Work and Employment - Essay Sample

Introduction

Globalisation may be regarded as the case where the world market becomes united and goes beyond the national border. Globalisation is an important topic of the international economy where it ensures a social-economic integration around the world. With the acceleration of globalisation and technological advances, it may be defined as the social, political, cultural and economic global integration on an international scale. However, the effect of globalisation on employment and jobs is a contemporary central issue of political economy. Although globalisation is regarded as a threat, increased jobs and employment is said to be a major cause that reduces poverty and helps in attaining sustainable development goals. However, the effect of globalisation on the global economy mechanism and labour markets may lead to the creation of jobs. The economic theory, therefore, recognises the role played by technology in accelerating economic growth. However, technological change consequences, indirect and direct effects of labour market dynamics is still a matter of debate. Globalisation and emergence of new technology have led to the generation of structural changes in most developed nations. This change affects spatial disparities and important economic activities. Therefore this essay will evaluate globalisation and how it has impacted the rise of new technology on the labour market.

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Background Information

Since the industrial era, there has been a fear of technological advancement thus, spawning mass unemployment. There emerged some prediction from Neoclassical economist who stated that this might not occur because the individual would search for other jobs, after a painful adjustment of a long period. However, that prediction has been proved to be inaccurate. About two hundred years of innovation since the industrial age dawn there has been improved living standard for ordinary people around the world with no cases of rising unemployment trend. There have been a lot of problems, such as inequality and increased horrific wars (Goroff, 2012). Although in most of the world people live longer, and live healthier lives and work a few hours. Moreover, it is evident that technological advancement has accelerated and thus this leading to more and deeper dislocations.

The Relationship Between Work, Employment and Globalisation

In developing countries, the significance of the relationship between employment and globalisation is increasing. On the contrary, the relationship is said to be difficult due to the globalisation nature of being a multi-faceted phenomenon where every facet has a different job and employment effect that varies with time, country, policies and industries. It also comes as a large array part of social, economic, policies, technical and legal changes, where each has a feedback and interaction thus making it challenging to separate globalisation effects. Moreover, there are various ways globalisation affects work; this is through foreign direct investment and increased trade. Foreign direct investment technology transfer increases competitiveness and efficiency rise and will ensure the industrial sector, quality product manufacturing cost will decrease and these factors will affect employment and increase export performance. Accelerating technological advancement, will intensify international trade, reduce competition and low-level manufacturing thus, this are the main factors that affect employment

How the Issue of Technology May Affect Employment and Work in Globalisation

Technological advancement is said to be low in the least developed countries, and a lot of them are ranked as lowest according to some international technology innovation indices. However, as countries adopt trade liberalisation policies in the last 20 years, they are faced with a huge challenge in how they may increase the technology and knowledge intensity of their economy to be able to compete with the international and national market. However, a study on skill accumulation and transfer in the least developed countries, (Mayer, 2000). Suggests that, the overall integration of technology among the least developed countries has increased. Therefore there is a need for least developed countries to adopt human capital that may integrate and absorb the advanced access to technology.

Global trade and new technological growth have led to the developed nation's structural change. The change alters economic activities and hence transforms their comparative advantage. This change also operates in sectors of activities through reallocating resources between tasks and occupations, and companies in a single sector. The developments have resulted in employment polarisation that is characterised by high and low wage jobs increased proportion at immediate pay jobs expense. This is through fostering intermediate jobs to high and low wage professions reallocation. It is said that technological change spread would affect the labour demand of employees performing some routine tasks; automation and computers will replace this employee. The example in France, a pool of local employment that employed a workforce that carried out repetitive tasks adopted more information technology in 1990; thus the country witnessed a decline in routine employment by the year 2011. (Toubal, 2018). However, most of the employment zones that highly depend on routine tasks have witnessed these tasks becoming more automated, and thus replaced by robots and computer. These developments are said to be unfavourable to the most unskilled employees.

Globalisation is at the forefront to increase the trade of services and goods, knowledge and capital. It also helps to speed up the technological spread around the world, where it offers various organisations the opportunities of reorganising their activities at the global level through trade or locating part or all their goods and services produced in foreign nations.

Globalisation could serve as an alternative factor that helps in explaining intermediate professional proportion through replacing tasks which are associated with jobs carried out abroad by the less costly workforce. Globalisation may also favour qualified employees through an increase in demand for non-routine work, of employees related to communication and management or organisation change between foreign company's affiliates. Inequalities between social, occupational categories and jobs, globalisation may bring about disparities between various employment pools. However, these effects may differ depending on where the international companies may choose to be located and thus depends on the decline and growth of the latter. The induced effect will enable territories to be affected by some varying extents that depend on their exposure intensity to globalisation. Technological change to globalisation effect may be differentiated with the local labour market characteristic.

In developing countries, technological change is mainly imported, and there is a connection between innovation and trade, international technology transfer and foreign direct investment. However, globalisation may lead to a technological upgrading among the developing countries by opening various channels. Moreover, a developed nation may implement technological advancement through importing mature machinery from other industries countries. However, the direct effect of embodied technological change, foreign direct investment and imports inflow may generate some spillover in technology that favours domestic firms that may absorb some imported new technologies through input-output relationships, labour mobility and reverse engineering. An example is the mobile telecommunication diffusion in Sub Saharan Africa nations, where networks of the traditional telephone are limited in urban centres. There may be technological catch-up inducement that involves export to developed countries through replacing or substituting some outdated technologies through developing new businesses and exporting sectors of new businesses that are characterised by product and product innovations. Technology transfer in developing nations leads to productivity gains that may be harmful to the employment level of local developing countries, where the dominant role of embodied technological change that implies to innovation process of labour saving may reduce domestic labour demand.

The main manifestation of the increasing world economy globalisation has been as a result of the foreign direct investment, world trade and financial flows of the cross border. This growth has been driven by economic liberalisation worldwide wave that includes lowering of non-tariff and tariff barriers of international trade, foreign investment encouragement, and financial market deregulation. However technological growth and development have increased the liberalisation effect by reducing communication and transportation cost. Thus this has helped in expanding volume and scope of goods and services which are tradable internationally.

Discussion

This research points out some disruptive technological changes nature thus stressing a wide range of job destruction implication. An estimate of about 47% of jobs in the US is susceptible to technological replacement. Frey and Osborne (2017. However, these facts overestimate the technological advancement effect of automation through focusing on the feasibility of technical capital-labour substitution.

Further technological advancement and automation is likely to destroy occupation but will, however, change the number and types of tasks in a lot of occupations. According to the World Bank report, less than twenty percent of jobs are said to disappear completely. ( World Bank, 2016 ). It is estimated that by 2030, 60 % of occupations may be automated. ( Pelissie, 2011).While this technological change may have an impact on employment and jobs globally, about 3 to 14 % of the global workforce needs to shift and switch their occupational categories. The social dialogue may play a major part in exploring options and in mediating new automation technological impacts on employees. Change in technology does not seem to have led to an increase in joblessness. However, there is a global employment that has continued to expand with the expanding labour force thus bringing the rate of global unemployment down to a rate of 5.6% (Inception Report for the Global Commission on the Future of Work, 2017). Moreover, the rate of job destruction has fallen over a long period.

Findings

Production process automation and the increased robots deployment require a huge investment. This investment will be unprofitable to countries with low cost of labour. Increase in income will likely lead to the adoption of automation technology and thus replace human with machine. Over the following decades, two-thirds of jobs may be automated (world bank, 2016). Flexible and mobile robots are supplied and at low prices. This robot performs various tasks and is said to have opened an opportunity window in creating jobs and developing new industries mostly in developing countries.

The Internet has helped in enhancing connectivity to global markets. There has being a development prospect improvement for countries which are capable of taking advantage of this connectivity and service supply around any point of the world. Today, the growth of the service sector plays an important and increasing role in the process of development. Developing and emerging economies may be able to mitigate its adverse impacts from production potential restoring through increasing their service trade.

Digitalisation may also have a positive effect on the developing nation's strength. Innovation ecosystems that include marker spaces and tech hubs are accessible o...