Men and better-paid white-collar workers’ jobs more likely to be affected by AI, research suggests
- The AI revolution could affect work in nearly every occupation, but certain demographics will be impacted more, research from the Brookings Institution suggests
- Men, over-represented in both analytical, technical and professional roles as well as production, work in occupations with much higher AI exposure
Earlier waves of automation may have already taken the most repetitive jobs from the hands of factory workers, but the artificial intelligence (AI) revolution is likely to most affect better-educated and better-paid white-collar workers, many of them men, according to a study released on Wednesday.
Brookings Institution researchers overlaid keywords in AI-related patents with job descriptions listed in the US government’s official occupational database to measure each job’s varying levels of “exposure” to AI applications in the near future.
The findings showed that AI could affect work in virtually every occupational group. A previous analysis by Stanford University PhD candidate Michael Webb, who developed the technique used in the Brookings researchers’ study, found that 740 out of 769 occupational descriptions analysed contained one or more of tasks that could potentially be exposed to, complemented by or completed by AI.
While research on automation’s robotics and software continues to show that less-educated, lower-wage workers may be most vulnerable to displacement, the Washington-based institute’s latest analysis showed that AI will be a significant factor in the future work lives of relatively well-paid managers, supervisors and analysts.
Bachelor’s degree holders were the most exposed to AI by education level, more than five times as much as workers with just a high school degree, while those with graduate or professional degrees were four times more exposed than high school degree holders.
“Unlike robotics (associated with the factory floor) and computers (associated with routine office activities), AI has a distinctly white-collar bent,” the researchers said in the report.
