03/04/2018

Automation is Changing American Industry

How to prepare for the large declines anticipated in several industries

Current economic projections see overall job growth in professional services, educational services and healthcare while most other industry job growth remains steady or declines. Large declines are anticipated to continue in manufacturing, financial services and government jobs.

Automation is a major driver in changes for the American economic landscape. It has been making America’s manufacturing industry the most competitive and productive in the world but also played a large part in dropping the number of manufacturing jobs in the U.S. About 9 percent of the US workforce is in manufacturing; this total has dropped from more than 30 percent in the 1950's. However, recent advances in machine learning, robotics and artificial intelligence are driving major changes in the economic marketplace - all of which impact a region’s economic development strategy. More importantly, automation is expanding beyond manufacturing into the service sector which dominates the U.S. economy.

Automation is having a major impact on retail. The growth in e-commerce matched by the evolution of robot technology are making major changes in the retail industry. The retail industry employs roughly 16 million Americans and nearly half of these workers are at risk of losing their jobs to robots and other automation technology.[xxxiv] Retail cashiers will suffer the most job losses from this industry that covers one in ten American workers. As an example, Wendy’s recently purchased a 1,000 kiosks that are replacing workers taking and processing food orders in their restaurants; the pay-off for this investment is only expected to take three years.

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