A Contribution to a European Strategy for the Well-being of Citizens in the Face of Automation
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.14422/icade.i109.y2020.002Keywords:
technological unemployment, well-being, European UnionAbstract
This article investigates the current and expected impact of automation technology in the well-being of European citizens. First, we explore the technical, social and economic factors that determine technological progress and the implementation of the new technologies. Second, we review the expected impact of automation on employment. Finally, we assess the impact that automation will have on the well-being of European citizens in light of the two first sections. To this end, we draw on the expected asymmetrical impact of automation in people with different education levels and on current inequality trends. Throughout the article, we use a normative approach, prescribing what European policy makers should take into account in light of our findings. We find that it is unclear what the net effect of technology on employment will be, but automation of non-routine manual and cognitive tasks will displace a significant percentage of workers. We find that current trends of increasing inequalities will intensify due to the fact that automation will affect more low-skilled workers. We find that the current institutional design of the European Union is unfit to tackle educational and social protection challenges. We can therefore expect social resistance to technological progress and political instability in the years to come.
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