Counter-Narrative? Automating manufacturing jobs adds more jobs. WSJ "Automation Has Its Limitations" (Mon, Jan. 8) "When companies adopt automation successfully, they end up adding workers as they become more productive and fill more orders." - Julie Shaw, MIT Professor & Head of MIT's Interactive Robotics Group "Machines' lack of flexibility has often resulted in 'zero sum automation', in which gains in productivity are cancelled out by the need for people to fix or reprogram robots and compensate for their drawbacks." "The U.S. may have 2.1 million unfilled manufacturing jobs by 2030, including entry-level and skilled workers." - Deloitte & the Manufacturing Institute The tldr = Intense competition for blue-collar labor unlikely to abate with increased automation - likely to increase with massive, recent investments in U.S. manufacturing capacity.
