The Skill Content of Recent Technological Change: An Empirical Exploration

Abstract

We apply an understanding of what computers dothe execution of procedural or rules-based logicto study how computer technology alters job skill demands. We contend that computer capital (1) substitutes for a limited and well-defined set of human activities, those involving routine (repetitive) cognitive and manual tasks; and (2) complements activities involving non-routine problem solving and interactive tasks. Provided these tasks are imperfect substitutes, our model implies measurable changes in the task content of employment, which we explore using representative data on job task requirements over 1960 -1998. Computerization is associated with declining relative industry demand for routine manual and cognitive tasks and increased relative demand for non-routine cognitive tasks. Shifts are evident within detailed industries, within detailed occupations, and within education groups within industries. Translating observed task shifts into educational demands, the sum of within-industry and within-occupation task changes explains thirty to forty percent of the observed relative demand shift favoring college versus noncollege labor during 1970 to 1998, with the largest impact felt after 1980. Changes in task content within nominally identical occupations explain more than half of the overall demand shift induced by computerization. on other developing and developed countries. Herbert Simon (1960) provides the first treatment of this question with which we are familiar. His essay introduces many of the ideas explored here. Influential studies in the ethnography of work literature provide insightftil discussions of what computers and related technology do in the workplace but do not consider economic implications

Estimating German overqualification with stochastic earnings frontiers

“…Finding earnings of unqualified workers distinctly below their potential earnings is also in line with the idea of Autor et al (2003) that technology substitutes labor on routine tasks and that this typically takes place in the middle of the wage distribution. The consequence for low-qualified people is that while some of them are working for a medium range wage, more and more are concentrated in "bad jobs" with low wages.…”

The evolving knowledge base of professional service sectors

“…Yet another contribution is the practical reading of how knowledge impinges upon sectoral dynamics not in abstract but rather in terms of practical application of learned routines. This resonates with Rosenberg's (1976: 86) remark about the role of 'qualitative changes in the human agent as a factor of production' and the centrality of individual learning processes that has found its place in some literature (Howell and Wolff 1992;Autor et al 2003;Neffke and Henning 2009;Giuri et al 2010).…”

“…The statistical exercise highlights an equally plausible association between Type 1 sectors, Legal and Accounting, and Cognitive Routine skills. This is interpreted as indicative of growing routinization in the array of activities involved along the lines suggested by Autor et al (2003).…”

“…Two specific contributions in this area connect explicitly changes in employment patterns to the pools of workers' skills. 1 An analysis of the impact of computerization on the demand for skills by Autor et al (2003) shows that the widespread adoption of ICTs associates with higher demand for non-routine cognitive and interpersonal skills, with lower demand for routine analytical skills and with a negligible impact on the demand for manual skills. Still focussing on the wave of ICT adoption in the U.S. economy, Levy and Murnane (2004) observe significant increase in the importance of expert thinking -i.e.…”

Production and work in the American metropolis: a macroscopic approach

“…In a series of recent publications, Autor et al (2003Autor et al ( , 2006 and Levy and Murnane (2004) have argued that this sort of change has been a function above all of the unparalleled capacity of digital technologies to substitute for live labor in a wide variety of mental and manual tasks, while at the same time complementing the capacity of the workforce to perform at increasingly higher levels of complexity. In this manner, large numbers of tedious, repetitive jobs in areas such as routine accounting, book-keeping, filing, machineminding, materials handling, assembly work, and so on, are disappearing from the modern economy.…”