traffic, NerdWallet considered days of precipitation, gas prices, insurance premiums, parking available and likelihood of getting into an accident.

The study indicates San Francisco is pretty hard on drivers. Check out where it lands among the top 10 and why. less

In addition to hours spent in traffic, NerdWallet considered days of precipitation, gas prices, insurance premiums, parking available ... more

New Yorkers spend $1,614.71 per year on car insurance - $500 more than the national average. They also spend 59 hours a year in traffic delays. However, the city's extensive rail system, bike sharing and other amenities help take the pressure off the already-jammed roads. less

New Yorkers spend $1,614.71 per year on car insurance - $500 more than the national average. They also spend 59 hours a year in traffic delays. However, the city's extensive rail system, bike ... more

Detroit has the least parking availability and highest car insurance prices in America, with .49 parking lots or garages per 1,000 commuters and an egregious $4,924.99 insurance premium - that's 3 1/2 times more than the average American's insurance costs. NerdWallet credits Detroit's high car theft rate as part of the reason for the expensive insurance. less

Detroit has the least parking availability and highest car insurance prices in America, with .49 parking lots or garages per 1,000 commuters and an egregious $4,924.99 insurance premium - ... more

NerdWallet blames Seattle's bad traffic on the weather. But they back it up with stats: In 2012, Seattle saw 150 days of rain, which causes hazardous road conditions and poor visibility. That's 40 more rainy days than the national average. We also spend 48 hours per year stuck in traffic, which is 46 percent more than the national average.

less

NerdWallet blames Seattle's bad traffic on the weather. But they back it up with stats: In 2012, Seattle saw 150 days of rain, which causes hazardous road conditions and poor visibility. That's 40 ... more

Here, drivers are 61.2 percent more likely to get into a traffic crash than the average American driver and the gas prices are 16 cents more per gallon than the national average.

Here, drivers are 61.2 percent more likely to get into a traffic crash than the average American driver and the gas prices are 16 cents more per gallon than the national average.

Chicago sees the most regularly torrential weather of the cities in the top 10 and its gas prices are the highest of the 25 worst cities for drivers with $4.16 per gallon.

Chicago sees the most regularly torrential weather of the cities in the top 10 and its gas prices are the highest of the 25 worst cities for drivers with $4.16 per gallon.

Miami drivers pay $1,750.10 per year in car insurance, which is 59 percent higher than the national average. There are also only .77 parking garages or lots per 1,000 commuters.

Miami drivers pay $1,750.10 per year in car insurance, which is 59 percent higher than the national average. There are also only .77 parking garages or lots per 1,000 commuters.

Los Angeles drivers suffer 61 hours of delays each year and 55.1 percent of the population travels during peak hours. Drivers also pay an average $4.01 per gallon for gas.

Los Angeles drivers suffer 61 hours of delays each year and 55.1 percent of the population travels during peak hours. Drivers also pay an average $4.01 per gallon for gas.

But, hey, at least they're not in Washington, D.C., where drivers spend 67 hours per year stuck in traffic - the most in the United States. Drivers in the nation's capital are also 97.3 percent more likely to get into a crash than the average driver. less

But, hey, at least they're not in Washington, D.C., where drivers spend 67 hours per year stuck in traffic - the most in the United States. Drivers in the nation's capital are also 97.3 ... more

But that isn't as bad as Boston, where drivers are 129.9 percent more likely than the average driver to wreck the car. Drivers here spend 53 hours per year in traffic. Good thing one-third of commuters use public transportation, but apparently that's not enough. less

But that isn't as bad as Boston, where drivers are 129.9 percent more likely than the average driver to wreck the car. Drivers here spend 53 hours per year in traffic. Good thing one-third of commuters ... more

Speeders beware: Legislation would allow automation crackdown

Aiming to get drivers to hit the brakes, San Francisco Assemblyman David Chiu introduced legislation Wednesday that would allow San Francisco and San Jose to install cameras that detect when someone is speeding and ensure that a ticket is issued.

Chiu made the announcement at a news conference in the lobby of San Francisco General Hospital, where five victims of car collisions are treated daily.

Speeding is the leading cause of pedestrian fatalities in the two cities, supporters said, and slowing traffic saves lives. While cameras at controlled intersections that detect red-light runners are legal in California, cameras that nab speeders are not.

If San Francisco had automated speed enforcement, the driver might not have been going so fast and my mother might not have been so seriously injured, said Jenny Yu, whose mother, Judy Szeto Yuen Man Yu, was struck by a car in the Richmond District. She suffered broken bones as well as brain damage that left her with multiple personalities and in need of constant care.

This crash took away moms ability to live a normal life. said Jenny Yu, who attended Chius news conference.

Also attending were other families of people killed or severely injured when they were hit by cars, Mayors Ed Lee of San Francisco and Sam Liccardo of San Jose, and transportation and health officials along with San Francisco Police Chief William Scott.

The legislation calls for a five-year trial. It would authorize the use of automated devices that measure speeds and trigger cameras that capture images of speeding cars and their license plates. Owners of cars found exceeding the speed limit by at least 10 miles per hour would then be mailed citations of no more than $100, including court fees.

Cameras would be placed on posts along some of the cities deadliest streets, focusing on areas where speeding is common. In San Francisco, those streets include stretches of Market Street and Geary Boulevard, said Paul Rose, a spokesman for the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency.

Traffic signs would be put in place warning drivers that speed cameras lurk ahead, and for the first 30 days after cameras are installed, drivers would be mailed warning tickets that do not include a fine.

Scott said the speed cameras are not an attempt to raise money, a complaint critics are sure to voice.

Lets be clear: Our goal is to save lives not write tickets, the police chief said.

But what will drivers think? Those interviewed at a South of Market gas station had a variety of thoughts.

Eeeeeew. I dont think thats good, said Jermaine Scott, 38, a San Francisco delivery driver who lives in Richmond. Thats real sneaky. But it could save lots of lives around here. This place has become a danger zone for pedestrians.

Proponents say automated speed enforcement has slowed drivers and deaths from traffic collisions by impressive amounts: a 53 percent reduction in deaths in Portland, Ore., a 31 percent decline in speeding in Chicago, and a 13.4 percent decrease in injury accidents near cameras in New York.

Some motorists, however, worried that cameras wont give drivers the benefit of the doubt and wont understand that they might have accelerated to avoid an erratic driver or a double-parked truck, or in advance of a hill.

Speed enforcement is a human job, Taj Turner, 36, a San Francisco salesman who lives in Oakland, said. I think its a horrible idea, especially in a city where a lot of people dont drive. Theyd be hurting Uber and Lyft and taxis, people who are just trying to make a living.

The legislation is sure to face opposition in Sacramento. Past efforts have stalled in the Legislature after criticism from the American Automobile Association and the trucking industry. Chiu said he hopes to persuade those groups to at least stay neutral.

Michael Cabanatuan is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: mcabanatuan@sfchronicle.com

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Speeders beware: Legislation would allow automation crackdown ... - SFGate

Wednesday, February 8, 2017

Were currently at 4.9percent unemployment, and its only because machines are not smart or cheap enough to replace us.

The motto of entrepreneurship incubators is disrupt your industry, which really means introduce technology to an established industry. Uber decimated taxis and public transportation, Amazon Now brought two-hour delivery to large metropolitan areas and Google is advancing its machine learning algorithms along with its consumer AI.

So far, these services have managed to improve our quality of life without negative impacts to our economy. However, the systems, infrastructure and technology that power these services are still in their infancy. Our economy is about to experience a change as dramatic as the industrial revolution.

Automation has been threatening to take our jobs since the cotton gin. And it has, but new, better jobs have come along. When agriculture was automated, our economy changed. No longer was it necessary to have 40percentof our workforce performing manual labor.

This freed up the necessary workforce to allow the industrial revolution to take off and manufacturing jobs took over as the American employer.

The industrial revolution was also a technological revolution. It allowed automation to build cars, air conditioners, or any product significantly cheaper while requiring less human involvement.

The economy adjusted. As these middle-class manufacturing jobs left our economy, we attempted to adjust. However, our middle class has suffered and continues to be in decline.

How long before automation takes a more significant role in our economy and lives?

Uber has become the ubiquitous transportation application. Since Ubers pricing became competitive its garnered more customers,and its service has become significantly more convenient. What most dont know is that Uber operates at a loss.

Every year, the company loses money but continues to be the most popular transportation app with no signs of slowing down. The long-term business plan isnt eventually paying drivers less; its eventually not paying them at all.

Uber is banking on self-driving cars to become commercially available in the next few years. An entire fleet of cars that need no sleep, are constantly available and run on electricity.

Retail companies havemade their logistical processes as automated and intelligent as possible. Amazon Now and Amazon GO are services that are recent, andboth function to connect a costumer to a product as quickly and as easily as possible.

Amazon Now is a two-hour delivery service, and its amazing. You can order 80percent of your grocery needs, anXbox controller and batteries and have them delivered to your door two hours later.

Amazons logistics process is the most advanced in the world, meaning that its the most automated. Amazon GO is a brick-and-mortar store that doesnt need cashiers. When a customer walks in, they scan their phone, grab the food they want and walk out.

Depending on their logistics process, Amazon might even have machines stocking the shelves as well.

Machine learning is the software side of automation. Google has been working on a project called Deepmind. Thissoftware learns any task by running billions of simulations, adjusting the variables its allowed, and without instructions, quickly learning the most effective ways to accomplish its goal.

This process allows it to approach problems in ways humans would never think of. Its most recent accomplishment is winning a game of GO, against the best player in the world. A step above Chess (as its believed you need a sense of intuition to win).

These systems can be taught to program, write papers and design complex structures, as well as take restaurant orders, provide better automated customer service, do research and design better versions of themselves.

Machine learning software can learn to write news articles by reading millions ofreports to understand human writing patterns. It will be able to quickly draft summaries for press conferences and speeches. Bias can even be programmed in.

Innovation and automation are an unavoidable future. Profit drives innovation, and no matter what the effect it has on the middle class, companies will not stop automating processes.

Our politicians are concerned with coal and manufacturing jobs that are already obsolete and fail to see the future thats looming.

Our economy is not prepared for a future in whichthe unemployment rateis constantly high or a people no longer need to work 40-hour weeks. Companies will continue to reduce overhead by cutting away the inefficient, prone to error fat that hinders profits.

Since machines run pretty lean, the only fat I see is us.

Hugo Salinas is a MIS senior and aregularcontributor to Cooglifemagazine. He can be reached atopinion@thedailycougar.com

Tags: Amazon GO, automation, Uber

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Automation is the unavoidable future of the economy - The Daily Cougar

Women need to be more aware of the effect automation will have on women further down the ladder, said EYs Uschi Schreiber. Photograph: Colin Anderson/Getty Images

A few months ago I was in LA on my way to a meeting. Having realised that everyone there has a side project, I got chatting to my Uber driver about what he does when he isnt working for the car-sharing app. He told me he was just about to make the final payment on his own Tesla driverless car. This was going to be the first in a fleet because he believed his days as an Uber driver were numbered.

Hed realised something important: the automation of jobs is coming faster than any of us are ready for and it presents both opportunities and losses. No longer restricted to actually having to be in the car in order to make money, this particular Uber driver had found a way to exponentially increase his income, while others might find themselves out of a job.

Depending on which study you look at, automation will affect between 47% and 80% (pdf) of all jobs in the US. Yet most of us believe our own jobs wont be affected. The bad news is they almost certainly will be in some way, and the worse news is that if youre a woman the impact is going to be greater.

As automation increases and men come to dominate the workplace even more, women are going to keep losing out

A recent report from the World Economic Forum (WEF), argues the automation of jobs is going to cause a particular problem for women in the technology industry. As certain industries begin to decline such as administration, healthcare and financial services others will increase. More roles will be created in the technology sector in particular.

This should be good news for women more jobs should mean more employment opportunities. But the problem comes when you look at the disparity between men and women entering the sector. Because men outnumber women in tech, the increase of jobs wont automatically mean more women get hired. In fact, the report argues that for every five female job losses there will be one job created. For men, there will be one job created for every three lost. So the gender gap in the workplace will actually increase rather than decrease.

We already know that unconscious bias leads to greater numbers of men (pdf) in senior roles. One way of changing this is to even out the numbers. But as automation increases and men come to dominate the workplace even more, women are going to keep losing out.

There is some good news, however. The WEF report suggested that the number of women in senior roles will increase in the coming years by 12%. Its not a huge number but its something.

At the EY Women in Leadership summit in 2016, Uschi Schreiber, EY global vice chair of markets and chair of the global accounts committee, spoke of the need for senior women to be more aware of the effect automation would have on women further down the ladder. We might say this is something wed never ask of men, but the reality is that redundancy programmes often hit women harder.

Earlier in 2017 the UK government announced that there needed to be a proper investigation into why pregnant women and mothers were at higher risk of redundancy. The reality is its because thats the way its always been, and unless senior women challenge this attitude thats the way it will always be. Automation might provide opportunities for some but the risks for women are huge, so we need to look out for each other.

Looking for a job? Browse Guardian Jobs or sign up to Guardian Careers for the latest job vacancies and career advice

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Women need to look out for each other in automated workplaces - The Guardian

If you're wondering how talk in Washington, D.C., about the H-1B visa program is going to affect the software industry, you're not alone. Although nothing is settled or clear, Patrick Heffernan, a practice manager at Technology Business Research and a former diplomat, predicted automation is going to be a bigger disruptor than any changes in the law.

The H-1B visa program allows workers from other countries to be employed in the United States for a set period of time. And although it has always been surrounded by at least some controversy, it's widely used by many high-tech companies in hard-to-fill jobs. As part of a re-examination of immigration, officials in the White House have said they plan to look at the H-1B visa program. According to published reports, executives in several large Silicon Valley companies are very unhappy about the possibility.

But that doesn't mean employers aren't already in the process of making changes that might make this less painful than it might have been, Heffernan said. Most of the larger companies with employees on an H-1B visa have already been working on streamlining their processes -- through automation and the cloud -- with the net result that they should need fewer people.

Heffernan pointed to Accenture as a company employing a lot of folks with H-1B visas, but that is also aggressively working on automation. The result, Heffernan predicted, is any changes aren't going to hurt as much, or for as long. "Automation is going to partly kill off the need to have as many jobs back in India," he said. Companies are realizing "they need people here to get the training and experience, and [to] stay here and work."

But if you're in the industry and have H-1B employees, how is it feeling? TechTarget asked a number of companies for comment. Many declined, but three shared their experiences.

Software lifecycle integration company Tasktop operates around the world and has used the H-1B visa program in the past, according to Neelan Choksi, COO and president at the company, based in Vancouver, B.C.

"Our U.S. operation has relied on the H-1B visa program in the past to fill specific roles where we've struggled to find suitable U.S. candidates. In addition, we had plans to further use the program in the current year," Choksi said. "Any changes to the program that impacts already issued H-1B visas or makes it harder to obtain new visas will result in our U.S.-based operations being impacted negatively.

These visas are invaluable for finding unique skill sets. Justin BarneyCEO, ScaleArc

"Based on previous challenges we've faced in recruiting for certain positions, we may end up having to hire in Canada, rather than filling those positions again in the U.S.," he continued. "The demand for talent in the technology sector is so great at present and the competition for qualified individuals so intense that some of our open positions have been left unfilled for long periods of time."

As far as a backup plan goes, "the H-1B program is not something we rely on, other than where all options have been exhausted. However, without this option, should we find ourselves unable to fill a position in a timely manner, we may end up defaulting to trying to hire those positions outside of the U.S."

ScaleArc, which makes database load balancing software and is based in Santa Clara, Calif., has also used H-1B employees, according to CEO Justin Barney.

"We appreciate the value of H-1B visas and have leveraged them to grow our talent base," Barney said. "We have both transferred employees who originally came over on another company's H-1B and sought and been granted new H-1B visas for overseas employees. These visas are invaluable for finding unique skill sets."

What's ScaleArc's backup plan? "We also use L-1B visas. The advantage for the employees is that their spouse can work in the U.S. The disadvantage, of course, is that it's not transferable to another company."

Flash storage array vendor Tegile employs engineers with H-1B visas in its headquarters in Newark, Calif., according to CEO Rohit Kshetrapal.

"It will start affecting us in slightly different ways along the path here. A big part of this is H1 visas and green cards," Kshetrapal said. "So, while this doesn't affect us, the next one will, and the one beyond that will. Go to any tech company and you will see a lot of H1 visas. We have engineers in India that have a desire to move here. To us, it's about meritocracy, and that's what the United States is about."

This story includes reporting from executive editor Jan Stafford, news director James Montgomery and editorial director Dave Raffo.

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Electric-powered Chevrolet Bolts in Cruise Automations San Francisco garage. PHOTOGRAPH BY ART STREIBER

Cruise Automation, a division of General Motors that makes autonomous car technology, has developed a mobile app to request rides in self-driving Chevrolet Bolt EVs.

The app is being used by Cruise employees on a test basis to request a ride in an autonomous Bolt EV from their home to the company's office in San Francisco. The test program was started a few months ago, according to a GM spokesman.

Information about the app was shared by Cruise Automation CEO Kyle Vogt in emailed statement that was released Wednesday along with a new video showing one of its autonomous vehicles successfully navigating the Potrero and Mission neighborhoods in San Francisco. This is the second video that the normally secretive unit, acquired by GM last year for $1 billion, has shared in the past month of its self-driving car exploits.

The video was captured from one of Cruise Automation's autonomous vehicles (this particular one is named Albatross) during a series of back-to-back test rides, according to Vogt. There was no additional planning involved in rides beyond what is typical, and the video was captured in a single take, he said.

More from Vogt:

The operator selected a random destination using the Cruise mobile app, pushed a button, and the vehicle started moving. Rides like this occur hundreds of times per day across our test fleets.

The video, posted below, is compressed to show a 23-minute tour that includes pedestrians, cyclists, and at least one car cutting in front of the self-driving vehicle as well as a combination of traffic lights, stop signs, and a construction zone . In other words, a complex environment.

The company's overall fleet for self-driving cars is growing, according to GM. In October, there were 30 self-driving cars in the company's fleet. Now there are more than 40 vehicles, which are being testing in San Francisco, Scottsdale, Ariz., and Detroit. In San Francisco, there are 25 autonomous vehicles being tested on public roads, according to GM spokesman Kevin Kelly.

General Motors has been more public and aggressive with its autonomous car ambitions in the past 18 months. The automaker announced a number of new initiatives last year that highlight its interest in self-driving cars and unconventional transportation options popularized by a new wave of startups, including a partnership and $500 million investment in ride-hailing startup Lyft, the creation of an engineering team dedicated to autonomous driving , and its acquisition of Cruise Automation .

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Cruise Automation Is Testing an App For Hailing Self-Driving Cars - Fortune

By Patrick Burnson, Executive Editor February 7, 2017

In a new manufacturing outlook report focusing on the automotive and industrial sectors, AlixPartners observes that many of the labor-cost advantages associated with near-shoring may be lost if companies fail to spend more on automation in the future.

The consultancy notes that automation capabilities have improved dramatically, and implementation expenses have come down. As a consequence this kind of technology can help manufacturers augmentor entirely replace functions previously performed entirely by humans.

To exploit those technologies, manufacturers will likely have to make capital-intensive investments, says Foster Finley, a managing director at AlixPartners in New York. But they should understand, too, that automation cannot replace a human workforce.

Instead, adds Finley, automation shifts the focus to a new set of critical skills.

As automation technology becomes more available and more affordable, companies will have to adopt longer-term views on developing and retaining talent aligned with the tactical use of robotics, he says.

The survey, which polled manufacturing and distribution companies in the U.S. and Western Europe, finds that 69% of respondents believe near shoring is a possible opportunity to meet demand from consumers, up from 40% in last years survey.

This increase in near shoring has led to labor challenges, however says Finley. Many respondents are having a hard time filling roles like product engineers and frontline supervisors.

Along with these labor issues, two-thirds of respondents said they plan to invest significantly in automation technologies.

So what we may expect is more spend in human resources with higher salaries and other incentives, at the same time companies will place greater reliance on technology.

Researchers note that automotive and electronics manufacturers have been the biggest adopters of automation technology thus far. But companies in other sectorssuch as pharmaceuticals, instrumentation and measurement devices, medical equipment, and pulp and paper will likely begin to shift more of their manufacturing capacity to robots in the coming years.

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AlixPartners examines automation in manufacturing and logistics management - Logistics Management