In the United States, there are currently 3.5 million truckers, one of the largest occupations in the country. Truck drivers are responsible for planning routes, inspecting vehicles and shipping goods. Yet right now many truckers feel threatened by new self-driving semi-trucks that are currently being tested on the road.
Advocates against self-driving trucks, including the teamsters union, say that this new technology threatens to put millions of people out of work, while also voicing safety concerns. Conversely, the engineers and entrepreneurs that are working on self-driving truck technology say that they will be creating more jobs and that the country should not stand in the way of innovation. They state that their companies will need to hire engineers, designers, computer scientists and other jobs to actually mass produce their vehicles. Meanwhile, the government has avoided weighing in on the issue, as they are worried that too much regulation will force a rapidly growing industry out of the country, while not protecting the jobs of truck drivers will earn them the ire of millions of hard-working Americans.
Manufacturers are not shy about their intentions to replace truck drivers. Today it costs 250 million dollars to make and test a self-driving semi-truck. Their goal is to reduce the annual expenses of each truck to be less than the average salary of a truck driver: 61,455 dollars per year. This is why truck drivers are scared: many believe that their jobs will soon be gone, and their skillset obsolete. However, in reality, there are many technological, ethical and legal issues that need to be addressed before these vehicles hit the road and begin to replace the jobs of truck drivers. For all of these concerns to be addressed, the government must create a standardized set of rules for self-driving vehicles and figure out how to implement them. Yet this does not seem to be a priority and will likely not happen any time soon. Instead of panicking about dystopian futures and mass unemployment, the country should examine the history of automation and prepare for a transition in the economy.
The fear of automation leading to a rise in unemployment is nothing new. Since the industrial revolution and the creation of the transcontinental railroad, people have worried about technology and machines taking over the workforce and pushing humans out. But researchers at the Brookings Institute and Stanford University argue the opposite. They believe that while artificial intelligence will be able to complete repetitive tasks at a more efficient rate than humans, they will not actually be able to replace one’s job.
At the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, Google Chief Economist, Hal Varian said, “Automation doesn’t generally eliminate jobs. Automation generally eliminates dull, tedious and repetitive tasks. If you remove all the tasks, you remove the job. But that’s rare.” Essentially, while a self-driving truck might be able to drive from point A to point B with a lower accident rate than a human driver, the truck itself will not be able to complete other aspects of the job like quality control of the cargo. In fact, according to the United States Census Bureau, only one occupation since 1950 has been eliminated because of automation, the position of the elevator operator. These researchers also argue that more jobs will be created in the technology sector as artificial intelligence becomes more widely used.
While proponents of that argument are excited about the rapid growth in the tech industry, critics ponder who is actually getting those jobs. Statistically, those positions will go to younger people with college degrees and highly trained immigrants via skill-based immigration. Skeptics are not necessarily opposed to increased job opportunities for the aforementioned groups of people, they are simply worried about what will happen to jobs traditionally held by adults that lack a college degree. David Autor, a professor of economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says “It’s a great time to be young and educated. But there’s no clear land of opportunity for adults who haven’t been to college,”
To combat job desertion for older, non-college-educated Americans, many economists are suggesting that the government subsidize job retraining programs, increase investments in unemployment benefits and insurance and fund technologies that will require human oversight, but not require extensive education. Furthermore, it is increasingly popular amongst employers to give their employees tuition assistance to further their education. Tuition reimbursement programs allow employees to earn college degrees while holding a job and not paying full price for their education. Many who take advantage of the program chose to earn degrees for high-demand jobs: engineering is amongst the most popular. These employees are not only more likely to stay at the company, but they are also more likely to get promoted into a job with more responsibilities, one that is less likely to be automated.
So while truck drivers, the teamsters, technology companies and the government will keep sparring over hypothetical situations, the workforce is not waiting for them to find a solution. Artificial intelligence is only becoming more prominent, along with skill-based immigration, tuition assistance programs, engineering and computer science degrees and subsidies for job retraining programs.
