Global labor markets are poised for a new era of turbulence as technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) accelerate the decline of clerical work, while simultaneously increasing demand for technology and cybersecurity specialists.
Over the next five years, nearly one-quarter of all jobs would change as a result of AI, digitization and other economic developments such as the green energy transition and supply chain reshoring, a report published yesterday by the World Economic Forum in Geneva showed.
About 69 million jobs would be created and 83 million eliminated by 2027, resulting in a net decrease of 2 percent of current employment, the Future of Jobs report said.
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The survey is based on input from about 800 companies employing more than 11 million workers across 45 economies and uses a dataset of 673 million jobs.
While the study expects AI to result in “significant labor-market disruption,” the net effect of most technologies would be positive over the next five years as big data analytics, management technologies and cybersecurity become the biggest drivers of employment growth.
The emergence of AI applications such as ChatGPT, which uses large language models to simulate human reasoning and problem solving, would have a particularly pronounced effect by displacing and automating many roles that involve reasoning, communicating and coordinating, the report said.
About 75 percent of surveyed companies said they expect to adopt AI technologies over the next five years, which they predict would eliminate up to 26 million jobs in record-keeping and administrative positions — such as cashiers, ticket clerks, data entry and accounting.
For now, AI remains a smaller threat to labor prospects than other macroeconomic factors such as slower economic growth, supply shortages and inflation, the report said.
Opportunities for job creation would likely come from investments that facilitate the green transition of businesses, the broader application of environmental, social and governance standards, and a broad reorientation of global supply chains, it said.
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Taiwanese manufacturers have a chance to play a key role in the humanoid robot supply chain, Tongtai Machine and Tool Co (東台精機) chairman Yen Jui-hsiung (嚴瑞雄) said yesterday. That is because Taiwanese companies are capable of making key parts needed for humanoid robots to move, such as harmonic drives and planetary gearboxes, Yen said. This ability to produce these key elements could help Taiwanese manufacturers “become part of the US supply chain,” he added. Yen made the remarks a day after Nvidia Corp cofounder and chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said his company and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) are jointly
United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) expects its addressable market to grow by a low single-digit percentage this year, lower than the overall foundry industry’s 15 percent expansion and the global semiconductor industry’s 10 percent growth, the contract chipmaker said yesterday after reporting the worst profit in four-and-a-half years in the fourth quarter of last year. Growth would be fueled by demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers, a moderate recovery in consumer electronics and an increase in semiconductor content, UMC said. “UMC’s goal is to outgrow our addressable market while maintaining our structural profitability,” UMC copresident Jason Wang (王石) told an online earnings
MARKET SHIFTS: Exports to the US soared more than 120 percent to almost one quarter, while ASEAN has steadily increased to 18.5 percent on rising tech sales The proportion of Taiwan’s exports directed to China, including Hong Kong, declined by more than 12 percentage points last year compared with its peak in 2020, the Ministry of Finance said on Thursday last week. The decrease reflects the ongoing restructuring of global supply chains, driven by escalating trade tensions between Beijing and Washington. Data compiled by the ministry showed China and Hong Kong accounted for 31.7 percent of Taiwan’s total outbound sales last year, a drop of 12.2 percentage points from a high of 43.9 percent in 2020. In addition to increasing trade conflicts between China and the US, the ministry said
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