Daily Archives: March 27, 2017

Steve Mnuchin takes the automated stairs. Photo: Getty

Steve Mnuchin, the genius behind Suicide Squad and our nations treasury secretary, isnt worried about artificial intelligence or automation. Its not even on his radar, so just relax.

On Friday, Mnuchin sat down with Axios Mike Allen to talk about a wide range of issues including the strength of the dollar, tax reform, and Donald Trumps perfect genes. At one point, they got around to addressing the topic of American jobs being replaced by technology. Heres what they said in video and text form:

We had an Axios event the other day with Mark Cuban who was very focused on artificial intelligence and how that was going to affect the workforce, Allen said. Whats your take on that?

I think that is so far in the future, in terms of artificial intelligence taking over American jobs, I think were, like, so far away from that, thats, uh... not even on my radar screen. Mnuchin nervously said with a tight smile.

How far away, Allen pressed.

Far enough that its...(guffaws with laughter) Mnuchin trailed off.

Seven more years? Allen tried to help.

Seven more years, Mnuchin balked. I think its 50 to 100 more years.

And with that, Mnuchin showed himself to be completely uninformed or just a bald-faced liar. Jobs in the United States are already being taken over by automation. After all, his boss, Trump, famously crowed about his brilliant deal to save manufacturing jobs at Carrier. That deal effectively amounted to taxpayers subsidizing the automation of the factory and temporarily hanging on to some of the workers until upgrades are complete.

According to a study by the Center for Business and Economic Research at Ball State University, 5.6 million manufacturing jobs were lost in the U.S. between 2000 and 2010. An estimated 85 percent of those lost jobs were actually attributable to technological change largely automation.

So, technology and automation have already had a big impact on American employment but what about the future? Accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP recently estimated that 38% of US jobs are at a high risk of automation by the early 2030's. Without giving a set number of years, Oxford Universitys Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael A. Osborne published a paper in 2013 that estimated 47% of American jobs are at high-risk of being replaced by machines. They isolated 702 different occupations that will likely be automated.

People who actually have a clue about whats going on were appalled. Mark Cuban, the impetus of the question, simply tweeted Wow. And thats really all that needs to be said. But why stop there? Larry Irving, a former Clinton Administration official who now works in the tech sector, tweeted, This actually is kind of frightening. And DJ Patil, former U.S. Chief Data Scientist, suggested that Mnuchin should take a look at the White House AI report published under the Obama administration.

In the same interview, Mnuchin claimed that Trump has stopped eating McDonalds. Maybe the two of them should actually stop into the fast food restaurant and take advantage of the convenient automated checkout.

[Axios via Business Insider]

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LOL, the Treasury Secretary Says Automation of Jobs Is "50-100 More Years" Away - Gizmodo

What makes your work valuable?

Does it fulfill you? Allow you to connect with or help people? Contribute to a greater good?

Or does its value come from your income, which allows you to do other meaningful things?

You probably know someone who has a bullshit job. Maybe you have one yourself. Anthropologist David Graeber estimates 20 to 30 percent of the workforce feels their jobs are meaningless, and hes calling for an end to the era of bullshit jobs.

Graebers call to overhaul how we think about work introduces a twist to the ongoing debate about automation. Computers and robots are taking over more jobs, and in the process theyre rendering human employees obsolete. But what if large-scale automation is just the push we need to take our concept of work in a new direction?

Graeber urges us to think about what we consider valuable in work to begin with, and he examines how our ideology of work has evolved over time.

In the 19th century, he says, there was an industrial-based labor theory of value. Men worked in factories to produce physical goods, and their work was valuable because of those goods. Male muscle and sweat got things done, and thus became the paradigm for all work.

Obviously, though, theres value in work by males that doesnt involve sweat and muscle, not to mention work by females. In the 20th century, the labor theory of value was replaced by the idea that productivity comes from entrepreneurs. People have ideas, and with those ideas they invent products or services that make our lives easier.

But then our lives got easier to the point where many of us can sit at a desk all day rather than work in a factory. If were not producing physical goods, and were not inventing a new product or service, what makes our work valuable?

We decided work is valuable in itself. It gives us the satisfaction of earning a living. Its a good feeling seeing that bimonthly check hit your bank account and knowing you worked for it, isnt it? Work builds character, makes us stronger and more well-rounded, no matter what it is were doing.

In fact, Graeber argues, bullshit jobs actually became a virtue; they require more discipline since theyre not interesting or enjoyable. And thats where we are now: we value meaningless jobs for their very meaninglessness.

But what does it do to our morality and motivation to feel that eight hours of our time each day goes down the drain? Meanwhile jobs that do give people satisfaction, like those involving caring for others, are often poorly paid.

Graeber says, We are at the brink of a re-formulation of what work is and what is valuable about it. It could lead to a reformulation of how we organize everything.

So maybe the specter of automation is coming at the right time, and it wont be as bad as people fear. What if, instead of phasing out all human work, automation just gets rid of the mindless, boring jobs?

Even if thats the case, though, it wont mean well all end up with fulfilling, well-paid work. Each of us has a different set of abilities and interests; not everyones cut out to be a doctor, lawyer, or entrepreneur (nor does a society need more than a given number of these). Similarly, if mindless work is taken over by machines, not every displaced employee will become an artist, musician, or inventor.

Experts have predicted that at least some portion of the time and energy freed up by automation will be channeled into innovation, creativity, and diversification of interests.

Its yet to be seen what the economic structure of such a society will look like, as well as how motivation and incentives will be affected. If we have the opportunity to eliminate bullshit jobs and find out, we should probably take it.

Image Credit: The Royal Society of Arts

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Automation Could End Meaningless JobsAnd None Too Soon - Singularity Hub

Nearly 40 percent of jobs in the U.S. may be vulnerable to replacement by robots in the next fifteen years, according to a new study by the research firm PwC.

Other major advanced economies have fewer jobs at risk. The study estimates that 30 percent of jobs in the United Kingdom could be threatened by technical advancements in automation from AI and robotics, compared to 35 percent in Germany and 21 percent in Japan.

The U.S. has a higher percentage of jobs under threat by automation because more workers in the U.S. are employed in positions that require routinized tasks, like filling out paperwork.

Jobs most at risk of being done by new technologies are in industries related to transportation, manufacturing and retail.

To arrive at these estimates, PwC broke down the types of tasks of various jobs in different industries. The researchers then applied an algorithm that took into account the automatability of those tasks and characteristics of the workers employed to do them.

One example of how jobs in the U.S. may be more susceptible to automation than jobs in the U.K., according to the study, is in the financial services sector. Although both countries have similarly service-dominated economies, financial services jobs in the U.S. are more retail oriented and routinized. Jobs in financial services in the U.K., however, are mostly occupied by professionals working in international banking, whose jobs are harder to automate and require more education.

More of Germanys workforce is employed in manufacturing than the U.K., which are the types of jobs that could one day be done by robots, according to the report, accounting for its higher percentage of jobs that may potentially be automated.

In Japan, the low percentage of jobs at risk to automation compared to the other major economies examined in the study may, in part, have to do with the fact that jobs that are highly automatable in other countries are historically less so in Japan. Retail, for example, requires more training and skills in Japan, where workers have more management and organizing tasks, than similar jobs in the other countries studied, the report notes. (Japan also already utilizes a significant amount of automation, such as vending machines at fast-food restaurants that often handle the job of a cashier.)

The researchers point to a few policy interventions that might be explored to address the effects of broad job loss due to automation, like workforce re-training programs or universal basic income schemes.

But new policies require government action, and in the U.S. where job loss to automation may reach 38 percent by the 2030s, according to the study the Trump administration doesnt seem immediately concerned.

At an event with Axios Friday morning, Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin said that job loss to technical advancements in AI and robotics isnt even on their radar screen and that he imagines these changes are more like 50 to 100 more years away.

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The US will be hit worse by job automation than other major economies - Recode

Automation is the new norm across sectors and will affect the bottom of pyramid so much so that four out of every 10 jobs globally would be lost due to this by 2021, experts say.

Automation is the new normal in sectors like engineering, manufacturing, automobiles, IT and banking. As automation adoption increases, all high transaction and labour intensive jobs will take a hit.

According to PeopleStrong CEO and Founder Pankaj Bansal, there will be a visible change in the next 3-4 years, first major effects will be seen in the sectors like manufacturing, IT and ITeS and security services and agriculture.

"We predict that by 2021, 4 out of every 10 jobs globally would be lost because of automation. And of these, one in every 4 will be from India. That sums up to 23 per cent of job loss in India," Bansal said.

India produces 5.5 million jobs (across levels) every year, but this number falls short of jobs needed to employ available talent and automation is further increasing the gap.

"If five years ago, there were 1,500 jobs in the assembly line, it has been reduced to 500 jobs now as focus has moved away from skilling to automation," said Francis Padamadan, Country Director KellyOCG India, a talent management solutions provider.

Experts said low skill and high transaction jobs will be affected as automation takes away their jobs. Hiring for short term projects, flexi hiring would be the way forward in these areas for roles that cannot be automated.

To cater to this fallout, government needs to focus on two key areas strengthening the mid-market segment and reskilling the workforce to take up new jobs which will emerge post automation, PeopleStrong's Bansal said.

KellyOCG India's Padamadan believes "automation will not take away all the jobs because you still need someone to build and monitor the robots. So, while jobs mostly at the bottom of pyramid will be affected, new jobs will get added".

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4 out of 10 jobs would be lost to automation by 2021 - Business Standard