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  • OUTLOOK

How automation is changing work

More robotics and artificial intelligence in the workplace doesn’t have to destroy your job.
  1. Michael Segal

    1. Michael Segal is a writer and editor-in-chief of Nautilus magazine.

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Self-driving trucks could turn the role of truck driver into a technology job. Credit: Daimler AG

If you were beginning a career in computer programming in 2007, there were good times ahead: robust salary growth, the construction of the app ecosystem and economy, and the meteoric rise of social media. But if you happened across that August’s issue of Business Week magazine, you might have been discouraged. It predicted that the career most likely to suffer from job losses in the United States was … computer programmer.

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Nature 563, S132-S135 (2018)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-018-07501-y

This article is part of Nature Outlook: Digital revolution, an editorially independent supplement produced with the financial support of third parties. About this content.

References

  1. Slaughter, A.-M. et al. Shift: The Commission on Work, Workers, and Technology. Report of Findings (New America & Bloomberg, 2017).

  2. Frey, C. B. & Osborne, M. A. The Future of Employment: How Susceptible Are Jobs to Computerisation? (Oxford Martin School & Univ. Oxford, 2013).

  3. Nedelkoska, L. & Quintini, G. Automation, Skills Use and Training. OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers, No. 202 (OECD Publishing, 2018).

  4. Acemoglu, D. & Restrepo. P. Robots and Jobs: Evidence From US Labor Markets. NBER Working Paper No. 23285 (NBER, 2017).

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