2 Billion Jobs to disappear from the world market

[Enki]

http://www.wfs.org/content/2-billion-jo ... ppear-2030

Yesterday I was honored to be one of the featured speakers at the TEDxReset Conference in Istanbul, Turkey where I predicted that over 2 billion jobs will disappear by 2030. Since my 18-minute talk was about the rapidly shifting nature of colleges and higher education, I didn’t have time to explain how and why so many jobs would be going away. Because of all of the questions I received afterwards, I will do that here.

If you haven’t been to a TEDx event, it is hard to confer the life-changing nature of something like this. Ali Ustundag and his team pulled off a wonderful event.

The day was filled with an energizing mix of musicians, inspiration, and big thinkers. During the breaks, audience members were eager to hear more and peppered the speakers with countless questions. They were also extremely eager to hear more about the future.

When I brought up the idea of 2 billion jobs disappearing (roughly 50% of all the jobs on the planet) it wasn’t intended as a doom and gloom outlook. Rather, it was intended as a wakeup call, letting the world know how quickly things are about to change, and letting academia know that much of the battle ahead will be taking place at their doorstep.

Here is a brief overview of five industries – where the jobs will be going away and the jobs that will likely replace at least some of them – over the coming decades.


1.) Power Industry

Until now, the utility companies existed as a safe career path where little more than storm-related outages and an occasional rate increase would cause industry officials to raise their eyebrows.

Yet the public has become increasingly vocal about their concerns over long-term health and environmental issues relating to the current structure and disseminating methods of of the power industry, causing a number of ingenious minds to look for a better way of doing things.

Recently I was introduced to two solutions that seem predestined to start the proverbial row of dominoes to start falling. There are likely many more waiting in the wings, but these two capitalize on existing variances found in nature and are unusually elegant in the way they solve the problem of generating clean power at a low cost.

Both companies have asked me to keep quiet about their technology until they are a bit farther along, but I will at least explain the overarching ramifications.

I should emphasize that both technologies are intended to work inside the current utility company structure, so the changes will happen within the industry itself.

To begin with, these technologies will shift utilities around the world from national grids to micro grids that can be scaled from a single home to entire cities. The dirty power era will finally be over and the power lines that dangle menacingly over our neighborhoods, will begin to come down. All of them.

While the industry will go through a long-term shrinking trend, the immediate shift will cause many new jobs to be created.

[YMix]

Interesting.

[NapLajoieonSteroids]

Interesting.

yes, interesting, thanks for posting.

[Demon of Undoing]

Learn much science, be prepared to learn new skills at WiFi speeds. Got it.

[noddy]

the thing i dont get when thinking about this, is just exactly what is expected.

are we talking food,housing,basic health and access to self education ? ... australia and england have had that for a long time now, apparently its not enough, apparently its unfair that "rich" people can party more and have more toys or something.

i do agree that low skilled work is going away, i even agree that their a reasonable percentage of the population that is only capable of enough focus todo unskilled work... what i dont have is any clear viewpoint on what exactly they "deserve"... above and beyond food and housing and the means to learn a new trade.

prepared to learn new skills at WiFi speeds

thats been my ruleset for my entire adult life and its not that bad, you dont get boring ruts very often and once you get over your existential fears of the unknown its not as hard as people make it out to be.... as someone who is always introducing new computerised systems to unwilling workforces it still shocks me sometimes just how paranoid and angry people get about having to learn a new thing, you would think i was trying to kill them.

[Demon of Undoing]

I personally don't appreciate it that much. It's a phenomenal pain in the ass. I'd much rather have a finite set of things I could apply myself to, in an environment with less opportunities to deal have to deal with those out- of- left- field ideas. I don't like the idea of having to learn a new career every 7.4 years. I'm the kind of guy that polishes sword blades on rocks, hunched over a wooden bracket by a river, for hour after year after decade. I want to spend six years perfecting one bow shot. You can't do that now. Not at this pace, not with these many unknowns.

But alas, 1492. Since I can't have a rock by a river, since they just had to piss off Eris, I guess we play hardball. Multitasking is a shitty way to go through life, though. makes you crazy.

[Enki]

Ultimately the focus on 'jobs' an 'production' as the primary motivators of society is no longer tenable. We are either going to go through a period of mass atrocity where resources are available, just certain people don't get them because there is no job that needs them. Or else we basically have a dependency state.

What I gather from speaking to my Liberal friends is that the expectation of what the government should provide for someone is: Food, Clothing, Shelter, Healthcare, Transportation and Internet Access. The thinking goes that they deserve to be healthy and secure, and that they deserve to have access to the job market so they can better their station. Past that I don't hear much about people deserving things.

[noddy]

i actually agree with both of you in this case, my viewpoint is mainly for my mental health ... keeping expectations inline with the realities.

unfortunately for me their is a certain level of kumbaya involved with "post stress' futures, perhaps im my own problem but i suspect not... i really cant see how this "attitude of the times" in the modern west even allows for the mind your own business, slower life... even if its technically possible i cant see the interventionist politics and social engineering going anywhere. left or right wing, stable economics or not, their is always going to be assholes with an agenda for my life, playing games with the rules.

they dont call em conservatives and progressives for nothing, they are constantly fixated on "improving" things to their tastes.. spending quality time on your priorities is not on their agenda.

[noddy]

What I gather from speaking to my Liberal friends is that the expectation of what the government should provide for someone is: Food, Clothing, Shelter, Healthcare, Transportation and Internet Access. The thinking goes that they deserve to be healthy and secure, and that they deserve to have access to the job market so they can better their station. Past that I don't hear much about people deserving things.

australia and england and canada have all these, except our education has recently become debt based, which im not a fan of... america is a tad different, your social safety nets seem to have more gaps in them than ours.

its not enough.. the reality is that their are non statistical elements to this, the atomisation, the lack of reasons to keep yourself together, the lack of being important.. not sure how you put it in words but this whole problem is existential its not rational and fixable with taxes and new services

how do you get that comfy little village "self worth" .. the basic sense of being a part of something and being wanted in this brave new world... it all feels like endless primary school to me, no matter how many angles i sniff it from.

[Enki]

Agreed noddy, agreed.

I fear Brave New World where interpersonal intimacy is considered some kind of deviant behavior.