Hostname: page-component-76fb5796d-22dnz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-27T07:59:29.528Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE AND HUMAN JOBS

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 November 2020

Chia-Hui Lu*
Affiliation:
National Taipei University
*
Address correspondence to: Chia-Hui Lu, Department of Economics, National Taipei University, 151, University Rd., San-Shia, 23741 New Taipei, Taiwan. e-mails: chiahuilu.chlu@gmail.com, chlu@mail.ntpu.edu.tw. Phone: (886-2)86741111 ext. 67166. Fax: (886-2)26739880.

Abstract

The development of artificial intelligence (AI) does influence human jobs but not necessarily in a negative way. Although labor force participation rates and firms’ job vacancies for human labor decline, the unemployment rate may be lower than that in an economy without AI. In an economy with heterogeneously skilled workers, the invention of AI usually has a negative effect on the skilled labor market but a positive effect on the unskilled labor market. The overall unemployment rate may decline as AI develops.

Type
Articles
Copyright
© Cambridge University Press 2020

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

This study was funded by the Ministry of Science and Technology of Taiwan (grant number MOST 107-2628-H-305-003-MY3).

References

Acemoglu, D. and Restrepo, P. (2017) Low-skill and high-skill automation. NBER Working Paper: No. 24119.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Acemoglu, D. and Restrepo, P. (2018a) Artificial intelligence, automation and work. NBER Working Paper: No. 24196.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Acemoglu, D. and Restrepo, P. (2018b) The race between man and machine: Implications of technology for growth, factor shares and employment. American Economic Review 108, 14881542.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Acemoglu, D. and Restrepo, P. (2019) Automation and new tasks: How technology displaces and reinstates labor. Journal of Economic Perspectives 33, 330.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Agrawal, A., Gans, J. S. and Goldfarb, A. (2019) Artificial intelligence: The ambiguous labor market impact of automating prediction. Journal of Economic Perspectives 33, 3150.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andolfatto, D. (1996) Business cycles and labor-market search. American Economic Review 86, 112132.Google Scholar
Arseneau, D. and Chugh, S. (2006) Ramsey meets Hosios: The optimal capital tax and labor market efficiency. International Finance Discussion Papers No. 870, Washington DC, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arseneau, D. and Chugh, S. (2012) Tax smoothing in frictional labor markets. Journal of Political Economy 120, 926985.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Autor, D. H. (2015) Why are there still so many jobs? The history and future of workplace automation. Journal of Economic Perspectives 29, 330.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Autor, D. H. and Salomons, A. (2018) Is automation labor share-displacing? Productivity growth, employment, and the labor share. Brookings Papers on Economic Activity 49, 187.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berg, A., Buffie, E. F. and Zanna, L.-F. (2018) Should we fear the robot revolution? (The correct answer is yes). Journal of Monetary Economics 97, 117148.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boskin, M. J. (1978) Taxation, saving, and the rate of interest. Journal of Political Economy 86, S3S27.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Diamond, P. (1982) Wage determination and efficiency in search equilibrium. Review of Economic Studies 49, 217227.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Domeij, D. (2005) Optimal capital taxation and labor market search. Review of Economic Dynamics 8, 623650.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Frey, C. B. and Osborne, M. A. (2017) The future of employment: How susceptible are jobs to computerisation? Technological Forecasting and Social Change 114, 254280.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hagedorn, M. and Manovskii, I. (2008) The cyclical behavior of equilibrium unemployment and vacancies revisited. American Economic Review 98, 16921706.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hagedorn, M., Manovskii, I. and Stetsenko, S. (2016) Taxation and unemployment in models with heterogeneous workers. Review of Economic Dynamics 19, 161189.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hansen, G. and Imrohorolu, S. (2009) Business cycle fluctuations and the life cycle: How important is on-the-job skill accumulation? Journal of Economic Theory 144, 22932309.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Heer, B. and Irmen, A. (2019) Automation, economic growth, and the labor share - A Comment on Prettner (2019) -. CESifo Working Paper Series 7730, CESifo Group Munich.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Imai, S. and Keane, M. P. (2004) Intertemporal labor supply and human capital accumulation. International Economic Review 45, 601641.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, R. G. and Rebelo, S. T. (1999) Resuscitating real business cycles. In: Taylor, J. B. and Woodford, M. (eds.), Handbook of Macroeconomics, pp. 927–1007. Amsterdam, New York, North-Holland: Elsevier.Google Scholar
Kydland, F. and Prescott, E. (1982) Time to build and aggregate fluctuations. Econometrica 50, 13451370.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kydland, F. and Prescott, E. (1991) Hours and employment variation in business cycle theory. Economic Theory 1, 6381.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leduc, S. and Liu, Z. (2019) Robots and workers? A macro analysis of automation and labor markets. Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco Working Paper 2019–17.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lucas, R. E. (1988) On the mechanics of economic development. Journal of Monetary Economics 22, 342.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
MaCurdy, T. (1981) An empirical model of labor supply in a life-cycle setting. Journal of Political Economy 89, 10591085.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Morikawa, M. (2017) Firms’ expectations about the impact of AI and robotics: Evidence from a survey. Economic Inquiry 55, 10541063.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mortensen, D. T. (1982) Property rights and efficiency in mating, racing and related games. American Economic Review 72, 968979.Google Scholar
Pissarides, C. A. (1984) Efficient job rejection. Economic Journal 94, 97108.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pissarides, C. (2000) Equilibrium Unemployment Theory. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Pratt, G. A. (2015) Is a Cambrian explosion coming for robotics? Journal of Economic Perspectives 29, 5160.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prettner, K. (2019) A note on the implications of automation for economic growth and the labor share. Macroeconomic Dynamics 23, 12941301.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sachs, J. D. and Kotlikoff, L. J. (2012) Smart machines and long-term misery. NBER Working Paper: No. 18629.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shi, S. and Wen, Q. (1999) Labor market search and the dynamic effects of taxes and subsidies. Journal of Monetary Economics 43, 457495.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shimer, R. (2005) The cyclical behavior of equilibrium unemployment and vacancies. American Economic Review 95, 2549.CrossRefGoogle Scholar