Crystal gazing and the future of work

Workforce, Sept, 2002 by Todd Raphael

Look into your crystal ball at the workforce of the future. You probably see a labor shortage-millions of jobs, too many retired people.

As a world-renowned futurist, Joe Coates sees something else. He sees a society in which tens of thousands of people have no jobs-no livelihood at all.

Coates, who holds 19 patents from his first career as an industrial chemist, says that automation will cause a massive labor surplus within about 10 years. He estimates that by then, about 70 percent of the workforce will do all the work.

Kroger won't need as many cashiers, because checkout stands will be automated. FedEx won't need as many delivery people, because machines will do more sorting. Shipping empire Maersk won't need as many longshoremen, because machines will determine which packages belong on which trucks.

The public-policy implications of such a labor surplus are enormous. If we're going to have a surplus, as Coates predicts, we should debate whether to lower-not raise-the retirement age, because there won't be a need for as many older employees.

We should consider making sabbaticals commonplace for people outside academia. We may even consider paying people to raise children, he says.

Roger Herman, Tom Olivo, and Joyce Gioia take the opposite point of view. In their new book, Impending Crisis: Too Many Jobs, Too Few People, the authors write about job shortages and warn HR leaders of "a potential catastrophe just around the corner."

Herman notes that many economists predict that unemployment will be only about 4 percent in 2010. And the Bureau of Labor Statistics predicts that in the same year, the U.S. employment market will have about 10.3 million more jobs available than warm bodies to fill them.

Coates doesn't have a problem with those figures, at least on the surface. He says that Herman's numbers forecasting a significant labor shortage tend to be accurate, if you follow a "conventional and traditional model of thinking." But, he says, Herman is "terribly mis-estimating the consequences of information technology on the society."

Herman admits that automation does have some effect on workforce planning. On the other hand, he is quick to point out that between 2000 and 2010, the four occupations requiring the greatest number of new employees will be food preparation and service, customer service, registered nursing, and retail sales.

"How'd you like to be cared for by an automated nurse?" he asks.

Indeed, it's hard to imagine that within 10 years all of these jobs could be automated. Sure, more of us will scan our own groceries. But new jobs will be created in other industries to replace work that is obsolete. We'll have jobs for people to design and program and maintain and sell all of those new self-service grocery machines.

It's a lot like what's happening in the HR field. If you installed HRMS and benefits self-service, over a period of several years your ratio of employees to HR pros would increase from, perhaps, 80:1 to 110:1. Just because your employee-to-HR ratio increased, however, doesn't mean that automation caused unemployment. You downsized because you automated your benefits administration. The company that built that benefits software grew-it hired programmers to build the system and upgrade it, designers to design it, and a sales force to hawk it. Meanwhile, you outsourced some of your functions to Exult, Hewitt, and others. They also hired some of your former colleagues.

Ira Wolfe, a futurist who calls his standard speech "The Perfect Labor Storm: Why This Labor Shortage Will Not Blow Over," says automation doesn't cost-and even creates-jobs. Wolfe was in a fast-food convenience store on August 1 and noticed that it took three "associates" and one store manager to check out a customer, while the line stretched out the door.

Thanks to automation, the convenience (word used loosely) store doesn't have to take time to inventory its products and can now track customer buying-habits. But automation didn't enable it to hire fewer customer-service employees, nor are these employees working more quickly because of technology.

Look, this debate about the future isn't just an academic exercise. The labor shortage affects more than HR; it also affects you and me when we're not at work. Patients in hospitals with high turnover, for example, are sicker and stay in the hospital longer, according to VHA, a hospital cooperative.

We have a decade to see which side is right. My money says that in 10 years, I will not be cared for by an automatic nurse.