Machines and foreign competition will
replace 1 of American jobs. But work
will be plentiful for people 2 in the
occupations of the future. The Labor Department predicts a net increase of 25
million new jobs in the United States in 1995, 3
service-industry jobs growing three times
4 rapidly as factory jobs. "Work will shift its emphasis
from the fatigue and 5 of the production
line and the typing pool to the more interesting challenge of the electronic
service center, the design studio, the research laboratory, the education
institute, and the training school, "predicts Canadian economist
Calvert. Jobs in high-tech fields will multiply
fastest, 6 from a low base. In 7 of actual numbers, more mundane occupations
will experience the biggest surge: custodians, cashiers, secretaries, waiters
and clerks. Yet much of the drudge work will be taken 8
by robots. The 9
of robots performing blue-collar tasks will increase 10 3 000 in 1981 to 40 000 in 1990, says John E.
Taylor of the Human Resources Research Organization in Alexandria, Va. Robots
might also be found on war zones, 11 space-even in the office, perhaps 12 coffee, opening mall and delivering messages. One unsolved
problem: what to do 13 workers displaced
by high technology and foreign competition. 14
the world "the likelihood of growing permanent unemployment is
becoming 15 accepted as a reality among
social planners," notes David Macarov, associate professor of the Hebrew
University in Jerusalem. Meantime, the percentage of time people 16 on the job is 17
to continue to fall. Robert Theobald, 18
of Avoiding 1984, fears that joblessness will
19 to increasing depression, bitterness, and unrest. "The
dramatic consequences of such a shift on the Western psyche,
20 has made the job the way we value human beings, are
almost incalculable, "he comments.