Runaway Automation

When you think of robots, you probably think of large steel giants with guns for arms and lasers in their eyes. And while those kinds of robots are probably in development, there's a much scarier kind of robot taking over the United States. 

Automation. Literally meaning, "the use of largely automatic equipment in a system of manufacturing or other production process."  When Henry Ford invented the assembly line, it skyrocketed production rates across the globe in all kinds of companies. Back then, the assembly line was made up of human workers. Now, as technology is getting exponentially better, many production facilities are using more and more automated robots to complete tasks. The largest example is in the automobile industry, where almost all of the car is being put together by robotic arms. 

While this move to an automated system works wonders for the company using it, the workers that are getting laid off because of it are not as happy. A recent McKinsey Global Institute study found that a staggering 70 million workers could lose their jobs due to rising automation rates by 2030 (Big Think). 70 million is a massive chunk of the American workforce and would ultimately destroy the economy unless there is a solution found for those people. 

In a recent blog post on the website Big Think, automation was listed as one of the top 6 technological fears of the future, along with others like biomedical advancements and autonomous artificial intelligence. The author drew from a Pew Research report that 72 percent of  U.S. adults are worried about runaway automation.