Terminator will have to wait. The specter that artificial intelligence (AI) technology will end up destroying jobs is a threat that has a predicament, but it has almost no foundation. This is stated by the European Central Bank (ECB) in a study it published yesterday under the title New technologies and jobs in Europe.
After examining a sample of 16 European countries between 2011 and 2019, the researchers’ conclusion is that AI creates jobs, especially for the younger group and highly qualified people. But the report concludes that there could be “neutral to slightly negative effects” on workers’ incomes. In the case of Spain, there are no big variations in jobs or salaries. Furthermore, the heterogeneity between countries should have nothing to do with technology, but rather with education levels, competition regulation and labor market protection laws.
“Historically, waves of innovation have been associated with anxiety about the future of employment”, acknowledges the ECB. Consequences are usually of three kinds. A “displacement” effect (because technology destroys jobs when it automates tasks), an increase in productivity (it supplements human work when demand for products increases) and a “relocation” (jobs are replaced and others are created).
Well, with AI “it is not clear that in the final balance there is a loss of employment”. On the contrary, more educated workers could take advantage of the opportunity of this technological change. What does seem to be true is that software-related professions are replacing mid-range and more routine jobs.
“Unlike industrial robotics and IT, AI can automate employment in any occupation. From natural language processing, through translation and image identification, to medical advice and writing codes.” But the ECB, based on the use of different models, denies that there is a substitution effect, estimates that overall there is an increase in the employment rate that ranges between 2.6% and 4 .3%, a percentage that almost doubles for the most qualified workers and that benefits the youngest.
Adrián Todolí, professor of Labor Law at the University of Valencia and author of the book Algoritmos productivos i extractivos (Aranzadi 2023), explains that “AI turns middle-class jobs and wages into low-skilled jobs and , in addition, it decreases the bargaining power of the worker and the remuneration”. For Todolí, AI creates a pyramid in the labor market and increases inequality, because it benefits the most qualified workers at the expense of the media. And this, in his opinion, can have political and social consequences. Terminator, part two?