A report released yesterday by PwC says the near future of automation technologies will arrive in three phases. The report calls them waves and maps out how they’ll wash over us:
- A flood of algorithms: - Already, data analysis and simple digital tasks are becoming the purview of machines.
- Augmentation inundation: - Into the late 2020s, repeatable tasks and the exchange of information, as in financial data analysis, will come to be done by humans and automated systems working together.
- Autonomy tsunami: - Starting by the mid-2030s, machines and software will make decisions and take physical actions, like driving cars, with little or no human input.
- Job impact: - Focusing on the UK job market, PwC economists predict that up to 30 percent of existing jobs could be affected by the mid-2030s, with a focus on transportation, manufacturing and retail positions. (But, as we have said before, job predictions like these are hard to trust.)
- A gender divide: - The study suggests that women will initially be impacted more heavily by the rise of automation, while men are more likely to feel the effects in the third wave. A good number of us, it seems, may find ourselves at sea.
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