McKinsey: automation may wipe out 1/3 of America’s workforce by 2030

[Sanguine]

In a new study that is optimistic about automation yet stark in its appraisal of the challenge ahead, McKinsey says massive government intervention will be required to hold societies together against the ravages of labor disruption over the next 13 years. Up to 800 million people—including a third of the work force in the U.S. and Germany—will be made jobless by 2030, the study says.

...

In the eight-month study, the McKinsey Global Institute, the firm's think tank, found that almost half of those thrown out of work—375 million people, comprising 14% of the global work force—will have to find entirely new occupations, since their old one will either no longer exist or need far fewer workers. Chinese will have the highest such absolute numbers—100 million people changing occupations, or 12% of the country's 2030 work force.

I asked Chui what surprised him the most of the findings. "The degree of transition that needs to happen over time is a real eye opener," he said....

https://www.axios.com/mckinsey-automation-may-throw-800m-people-out-of-work-by-2030-2513416488.html

[Oceander]

Tell me, if automation is really going to put everyone out of work, who will be able to buy what these automated businesses produce?  And if they can’t sell, then they can’t afford their expensive new automation.  Answer: nobody.   

And so the dire anti-automation story is nothing more than the next “Big Lie” concocted by those with ulterior political motives. 

[Sanguine]

Yeah, I don't know.  I do note that the number of articles predicting work force doom seem to be increasing.  It could be a "global warming" kind of thing, or they could be correct.

[LMAO]

Tell me, if automation is really going to put everyone out of work, who will be able to buy what these automated businesses produce?  And if they can’t sell, then they can’t afford their expensive new automation.  Answer: nobody.   

And so the dire anti-automation story is nothing more than the next “Big Lie” concocted by those with ulterior political motives.

 But it will displace some of the workforce.  How much hard to predict.  And automation will compete with wages

 Automation itself won’t be the problem.  It’s what lawmakers do that will exacerbate it. Making it more expensive to hire actual human workers with things like more regulations, more demands  placed on industry, $15 an hour minimum wages, and much higher taxation than  we currently have could actually make the effects of automation more dire