Daily Archives: February 12, 2017

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

posted at 8:31 pm on February 11, 2017 by John Sexton

Thursday, Bloomberg published an article titled Machines Can Replace Millions of Bureaucrats which offers some amusing insights into what the future of bureaucracy might look like. The story is largely based on the work of two Oxford academics,Carl Frey and Michael Osborne, who have been studying the likelihood of various jobs being automated. What they found is that some of the jobs which are ideal for automation are government jobs:

Government clerks who do predictable, rule-based, often mechanical work also arein danger of displacement by machines. In a recentcollaborationwith 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 ($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 percent of government employeesdo strategic, cognitive work that requires human thinking at least for now, while artificial intelligence is as imperfect as it is.

The article goes on to say that in the UK there are 10 levels of government service, similar to the 14 GS levels here in the U.S. In the UK many of the people in those middle levels are doing routine, rule-based tasks that could potentially be turned over to machines. Bloomberg notes, Only 38 percent of middle-level bureaucrats say they feel good about what they do. If 132,000 bureaucrats could be eliminated in the UK, the number that could be done away with in the U.S., where the population is five times larger, couldapproach half a million. Plus, the robots wont unionize and send campaign cash to one political party.

In addition to replacing mid-level bureaucrats, there is also the possibility of using automation for jobs where bureaucrats interact directly with people. This wouldnt necessarily look like a scene from a dystopian science fiction movie. It might look more like the automated kiosks in airports that print your boarding passes. Banks in the U.S. are also expanding the use of automation to replace tellers. At my Bank of America branch there are now specialized kiosks inside the building which look like ATMs but with phones attached. These machines allow you to do almost anything you can do with a human teller but the human in this case is speaking to you by phone from a remote location. Presumably having a central location which can respond to requests from multiple banks is more efficient than staffing each branch with enough people to handle a rush of customers.

When you think about it, airports, banks, grocery stores and even some fast food places are offering automation to replace basic tasks but government offices often seem stuck in the 1950s. That needs to change. Automation can save taxpayers money and, very likely, make the experience of interacting with bureaucrats less tiresome than it is now. It wouldnt have to look like this scene from Neil Blomkamps Elysium:

Link:

Automation can replace bureaucrats and save taxpayers money - Hot Air

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

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