And that’s a problem, because if robots take all the jobs, our long march of progress may well go into reverse.įord’s thesis is not new. They’re getting too smart, too flexible and too convenient. This time, writes Martin Ford in “Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future,” the robots are coming for (almost) all the jobs. Technological progress has created far more jobs than it has destroyed. But ever since, economists and historians have dismissed the Luddites as jokes, because the forces of industrialization they decried ended up making the world a far richer and more comfortable place. The Luddites hit the alarm bell, and not without reason: The automation of weaving and spinning technology displaced an entire class of skilled artisans. Rise of the Robots is essential reading to understand what accelerating technology means for our economic prospectsnot to mention those of our childrenas well as for society as a whole.The prospect of machines stealing our jobs has perturbed and enraged humans for at least 200 years. We must decide, now, whether the future will see broad-based prosperity or catastrophic levels of inequality and economic insecurity.
The past solutions to technological disruption, especially more training and education, aren't going to work.
The result could well be massive unemployment and inequality as well as the implosion of the consumer economy itself. At the same time, households are under assault from exploding costs, especially from the two major industrieseducation and health carethat, so far, have not been transformed by information technology. As progress continues, blue and white collar jobs alike will evaporate, squeezing working- and middle-class families ever further. Artificial intelligence is already well on its way to making good jobs obsolete: many paralegals, journalists, office workers, and even computer programmers are poised to be replaced by robots and smart software. Winner of the 2015 FT & McKinsey Business Book of the Year Award A New York Times Bestseller Top Business Book of 2015 at ForbesOne of 12 Notable Science and Technology Books of 2015 What are the jobs of the future? How many will there be? And who will have them? As technology continues to accelerate and machines begin taking care of themselves, fewer people will be necessary.
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