The New Division of Labor: How Computers Are Creating the Next Job Market

Education Next, Wntr, 2005

The New Division of Labor: How Computers Are Creating the Next Job Market, by Frank Levy and Richard J. Murnane (Princeton University Press).

On the big screen, self-aware and insubordinate robots mount organized rebellions that are defeated only by grand acts of human heroism. In the real world, policy challenges posed by new technologies are less dramatic, but only slightly less daunting.

As economists Levy and Murnane explain, computers excel at tasks that can be reduced to the application of a set of rules (if X, then do Y), but fall short when it comes to more complex tasks involving the recognition of patterns (this reminds me of the time ...). The distinction, while hardly clear-cut, is useful. For instance, it explains why the rise of computers has not led to mass unemployment, as early observers worried, but instead has increased demand for workers capable of nonroutine, expert thinking.

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The authors embrace "standards-based reform" as a means of bolstering our flagging school system to meet this demand, wisely noting that proficiency in core academic subjects is a prerequisite for higher-order tasks. Unfortunately, they also deem improvement in education a "slow and difficult process" that "cannot reach everyone"--thoughts seemingly inconsistent with the sense of urgency that authentic reform will require.