The global job market will be rocked by huge disruptions over the next five years as the economy weakens and companies boost the adoption of technologies such as artificial intelligence (AI) to replace manual work, a new report has revealed.
That finding comes from the World Economic Forum (WEF), which published a report based on surveys of more than 800 companies, reports CNN.
IANS says that WEF, which hosts a gathering of global leaders in Davos, Switzerland, every year, found that employers expect to create 69 million new jobs by 2027 and eliminate 83 million positions.
That will result in a net loss of 14 million jobs, equivalent to 2 per cent of current employment, CNN reported.
But... why?
Many factors will feed labour market churn during that period. The shift to renewable energy systems will be a powerful engine for generating jobs, while slower economic growth and high inflation will drive losses.
The rush to deploy artificial intelligence (AI), meanwhile, will serve as both a positive and a negative force. Companies will need new workers to help them implement and manage AI tools.
The employment of data analysts and scientists, machine learning (ML) specialists, and cybersecurity experts is forecast to grow 30 per cent on average by 2027, according to WEF.
At the same time, the proliferation of artificial intelligence will put many roles at risk, as robots replace humans in some cases. There could be 26 million fewer record-keeping and administrative jobs by 2027, WEF predicted. Data entry clerks and executive secretaries are expected to see the steepest losses, CNN reported.
Despite the recent controversy surrounding tools like ChatGPT, automation has expanded slowly in the early part of this decade.
Organisations polled by WEF estimated that 34 per cent of all business-related tasks are currently performed by machines. That's just a hair above the figure from 2020.
