Transcript 0:00 [upbeat music] Welcome back to the Peggy Smedley Show, the podcasting voice of IoT and digital transformation. Hello, listeners, and welcome back to the Peggy Smedley Show. 0:14 My guest today conducts data-driven studies of issues related to personal finance and economics with a special interest on migration. Please welcome Derek Miller, senior research analyst of LendingTree and Magnify. 0:30 Derek, welcome to the show. Hi. Thanks for having me. So Derek, there's a lot to talk about when we are looking at what makes a job vulnerable to automation. I'd love to get your thoughts on that one. Yeah. 0:44 I mean, so in the past, uh, when you think about it, um, uh, you had stuff like sort of plow horses or, you know, uh, other saving labor devices that work on farms. 0:53 Um, and so basically, you were limited to, um, what kind of problems, um, could someone create and think of an automatable solution. Um, so traditionally, you know, that's been manufacturing workers. 1:06 You think about, you know, working in manufacturing, that's a lot of manual labor doing pretty, uh, repeatable tasks that, um, someone could program a machine to do pretty easily. 1:15 So it's basically what sort of problems can people, um, create a machine to do pretty easily? 1:21 Recently, uh, one reason we see, you know, so many automatable jobs that, uh, the increase in big data, uh, improvement in sensors, uh, and other sort of machine learning algorithms has meant more and more tasks that, you know, previously were seen too difficult to automate, um, have proven to be automatable. 1:40 So I think the last time we used plow horses might've been quite some time. I don't think we've used [laughing] plow horses anytime soon, but- Certainly not. Mm-hmm... I mean, when you look at that... 1:50 When you think about that, though, I mean, you make a good point. I mean, think about, uh, plow horses. When we- Mm-hmm... 1:55 moved away from plow horses, I would think farmers and things like that were nervous about making- Mm-hmm... the transition to automation. I think- Mm-hmm... 2:03 we're at that same point in time now when we think manufacturers or construction or any market, retail, any industry you're in that has to be automated, and I, and I kind of made a whole list in my first segment about the percentage and time that we're gonna be automated out by AI, and I think- Mm-hmm... 2:23 c- industries get nervous by that. But instead of being afraid of it, they need to upskill up and think about where they're gonna be in that whole chain of automation. 2:33 And shouldn't companies take some responsibility to help upskill their employees instead of ra... 2:39 instead of being nervous about being job vulnerable to automation, how they can actually leverage and help those employees do something better with their lives? Uh, definitely. 2:50 I think there's, um, obviously if one, um, set of skills becomes automationable, um, you know, it increases the productivity of other workers. 2:58 I think, um, there are probably also other benefits to just having internal knowledge of an industry. 3:03 Um, just because, you know, maybe one worker at your company, his, his or her job has become automatable, doesn't mean his, his other skills and industry knowledge, you know, are no longer valuable. 3:13 Um, thinking of ways of retraining internal employees or, um, maneuvering them around, I think could definitely, um, give a competitive edge to some companies who do wanna do that, rather than just looking at maybe some short-term, um, you know, cost advantages of, of replacing some workers with machines. 3:30 I think that's absolutely right. I mean, if you think about it right now, w- if, if we're thinking about the industries that are going to be v- vulnerable and, and some of the ones- Mm-hmm... 3:40 that I talk about is we talk about things like retail. By twenty thirty-one- Mm-hmm... you know, automation's gonna replace a lot of them. Uh- Mm-hmm... driving a truck, twenty twenty-seven. Mm-hmm. 3:50 These are all what PWC and things are, are saying things like this, but if we look at some of these, I... and, and we think that AI is going to... What other industries are you seeing that would... 4:03 that, you know, they're going to be vulnerable to automation and technology? 4:06 I mean, is it going to be that you better do something, or it's even sooner than this, you're going to find yourself out of a job unless you start doing something to help yourself be in a job? 4:18 Yeah, I mean, it's hard, it's hard to say. Um, from the research I've read, you're right, maybe ten to twenty-year horizons. 4:24 So, you know, if you're, if you're maybe an older worker, it's, it's more difficult to transition out. If you're younger, maybe it's something to think about, um, for sure. 4:32 Um, other industries, you know, that maybe get less, less play in the media, um, administrative office support workers, um, is a group of occupations or, uh, for example, insurance claim processing clerks had, you know, ninety-eight to ninety-seven percent risk of automation. 4:48 Uh, according to the research I was looking at, brokerage clerks, order clerks, all, um, highly automatable, not that often discussed, and there are, you know, hundreds of thousands of these people. 4:58 These are traditionally, you know, sort of middle-class jobs, uh, median skill levels that, you know, typically pay pretty well. 5:06 So, so that's, um, a, a, another concern is sort of it's not just, you know, uh, lower class jobs that are dis-disappearing in the production field, also, you know, middle class office support jobs that, um, according to this data, have, uh, some pretty significant automation risks. 5:22 Do cities themselves need to worry about this? I mean, we always talk about individuals having to worry about being ou- you know, losing their jobs. 5:30 What about cities that now have to worry about the income that they have? People aren't gonna live there anymore. 'Cause you always walk and you see cities and you say, "Wow, you know, there's no storefronts anymore." 5:40 I mean, do they have- Yeah... to worry that people are gonna move out of those cities, and the cities are gonna be wiped out? Yeah, I think, I think absolutely it's important. 5:49 Um, you know, uh, uh, our data showed Las Vegas, um, to be one of the most at-risk big cities. 5:55 Roughly two-thirds of jobs there, um, are, are at risk of automation, partially, uh- Nobody's gonna gamble?Nobody's going there to gamble anymore? [laughs] Well, uh, they'll come to gamble. 6:05 It's, uh, the gaming dealers, for example, um, all the people working in the support industries, uh, the food processors, the waitresses, all those jobs are rated pretty highly, um, for automatability. 6:16 Um, but it's, um, not just Las Vegas. Even at the lower end, San Jose had a roughly fifty percent. 6:22 But I guess if, you know, if you're maybe i-uh, in Las Vegas and thinking about that, um, possibly trying to, uh, diversify the economy of the city, if possible, would be something I would be concerned about, or thinking about ways of, um, encouraging retraining for people who do live there. 6:38 Um, you know, but if it is maybe a smaller sized city w-with very, very concentrated industries that are highly automatable, 6:47 you know, I think we've seen maybe some cities maybe a hundred years ago used to be, um, pretty important, and they're much less important now. 6:54 Um, if, if, you know, the economy just starts moving in one direction, I'm not sure what we can do or even cities could do if they're sort of, 7:03 uh, kind of against the crush of automation and, you know, a whole industry disappears and that was the whole industry for the city. I think that would be a tough, tough situation. 7:12 You know, that's an interesting point to think about. I was... I was... I was being facetious about Vegas, but think about that. Mm-hmm. 7:17 You know, servicing, you know, you have all these people who might wanna come to gamble, but then you don't- Yeah... have people who can afford to live there anymore to actually service- Right... 7:24 the people who wanna gamble. I mean, there's- Yep... that's a very interesting point in looking at things like that because I think they take some of that for granted. Mm-hmm. 7:31 And how are you going to be able to afford the people who are going to service all these other communities who live there- Yeah... to be able to do all this? And vacation spots and things like that. I mean- Yep... 7:40 are some of those things need to be taken into consideration to figure out how you're gonna do it? 7:45 I mean, the same thing like when you think, I don't know, I think of like, you know, Disneyland and things, Disney World- Mm-hmm. Yep... and, you know, some of those where people have to live to kind of support. 7:53 I know they automate a lot of things in those tourist areas, but that then- Yeah... comes into play that some of those areas are going to be vulnerable. Absolutely. I mean, this is, um, sort of an issue in San Francisco. 8:05 You see a lot with, um, commute times for, for workers are skyrocketing, uh, because that cost of living is so high, uh, they're forced to work farther and farther away. 8:14 Now, you know, if, if sort of middle class jobs end up being more and more automated, you'll see just as say in Disney, a lot of those, um, hospitality industry jobs, um, that, you know, can pay pretty well but are also vulnerable, um, to automation. 8:28 Um, if people decide to leave, that could hurt the industry. Um, you know, if you don't have enough workers, they create, you know, their own demand as well, so it's not just the jobs that are being automated. 8:38 It's then, you know, that income from those jobs that create demand for other jobs that sort of create, you know, a feedback loop into the whole economy. 8:46 Uh, even if you can, uh, automate, um, you know, some jobs and make some savings, if you then aren't able to turn that into more jobs, uh, ideally higher paying jobs, then, um, you know, the, the benefits of the automation won't accrue to the city. 8:58 It'll actually just accrue to the tourists who come and then bring their savings back to the cities they live in. Well, it's interesting point. 9:05 Derek Miller, Senior Research Analyst of LendingTree and Magnify, thank you for being with us. What's your URL? Uh, magnifymoney.com and lendingtree.com. Thank you so much. 9:16 We'll have to have you come back and talk more about this. I appreciate your time. Thank you again. I'd love to. Thank you for having me. All right. Remember, we are broadcast live every Tuesday at twelve PM Central. 9:27 Please check out our website at connectedworld.com or our show website at www.thepeggySmedleyShow.com. As always, share your thoughts with me on Twitter or follow us at ConnectedWMag. All right. 9:39 This is The Peggy Smedley Show, the podcasting voice of IoT and digital transformation. Remember, with great technology comes great responsibility. Have an awesome week. Thank you. 9:51 [upbeat music] Constructek TV, your fierce advocates for construction. 10:03 Constructek TV digs into infrastructure, drills into global economic conditions. 10:09 It is changing the talent gap narrative, adopting a new vision and a voice to the new skilled worker in construction, all with the help of technology. 10:19 Constructek TV, everything you need for infrastructure, labor, and technology. 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