technological unemployment
In plain wordsJoblessness caused by machines or software taking over work that people used to be paid for, faster than new kinds of work appear for them.
Unemployment caused by technical change that reduces demand for human labor in particular tasks or occupations faster than the economy creates demand elsewhere. Economists, following Daron Acemoglu and Pascual Restrepo, set the displacement effect (machines taking over tasks) against offsetting forces: productivity effects (cheaper goods raising demand), reinstatement (new tasks in which people have an advantage) and shifts toward other sectors. Historically these offsets have kept long-run employment high, though transitions were often painful and displaced groups lost income. Whether AI breaks the pattern is disputed: some argue that systems able to perform most cognitive tasks, and later physical ones through robotics, could reduce labor demand permanently; others expect a familiar, if faster, reallocation. Studies of task exposuretask exposure, n.: A measure of how much of a job's work AI could, in principle, do or speed up. High exposure means many of the job's tasks are within AI's reach, not that the job will vanish. estimate which jobs are most affected, and policy debate covers retraining, wage insurance and universal basic incomeuniversal basic income, n.: A regular cash payment from the government to every adult, with no conditions attached, sometimes proposed as a way to share wealth if AI takes over much paid work..
The study found little technological unemployment so far, but sharply lower hiring of junior staff in exposed occupations.
Origin
Popularized by John Maynard Keynes in 'Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren' (1930), which described it as a new disease readers would hear much more of; the worry goes back to David Ricardo's chapter 'On Machinery' (1821) and the LudditeLuddite, n.: Originally one of the English textile workers who smashed machines in protest in the 1810s; now anyone who opposes new technology, often used as an insult against AI skeptics. protests. Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael Osborne's 2013 estimate that 47% of US jobs were at high risk of computerization revived the debate.
Usage note
The lump-of-labor fallacy, the assumption that there is a fixed amount of work to go round, is the classic objection to simple job-loss arithmetic; it does not, however, show that displaced workers will find comparable jobs.
Related
- automationautomation, n.: Using machines or software to do work that people would otherwise do, from factory robots to programs that sort email or write reports.
- task exposuretask exposure, n.: A measure of how much of a job's work AI could, in principle, do or speed up. High exposure means many of the job's tasks are within AI's reach, not that the job will vanish.
- augmentationaugmentation, n.: Using AI to help people do their work better or faster while they stay in charge, instead of having the AI do the job on its own.
- LudditeLuddite, n.: Originally one of the English textile workers who smashed machines in protest in the 1810s; now anyone who opposes new technology, often used as an insult against AI skeptics.
- general-purpose technologygeneral-purpose technology, n.: A technology, like electricity or the computer, that spreads through the whole economy, keeps improving and sparks many other inventions. Many economists think AI is one.
- universal basic incomeuniversal basic income, n.: A regular cash payment from the government to every adult, with no conditions attached, sometimes proposed as a way to share wealth if AI takes over much paid work.
- intelligence curseintelligence curse, n.: The worry that once AI can do most jobs, governments and companies will no longer need ordinary people and so will stop looking after them, like oil-rich states that neglect their citizens.
- augmentationaugmentation, n.: Using AI to help people do their work better or faster while they stay in charge, instead of having the AI do the job on its own.
Sources
- Keynes, J. M. (1930). Economic Possibilities for our Grandchildren. The Nation and Athenaeum.
- Frey, C. B. & Osborne, M. A. (2017). The future of employment: How susceptible are jobs to computerisation? Technological Forecasting and Social Change 114, 254–280.
- Acemoglu, D. & Restrepo, P. (2019). Automation and New Tasks: How Technology Displaces and Reinstates Labor. Journal of Economic Perspectives 33(2), 3–30.
Mentioned in
AI riskAI risk, n.: The ways AI could cause harm: people misusing it on purpose, systems behaving in ways nobody intended, and slower effects on jobs, power and society that no single person causes., automationautomation, n.: Using machines or software to do work that people would otherwise do, from factory robots to programs that sort email or write reports., GDPvalGDPval, prop. n.: An OpenAI test that pits AI against seasoned professionals on genuine workplace assignments, from reports and spreadsheets to slide decks, in 44 occupations important to the US economy., general-purpose technologygeneral-purpose technology, n.: A technology, like electricity or the computer, that spreads through the whole economy, keeps improving and sparks many other inventions. Many economists think AI is one., gradual disempowermentgradual disempowerment, n.: The risk that, as AI does more and more of the work people now do, humanity slowly loses its grip on business, government and culture, until it no longer steers its own future., LudditeLuddite, n.: Originally one of the English textile workers who smashed machines in protest in the 1810s; now anyone who opposes new technology, often used as an insult against AI skeptics., Norbert WienerNorbert Wiener, prop. n.: An American mathematician who founded cybernetics, the study of feedback and control in animals and machines, and warned early that machines might pursue goals we did not truly intend., task exposuretask exposure, n.: A measure of how much of a job's work AI could, in principle, do or speed up. High exposure means many of the job's tasks are within AI's reach, not that the job will vanish., universal basic incomeuniversal basic income, n.: A regular cash payment from the government to every adult, with no conditions attached, sometimes proposed as a way to share wealth if AI takes over much paid work., Deep Blue (malaise)Deep Blue (malaise), n.: A feeling of gloom and dread among programmers as AI tools become able to do much of the work that once gave their jobs meaning., Erik BrynjolfssonErik Brynjolfsson, prop. n.: An American economist who studies how digital technology and AI change productivity and jobs, and who warns against AI built to replace people rather than to augment them., explosive growthexplosive growth, n.: A hypothetical jump in the world economy's growth rate to 30% a year or more, about ten times today's pace, which some economists think AI that replaces human workers could cause., high-level machine intelligencehigh-level machine intelligence, n.: A yardstick used in surveys of AI researchers: the point at which machines on their own could outdo human workers at every task, in both quality and cost., intelligence curseintelligence curse, n.: The worry that once AI can do most jobs, governments and companies will no longer need ordinary people and so will stop looking after them, like oil-rich states that neglect their citizens., Remote Labor IndexRemote Labor Index, prop. n.: A test that gives AI agents real paid freelance projects — design, video, data work and more — and checks how many they finish to a standard a client would accept. Early agents managed very few., Turing trapTuring trap, n.: The risk that by building AI mainly to imitate and replace people, rather than to extend what people can do, society ends up with less widely shared prosperity and weaker bargaining power for workers., windfall clausewindfall clause, n.: A proposed promise by AI companies to give away a large share of any enormous profits they make if their AI transforms the economy, so that the gains are widely shared.