Exploring the Effects of Automated Production Lines on Traditional Manufacturing Jobs

Abstract

When famous companies such as BMW and Fast introduced fully automated production lines, some workers lost their jobs. This article mainly studies the impacts of automated production lines on labor market, including the job opportunities of high-skilled and low- skilled employees, worker’s wages and two important effects which are replacement effect and creative effects. In the research, I analyze the labor market situations of several economies and use some important data to show the current labor market trends. The result is that the introduction of automation will increase employment opportunities for high-skilled workers, but workers' wages may fall because the tasks of labor are smaller than those of machines. Meanwhile, the extent of impacts of replacement and creative effect on labour market might depends on time period and the relevant size between those. According to impacts, the policies for protecting labor force and increasing economic growth rates have been proposed. It is also expected that more job positions would be provided when the labor could adjust to the development of automated production lines in the future, and the productivity of firms will be improved dramatically.