So, the TRUMP effect is succeeding and encouraging major corporations to come streaming back into America to rebuild plants and to recommit to employment. Problem of unemployment solved. Right? WRONG.
To compete in the global marketplace, companies will have to continue to outsource to places were labor is cheapest, environmental laws and other regulations the most lax. When that option is exhausted as a cost-control measure, big companies will turn to robotics and other means of automation. After all, robots don’t have unions. Robots never ask for a pay raise. Robots can work without coffee and lunch breaks. Robots can work 24/7 without accusing their employer of slave labor. Robots can work in a plant with no lighting and no heat, so operating costs are extremely low. Sounds devastating to us mere mortal beings, doesn’t it?
The optimist in us tells us that where there appears to be a problem, there is also an opportunity. So, you, (and your kids), have two choices. You can sit back and complain that you/they are being displaced by mere mechanics or you can jump on the bandwagon and try to find a place for yourselves in the new world order.
Robotics, automation, artificial intelligence…THAT’S where your future job is going to be. And it is not too far off. Years, not decades from now!
You will have to be robotics-oriented or you will find yourself looking for a government handout while you are standing in the unemployment line, right alongside any of your newly-graduated kids.
The message here is that ANYTIME technology ups the ante of the manufacturing game, you have to evolve and go with the flow. Technology keeps pushing the employment opportunity boundaries in two ways. It obsoletes existing jobs. It creates new jobs related to the new technology. And it is starting to happen.
Robots are already being installed in plants in America. But the reality is, manufacturers will be in a robotics race war with CHINA which has pledged to be world dominant in robotics and automation technology by 2030. American manufacturers either sit back and let China make EVERY SINGLE PRODUCT that the world will consume, or the nation’s manufacturers step up and challenge China for ROBOTIC DOMINATION of manufacturing. Either way, there will be no place for many of today’s typical jobs and sentient beings, (you or your kids).
For your kids, a good first step is to increase their competency in the original basic educational skills:
- Arithmetic, then Mathematics, (WITHOUT THE USE OF TECHNOLOGY, that is learning the basics of mental math without devices such as computers, handhelds, or calculators).
- Physics, (including electronics/electricity/mechanics), but evolving into curriculums including robotics.
- Chemistry.
- Biology.
- Coding skills.
- A foreign language.
For yourself…well, start re-orienting yourself away from the nonsense of news channels, soap operas, and sports, and towards various jobs related to robotics and other future trends. If you are carrying a job and supporting a family and paying your bills, today, this strongly suggests that you will have to spend you non-work time devoted to upping your skill levels in the new, immediate-future technology areas. Yup…you may have to do with a bit less sleep for the next few years as you build an entirely new skill set or as you deepen and enrich you existing skills, if, in the latter case, you already are deeply immersed in these near-future technology.
END NOTE
PHOTO: Joe McCauley, (left), and Fraser Feeney, (right) students at H.B. Beal Secondary School, London, Ontario, Canada, featuring their robot that is able to toss a basketball into a basketball net to promote RAIDER ROBOTICS 5024 Third Annual Science Expo. On the other side of the back wall, in a second auditorium, LEGO company was sponsoring an intense competition between students of London, (Canada), schools using LEGO BRAND robots which students programmed, (coded), to speed through an obstacle course. For those of you who have never attended such events, it is as exciting as watching any other competitive sport. As a result of these two events, a number of students have committed their personal visions, passion, enthusiasm to mastering robotic technology. Imagine YOUR kid in grade 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, having a vision that will be powerful enough to motivate them to study their sciences…without parental prompting!!
