Category Archives: Automation

(Bloomberg) -- The advance of technology is the biggest reason workers are earning a shrinking slice of the income pie, according to a new study by the International Monetary Fund.

Labors share of national income declined in 29 of the worlds 50 biggest economies between 1991 and 2014, the IMF said in a study released Monday.

Analysis suggests technology is the largest contributor to the change in labor shares in the large majority of countries, it said. Several other studies and recent reports suggests that technologies such as artificial intelligence, automation, robotics and machine learning are all contributing to that outlook.

The second main component of income is capital. When wages grow more slowly than productivity, labors share of income falls as the owners of capital reap gains at a quicker pace. That often worsens income inequality because capital tends to be concentrated in the hands of a few, the IMF said in a blog accompanying the research.

The IMFs finding is significant because economists have been debating whats to blame for decades of sluggish wage growth. President Donald Trump has blamed trade with countries such as China and Mexico for hurting American workers and hollowing out the nations manufacturing sector. The IMF study suggests technology is a bigger driver. Some recent studies suggest that automation will decimate the labor force in certain industries over the next 20 to 30 years, which will put an enormous drain on wages for existing workers.

About half the decline in national labor shares can be traced to the impact of technology, according to the study, which is part of the World Economic Outlook. The full outlook, including the funds forecasts for global growth, will be released April 18 in Washington.

Workplace Robots

The study notes the rapid advance of information and communications technology has accelerated the automation of routine tasks, causing firms to substitute capital for workers.

Global economic integration has also played a part in labors declining share of income, the IMF said. The impact of changes in policies and institutions appears to be limited, though its difficult to say how much of the slump has to do with the decline of labor unions, according to the fund.

The IMF has warned before of the threat from from the growing use of robots. A paper by fund economists in September drew on science fiction as well as economic analysis to show the likely profound negative implications for income distribution of increased automation. It even depicted an extreme scenario, or singularity, in which capital takes over the entire economy to the exclusion of labor.

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AI, automation among technologies shrinking salaries nationally - Information Management

There is a growing trend among vendors to integrate automation technologies into their offerings says a bioprocessing expert, as GE Healthcare invests in its partner Zenith.

This week, bioprocessing equipment and services supplier GE Healthcare announced it has made a meaningful minority stake in its automation collaborative partner Zenith Technologies and has taken a seat on its board.

The deal is the latest in a string of investments by vendors in third-party automation software, controls and technology partners.

Last week Sartorius AG acquired its long-term process analytical technology (PAT) and quality by design (QbD) software partner MKS Instruments AB for $72.5m (68m). And in February Thermo Fisher bought Finesse Solutions, a developer of scalable control automation systems and software for bioproduction and a partner the firm has been working with since 2013.

While such deals could be considered competitive expansions in the highly consolidated bioprocessing sector, Eric Langer managing partner at independent strategic biomanufacturing information and analysis firm BioPlan Associates told us investments in automation and PAT technologies make logical business sense.

The more these guys integrate their software into hardware solutions, the more locked in they can become. Further, as the industry continues focusing on manufacturing productivity and efficiency, the more they need to rely on automation, integrated equipment, controllers, software, etc.

So its also probably a strategic move to capture the future ability to streamline production.

He added automation integration also has benefits from a regulatory perspective, as the more automation, the less human interaction and the fewer failures.

His views were echoed by Jan Makela, general manager of Bioprocess at GE Healthcare Life Sciences:

GE decided to invest in Zenith Technologies, as automation is becoming increasingly important for our customers, biopharmaceutical manufacturers who are looking for increased efficiency, productivity and increased product quality, he told Biopharma-Reporter.com.

Automation brings significant benefits to their production processes, and the role of automation is likely to only accelerate in the near future as new opportunities emerge with digitalisation.

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Automation acquisitions 'capture the future of streamline production' - BioPharma-Reporter.com

Govt striving hard for healthy Pakistan: minister

Islamabad

Computerisation and automation of Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) would be beneficial to all the stakeholders across the board.

Marriyum Aurangzeb, Minister of State for Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage, said this while presiding over a consultative session with the representatives of media bodies and officials of federal and provincial information departments on automation system of ABC here on Monday. The regional and local newspapers would also reap benefits of modern technology and new management information system, she said.

Marriyum Aurangzeb said that automation was primarily aimed at ensuring credible and authentic newspapers circulation data, as once the online system was in place it would not only prove benevolent for the media industry, but would also enhance transparency and good governance.

The minister of state directed the authorities concerned to share management information system with the stakeholders for the test launch and it was decided that feedback by them would be given due consideration at the formal launch of the automation system.

It was also decided in the meeting that the stakeholders would come up with their feedback latest by May 10, 2017 and the next consultative session would be held on May 15, 2017.

The media bodies appreciated the efforts of the Ministry of Information, Broadcasting and National Heritage in streamlining and facilitating the existing process of Audit Bureau of Circulation and apprised the meeting that they would be holding consultations amongst their representative bodies and others having a stake in the proposed initiative, before giving final feedback on the subject.

The meeting was attended by Secretary Information, Principal Information Officer, ABC Director General, senior officials of provincial information departments, and representatives of All Pakistan Newspapers Society and Council for Pakistan Newspapers Editors.

Later on while talking to Assistant Secretary General and Coordinator for the Scaling Up Nutrition (SUN) Movement Gerda Verburg here on Monday Marriyum Aurangzeb said that the Government of Pakistan was striving hard for a healthy Pakistan, through addressing the problem of malnutrition, which it considered a sine quo non for achieving Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

The setting up of a task force and special cell in the National Assembly and similar entities in the provinces and departments concerned amply demonstrated the commitment with which the government was pursuing that objective, she added.

The minister felt that proactive collaboration and coordination between SDGs and SUN Secretariat was critical for realisation of Pakistan's vision 2025 and said that Pakistan was keen to adopt best practices and learn from the expertise of other countries to achieve the goal of a healthy Pakistan.

Marriyum Aurangzeb said that nutrition was the key to achieving Sustainable Development Goals and acknowledged that it was a multi-faceted issue, which was prevalent among infants, children, mothers and adolescents. She said that the executive was working with dedication and diligence to advance the agenda of Sustainable Development Goals under the parliamentary oversight and was making all possible efforts to create a congenial and enabling environment to ensure people's access to healthy nutrients, safe drinking water and adequate sanitation so that the children were not exposed to various infections and diarrhoea.

The minister informed Ms Gerda that Pakistan was the first country, which had established its first secretariat of Sustainable Development Goals where thematic sessions were conducted to provide data and information to representatives of the people, so that they could be able to address the issues in their respective constituencies.

Gerda Verburg appreciated the contribution of the Minister of State towards the efforts for the achievement of Sustainable Development Goals and hoped that Pakistan would not only persist with those efforts but would also take further practical steps to deal with the problem of malnutrition, simultaneously taking care of the issue of stunting growth.

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ABC automation to benefit all stakeholders, says Marriyum - The News International

Last year, Tesla announced plans to acquire German engineering firm Grohmann Engineering and reconstitute it as "Tesla Advanced Automation Germany." Now, the carmaker is using all of its new possession's resources to gear up for Model 3 production, reports say.

As an independent company, Grohmann had a client list that included other automakers. But it recently announced that it would drop all other clients and focus solely on Tesla, according to Electrek. Tesla is focusing on improving its manufacturing process as it works to launch the Model 3, and the creation of Tesla Advanced Automation Germany is understood to be a part of that project.

A streamlined manufacturing process is key to meeting Tesla's ambitious goals for the Model 3. CEO Elon Musk wants the company to be building 500,000 cars a year next year, the more affordable Model 3 will make up the majority of that total. Tesla also has hundreds of thousands of reservations for the car. But the company has also missed every one of its deadlines for new-car launches so far.

Musk previously said the new outfit would honor contracts already entered into by Grohmann Engineering. But a recent report from German-language news outlet Sdwestrundfunk indicated that the group was in the process of ending all relationships with outside clients, including canceling existing orders.

The shift comes amid some instability within the group itself. At a recent Grohmann Engineering employee meeting, Tesla CTO JB Straubel announced that founder Klaus Grohmann was retiring. About half of the roughly 680 employees are also reportedly attempting to unionize. This comes as Tesla deals with a unionization push at its Fremont, California, assembly plant.

It's unclear what role Tesla Advanced Automation Germany will have in the initial rollout of the Model 3. Tesla may be planning to use some of Grohmann Engineering's automation expertise right off the bat, but the group's European location hints that it may be more geared toward an eventual expansion of car production outside the U.S.

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Tesla's "Advanced Automation" Division Gears Up for Model 3 Production - The Drive

With Technological Advancement Comes Easier Methods to Exploit

Despite all the promises of technological innovation, the proliferation of automated machines will harm financial prospects for working people in the following decades. According to Digital Trends, robots are likely to replace around five million jobs by 2020. Beyond the threat of job destruction, Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers have found that the effect of creating one robot for every thousand workers is a decrease in wages by about 0.250.5 percent. As robots are continually engineered to be more efficient and productive than humans, their work is valued at lower costs and is preferred over human labor.

But this change doesnt only affect blue-collar and administrative work; with the advent of artificial intelligence and machine learning, automated machines have already begun to substantially impact skilled professions, such as surgery and accounting. Additionally, reliance on technology allows corporations to find loopholes in providing worker benefits. Uber and Lyft, for instance businesses that utilize apps in providing services categorize their drivers as independent contractors rather than employees to avoid extra fees, leaving workers without proper coverage and protection. This trend of prioritizing profits at the expense of uncompensated employees one so prescient in these apps will likely be worsened as technological advancement integrates technology with employment.

The expansion of automation brings heavy implications beyond the economic sphere. Although we are in the age of connectivity, the next decades will inevitably witness people physically withdrawing from reality by immersing themselves in virtual worlds, sometimes with great consequences. Virtual reality will allow those dissatisfied with their lives to not only escape into more ideal digital worlds, but ultimately prefer virtual fantasy to real life. This will consequently hinder physical connection and intimacy in human relationships. As an extreme example of technological innovation being detrimental to human interaction, a Japanese virtual reality game allowing users to sexually assault women characters was released last summer. The future of the digital age may distort the authenticity and moral standards surrounding human connection, and desensitize users from the true weight of their actions, rendering them lost and physically detached in virtual worlds.

EMILY ZHAO,Staff Writer

At its core, technology is a beautiful and wonderful tool of humanity that has the potential to elevate standards of living to previously unimagined levels. Yet, despite this incredible potential for growth, many have come to see technology and automation of labor as malevolent job-destroyers intent on dismantling the livelihoods of millions of Americans who rely on their unskilled labor to earn a living.

The truth, however, is far more nuanced. Although automation will indeed reduce the labor needs of some professions, it will also open up entirely new job industries for workers to enter. According to the Economist, labor costs related to weaving and textile production during the 19th century dropped 98 percent after improvements in automation. Yet, this did not destroy weavers livelihoods since they simply migrated from directly producing the cloth to managing the machines. Furthermore, the price of cloth dropped substantially, hugely increasing demand and, as a result, increasing total employment by over four times the original amount from 1830 to 1900. Automation, therefore, does not destroy labor but rather changes it and forces workers to adapt to a new job role.

The same situation is unfolding in the modern day. Automated improvements in the transportation industry (which is expected to see massive changes in employment) will result in drivers moving toward maintaining the self-driving trucks. Grocery store cashiers will migrate to overseeing large sections of self-checkouts rather than their own individual lane. Chefs will become waiters or managers (which still require a personal touch). All of these improvements will result in lower prices and a higher standard of living.

Furthermore, the increased automation of labor opens us up to explore the creative aspects of humanity. Similar to how specialization of labor helped allow early tribes to become powerful civilizations and create incredible works of art, the reduced demand on routine labor will allow humanity to focus on deeper, more important questions in both STEM and humanities. We will undoubtedly see an explosion of higher learning, deeper research and great works of art that will define the post-Information Era of humanity.

NATHAN WALKER,Editorial Assistant

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Quick Takes: Automation of Labor - The UCSD Guardian Online

In BriefAs automation threatens to make more and more jobs obsolete,the Canadian government has laid out a research and education basedplan to support innovation and the employment of its citizens. Candid Canada

As automation continually becomes a larger threat to human jobs, Canada is taking action. Justin Trudeau, Prime Minister of Canada, recently made public statements about the countrys plans for dealing with these rising trends. Instead of ignoring the issue, or pretending like its something we wont have to deal with for a long time, Canada has formed a comprehensive strategy.

According to Trudeau,

We know that the job market is changing, and instead of resisting in vain, were focused on funding research and innovation, like in AI and quantum computing, thatll help lead the change here in Canada. And while we do that, were preparing Canadians to find good jobs through investments in education and training.

This plan is important to take note of, because job loss due to automation has already begun to take effect. And, while the White House has released similar intentions to focus on research and education, programs will need to be incorporated and explored much sooner than most people assume.

In fact, just within the next 15 years, we are expected to lose up to 30% of jobs to automation in the U.S. alone. And, while many may scoff with ambivalence in assuming that the jobs lost will be only low-paying jobs in customer service, IT, or in factories, they are absolutely wrong. Just this past year, artificially intelligent (AI) lawyers became less of a novelty and more of a reality. There are virtually (pun intended) no jobs that exist that would not be threatened by growing automation.

What many fear is that, as automation replaces more and more jobs, the middle class will disappear. Even Stephen Hawking thinks that this is a real and dangerous possibility. This future is possible if we do not plan effectively for the progression of automation. Without a quality strategy in place, jobs will only exist for the ultra-privileged. Manufacturing jobs are already feeling the burn of automation-caused job loss, and this trend will continue through many other jobfields.

And so, as Trudeau has asserted about Canada, investing in education and research will create jobs and grow the middle class. This plan will support additional job training, education, and even post-secondary education for all citizens. In fact, to support unemployed citizens, Trudeau writes that Canadas 2017 budget aims to provide $132.4 million over four years, beginning next year, and $37.9 million per year thereafter, to allow unemployed Canadians to pursue self-funded training while receiving Employment Insurance benefits.

The Canadian government additionally plans to invest in 13,000 work-integrated learning placements for students to help young Canadians transition from school to work. It seems as though Canada has every intention to fully support its citizens from the beginning of their careers up through all levels of employment. And, while there will still be difficulties as automation makes more and more jobs obsolete, supporting education will undoubtedly improve the situation. Education leads to innovation, which leads to job creation. Its simple, but undeniably effective.

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Canada: Here's How We're Preparing for the Automation of Human ... - Futurism

Last year, Tesla made the acquisition of the German engineering group Grohmann Engineering in order to createTesla Advanced Automation Germany. The transaction closed in January, but we now learn that things havent been going smoothly since then.

Tesla co-founder and Chief Technology Officer JB Straubel visited the headquarters earlier this month to announce that the companys founder left just a few weeks after the deal was made official.

Furthermore, the company announced this week that it will drop all other clients, among them are several major automakers, in order to focus on Teslas needs for the Model 3, which is apparently worrying the workforce.

Grohmann Engineering is an engineering firm headquartered in Prm, Germany, where they serve important manufacturing clients, especially major German automakers like BMW and Daimler.

During a press call following the announcement of theacquisition, Grohmann described the companys client base:

We have practically all the big automotive manufacturers as our clients.We also have the semiconductor producers as clients, as well as significantly large companies in the field of bio-automation and life science.

At the time, Tesla CEO Elon Musk hinted that he would be open to continuing working with Grohmanns clients, but he only committedto completing the current contracts:

There are a number of existing automotive clients for Grohmannand we will, of course, honor those contracts and try to be as useful as we can to the industry as a whole in transitioning to clean energy mobility. [] If you apply Teslas philosophy to help the whole automotive industry in moving to e-mobility as you may know, Tesla made all of its patents freely available just to be helpful to the rest of the industry and as a gesture of goodwill. And thats something we expect to continue.

Now we learn via local news outlet Sudwestrundfunk(German) that Tesla is in the process of ending all relationships between Tesla Advanced Automation Germany and itsoutside clients. Tesla confirmed the news and the head of the companys workers council even said that they are canceling existing orders.

The reason given for the sudden change is to focus on the production of the Model 3 somethingGrohmann Engineering has been involved in even before its acquisitionby Tesla.

Before this weeks announcement, CTO JB Straubel was present at an employee assembly with about half of the 680 employees, mostly engineers and techniciansspecialized in manufacturing, on April 1st, according to local news outlet Volksfreund (German):

During this meeting, the company announcedthat its 74-year-old founder Klaus Grohmann decided to retire.

When he announced the deal to acquire the company last year, Musk said of Grohmann, the founder of the engineering firm, that he was one of the world leaders in highly automated methods of manufacturing.

The company is still full of skilled engineers, but some of them are apparently worried about dropping other clients to focus only on Tesla. The head of the workers council said that they are excited about the prospect of working for an innovative company like Tesla, but they also liked the security of having a broad range of clients. Though the company is currently growing and Tesla currently lists a dozen engineering jobs in Prm. The concerns appear to be more long-term.

In the past few weeks, over 100 workers decided to unionize bringing the total to about half of the ~680 employeesatGrohmann, nowTesla Advanced Automation Germany.

They are seeking a labor agreement for a compensation increase of 150 euros per month. The move comes amid Tesla being in the middle of another union push at its Fremont factory in California.

This is all happening while Tesla is trying to bring the Model 3, its $35,000 all-electric sedan, to production in July. The vehicle will be assembled at the Fremont factory, while the powertrain will be manufactured at the Gigafactory 1 in Nevada, and the engineering group is working on the production processes or the machines building the machines as Musk likes to say.

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Tesla's new 'Advanced Automation' group will drop all other clients ... - Electrek

Vehicular automation involves the use of mechatronics, artificial intelligence, and multi-agent system to assist a vehicle's operator. These features and the vehicles employing them may be labeled as intelligent or smart. A vehicle using automation for difficult tasks, especially navigation, may be referred to as semi-autonomous. A vehicle relying solely on automation is consequently referred to as robotic or autonomous. After the invention of the integrated circuit, the sophistication of automation technology increased. Manufacturers and researchers subsequently added a variety of automated functions to automobiles and other vehicles.

Ground vehicles employing automation and teleoperation include shipyard gantries, mining trucks, bomb-disposal robots, robotic insects, and driverless tractors.

There are a lot of autonomous and semi-autonomous ground vehicles being made for the purpose of transporting passengers. One such example is the free-ranging on grid (FROG) technology which consists of autonomous vehicles, a magnetic track and a supervisory system. The FROG system is deployed for industrial purposes in factory sites and has been in used since 1999 on the ParkShuttle,[2] a PRT-style public transport system in the city of Capelle aan den IJssel to connect the Rivium business park with the neighboring city of Rotterdam (where the route terminates at the Kralingse Zoom metro station). The system experienced a crash in 2005[3] that proved to be caused by a human error.[4]

Applications for automation in ground vehicles include the following:

Research is ongoing and prototypes of autonomous ground vehicles exist.

Extensive automation for cars focuses on either introducing robotic cars or modifying modern car designs to be semi-autonomous. Semi-autonomous designs could be implemented sooner as they rely less on technology that is still at the forefront of research. An example is the Dual mode monorail. Groups such as RUF (Denmark), BiWay (UK), ATN (New Zealand) and TriTrack (USA) are working on projects consisting of private cars that dock onto monorail tracks and are driven autonomously. As a method of automating cars without extensively modifying the cars as much as a robotic car, Automated highway systems (AHS) aims to construct lanes on highways that would be equipped with, for example, magnets to guide the vehicles. Automation vehicles have auto-brakes named as Auto Vehicles Braking System (AVBS). Highway computers would manage the traffic and direct the cars to avoid crashes.

The European Commission has established a smart car development program called the Intelligent Car Flagship Initiative.[5] The goals of that program include:

There are plenty of further uses for automation in relation to cars. These include:

The concept for autonomous vehicles has also been applied for commercial uses, like for autonomous or nearly autonomous trucks. As recorded in June 1995 in Popular Science Magazine, self-driving trucks were being developed for combat convoys, whereby only the lead truck would be driven by a human and the following trucks would rely on satellite, an inertial guidance system and ground-speed sensors.[8]Caterpillar Inc. made early developments in 2013 with the Robotics Institute at Carnegie Mellon University to improve efficiency and reduce cost at various mining and construction sites.[9] Companies such as Suncor Energy, a Canadian energy company, and Rio Tinto Group were among the first to replace human-operated trucks with driverless commercial trucks run by computers.[10] In April 2016, trucks from major manufacturers including Volvo and the Daimler Company completed a week of autonomous driving across Europe, organized by the Dutch, in an effort to get self-driving trucks on the road. With developments in self-driving trucks progressing, U.S. self-driving truck sales is forecasted to reach 60,000 by 2035 according to a report released by IHS Inc. Automotive in June 2016.[11]

An automated guided vehicle or automatic guided vehicle (AGV) is a mobile robot that follows markers or wires in the floor, or uses vision, magnets, or lasers for navigation. They are most often used in industrial applications to move materials around a manufacturing facility or warehouse. Application of the automatic guided vehicle has broadened during the late 20th century.

Aircraft has received much attention for automation, especially for navigation. A system capable of autonomously navigating a vehicle (especially aircraft) is known as autopilot.

Autonomous boats can provide security, do research, or perform hazardous or repetitive tasks (such as guiding a large ship into a harbor or transporting cargo).

Underwater vehicles have been a focus for automation for tasks such as pipeline inspection and underwater mapping. See Autonomous underwater vehicle.

An example of an automated train is the Docklands Light Railway in London.

One of the current limitations for vehicular automation is the electrical power required to run the processors.[12]

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Vehicular automation - Wikipedia

Every week there's a story in a tabloid newspaper that contains the phrase 'rise of the robots'. Journalists trot out shock headlines like 'robot job invasion' and 'robots will destroy our jobs' as if this is something society should, and can, prevent.

Does a perfect storm of cloud, AI, mobile, IoT, chatbots and machine learning being applied to business processes mean jobs are really at risk from automation? Or is this merely the latest chapter in a story about a skills shortage in an increasingly information-based society?

Robotics already dominate the shop floors of car plants and industrial facilities; this next wave of automation is about the office. "It differs from the previous purely mechanical and industrial wave in that it is powered by data and our ability to analyse with more powerful techniques," says Ian Hughes, Analyst, Internet of Things, 451 Research, who thinks that now the dangerous jobs have been given to robots, it's time to automate mundane tasks. "Whether its software or hardware, these are advanced tools best suited to assist us and let us move on to more interesting things."

So it's not really about unskilled labour at all. "A better starting point is to view AI as a way of dealing with predictable, non-personal work, where lots of data exists," says Matt Jones, Analytics Strategist at Tessella, explaining that this helps us understand its potential impact not only in manufacturing, but also on legal research, drilling for commodities, and even diagnosing diseases. "AI will affect different industries in very different ways," he observes.

Robots already rule manufacturing (Image Credit: Thyssenkrupp)

The reality of AIs impact is somewhat different to what we have been reading about in the papers," says Harrick Vin, VP and Chief Scientist at Tata Consultancy Service, whose Global Trends Study of 835 decision makers in 13 different industry sectors found that 84% view AI as essential. And thats particularly the case in Europe and North America, where the average spend has hit around $80 million (around 65 million, AU$105 million) per region over recent years.

"The opportunities and challenges this technology presents are still not yet fully understood, but what is clear is the impact is going to be big," says Vin. "From Apple investing in face recognition through Emotient, to Shell, the oil and gas giant, launching an online virtual assistant to respond to customer enquiries, there are already major investments and belief in AI."

However, this isn't just from IT departments. "Despite 68% of companies using AI for IT functions, by 2020, 70% believe AIs greatest impact will be in admin, back office, sales, marketing and finance."

Some jobs could disappear almost completely. "Jobs in call centres, routine machine operation and stock taking are probably not long for this world," says Jones. "Industries like manufacturing will indeed be heavily affected at the lower skilled end."

However, he thinks that industries already accustomed to automation will actually be better prepared for the effects of AI. "Perhaps a bigger shock will come to industries that rely heavily on manually collecting, processing and interpreting data, tasks that have long relied on highly paid, highly skilled people," he says, which means the end of report writing jobs in legal, accountancy, finance, insurance and management consultancy industries.

Does that means horrendous job losses in white collar businesses? Not necessarily this is about eliminating the lower value work that clients hate paying for, so staff can concentrate on higher value tasks. "Whether this means companies deliver more value for less, or employ fewer people, will depend on how they approach this new world," says Jones.

Folks arent likely to be clamouring for robot judges

Not only will jobs that rely solely on human interaction not change, but there will doubtless be a renaissance if automation is pushed too far.

"Highly emotive experiences training, counselling, medical advice, restaurant service will probably never be delivered predominantly by AI, even if they become technically possible," says Jones. "Equally, situations requiring human judgement or empathy, from managing a team, to deciding a court case, to operating a bulldozer, will need humans for the foreseeable future."

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AI and automation will take jobs but how and where? - TechRadar

Fears that automation will kill more jobs continues to grow. An estimated 5 million U.S. factory jobs have evaporated since 2000 and most of those (88%) were lost to increased productivity due to automation, according to a study by Ball State University.

But opinions about what, if anything, can be done to reverse the trend differ greatly.

Real estate billionaire Jeff Greene, who hosted his second Managing the Disruption conference on the topic of job destruction and what to do about it in Palm Beach, Fla., this week, has some ideas. Last year, he raised a ruckus by saying that robotics and artificial intelligence would kill not just blue-collar factory jobs but also many white-collar careers. Paralegals, journalists, airline pilots, even surgeons could be impacted, for example.

Greene continued the drumbeat last week in a Washington Post article , warning that automation will kill jobs much faster than Steven Mnuchin , President Donald Trump's Treasury secretary, expects. Last week Mnuchin said, controversially, that he didn't think major automation-related job losses would kick in for another 50 to 100 years.

In contrast, a recent report by consultancy PricewaterhouseCoopers estimates that 38% of U.S. jobs have a "high risk" of being wiped out by automation by 2030.

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Greene's take is that automation isn't entirely bad if it can be perfected and deployed to lower the cost of living for the middle class so that they wouldn't need to earn as much money to get by. For example, using 3-D printers to build homes could cut the cost of housing to a more manageable level so that families wouldn't have to devote most of their income to mortgage payments, Greene told Fortune on Wednesday.

If machines could 3-D print homes using high-density resins, a structure that now costs $200,000 might cost $50,000, Greene said. That would take a big chunk of debt off the table for most families, he said.

Another huge drain on family budgets is energy. Part of that problem could be solved by using alternative energy. Families could save money if the U.S. used solar energy to power electric cars and heat homes. Of course that assumes that the cost of alternatives goes lower than the cost of oil.

The net impact, in his opinion, is that a couple would no longer have to work 80 to 90 hours a week to pay the bills. And if they can live on less money, the need for a two-income household is lessened, allowing one parent to stay home with any children. That, in turn, reduces the risk of children turning to drugs or getting pregnant.

Greene acknowledges that his ideas are "possibly Utopian" in that he's seeing the use of automation that poses risks to workers across the spectrum in the best possible light.

Many who worry about automation also tout universal basic income as a way to make up for lost jobs. In this scenario, all citizens who are too young for Social Security would receive a flat annual payment from the federal government. It's a trendy idea in Silicon Valley and other tech enclaves, where it's seen as a way to hedge against automation-induced job losses.

One small problem: It is unaffordable, according to former Treasury Secretary Lawrence Summers, who spoke at this week's event. It would cost about $5 trillion annually, or about $4 trillion more than the country's annual income tax revenue, to pay each American adult $25,000 a year.

"It's almost impossible to make the arithmetic work," Summers said, according to The Palm Beach Post.

Others see hope in smaller, more tactical steps, like improving tech education for students and re-training current workers. Last week, General Electric contributed $50 million to the Boston Public Schools to improve science technology engineering and math (STEM) education to train students to help fill what the company sees as a gaping skills gap.

That's a step in the right direction, but retraining people on a much broader scale is needed to address skills gap nation-wide. There does not seem to be much desire in the Republican-controlled Congress to boost funding on education.

Others say technologies like augmented reality, which layers information onto the real world through connected eye glasses or goggles, could help. For example, field repair technicians could get diagrams and instructions, even video, projected into their goggles so that they can work faster and better without having to stop to consult manuals. That's technology that Upskill, a Herndon, Va.-based tech company, already provides to customers like GE ( ge ) and Boeing ( ba ) , which just invested in the company.

"This technology can augment the skills of less specialized workers and help expert workers work faster," Upskill executive chairman Dr. Magid Abraham told Fortune at a GE event last week.

But back to the conference: Greene says he was struck about how optimistic most of the speakers werethe roster also included former British Prime Minister David Cameron and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman. "If I were optimistic, I wouldn't spend all this time and energy on this conference," he said.

The difference between the industrial revolution of the 19th century and the current situation, he said, is that back then machines replaced physical labor but also created many retail, bookkeeping, machine repair, and accounting jobs related to the goods produced. Now, however, the world is dealing not only with robots that do physical labor but with AI that does mental labor as well.

Says Greene: "We can't compete with both physical machines and thinking machines."

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The Bright Side of Job-Killing Automation - Fortune