Question

Make a list of activities done in the tertiary sector. Do you think that in future these will help in eliminating unemployment

Answer 1

ing technologies like industrial robots, artificial intelligence, and machine learning are advancing at a rapid pace, but there has been little attention to their impact on employment and public policy. Darrell West addresses this topic in a new paper titled What Happens If Robots Take the Jobs? The Impact of Emerging Technologies on Employment and Public Policy. It examines what happens if robots end up taking jobs from humans and how this will affect public policy.

While emerging technologies can improve the speed, quality, and cost of available goods and services, they may also displace large numbers of workers.  This possibility challenges the traditional benefits model of tying health care and retirement savings to jobs.  In an economy that employs dramatically fewer workers, we need to think about how to deliver benefits to displaced workers. 

The impacts of automation technologies are already being felt throughout the economy. The worldwide number of industrial robots has increased rapidly over the past few years.  The falling prices of robots, which can operate all day without interruption, make them cost-competitive with human workers.  In the service sector, computer algorithms can execute stock trades in a fraction of a second, much faster than any human.  As these technologies become cheaper, more capable, and more widespread, they will find even more applications in an economy.

The recent trend towards increased automation stems in part from the Great Recession, which forced many businesses to operate with fewer workers. After growth resumed, many businesses continued automating their operations rather than hiring additional workers. This echoes a trend among technology companies that receive massive valuations with relatively few workers.  For example, in 2014 Google was valued at $370 billion with only 55,000 employees, a tenth the size of AT&T’s workforce in the 1960s.