Terminator will have to wait. The specter that Artificial Intelligence (AI) technology will end up destroying jobs is a threat that has serious consequences, but is hardly founded. This is what the European Central Bank (ECB) maintains in a study released this Tuesday entitled New Technologies and jobs in Europe.
After examining a sample of 16 European countries in the period 2011-2019, the researchers’ conclusion is that AI is creating jobs, especially for the youngest 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 major variations in jobs or salaries. Furthermore, the heterogeneity between countries would not have to do with technology, but rather with education levels, competition regulation or labor market protection laws.
“Waves of innovation have historically been associated with anxiety about the future of employment,” the ECB acknowledges. The consequences are usually of three types. A “crowding out” effect (because technology destroys jobs by automating tasks); an increase in productivity (it complements human work when the demand for products increases) and a “relocation” (jobs are replaced and others are created).
Well, with AI “it is not clear that there will be a loss of employment in the final balance.” On the contrary, more educated workers could take advantage of the opportunity of this technological change. What it does seem is that software-related professions are replacing mid-range and more routine jobs.
“Unlike industrial robotics and computing, AI can automate employment in any occupation. From the natural language procedure, through translation, image identification, to medical advice and writing codes.” But the ECB, using several models, denies that there is a substitution effect, estimating 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 Productive and extractive algorithms (Aranzadi 2023), explains that “AI turns middle-class jobs and salaries into low-skilled jobs and thus “It reduces the bargaining power of the worker and their 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 average ones. And this, in his opinion, can have consequences on a political and social level. Terminator, part two?
