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Who will fare the best against the challenges of automation predicted for our future?
Key points:
- Five million jobs in major developed countries are expected to disappear by 2020
- Researchers ranked 25 Australian cities on their preparedness for the future of work
- Their index considers six measures like education, ability to attract talent and digital innovation
One team of researchers believe we've been approaching this question all wrong, and we should be thinking about how cities, not countries, will adapt.
The OECD is predicting that half of all jobs will be automated in the coming two decades, prompting calls for more investment in 'knowledge economies'.
Those predictions prompted Professor Lawrence Pratchett and his team to examine 25 cities across Australia in order to create an index to rank so-called 'knowledge cities'.
"We thought it would be really useful to understand what that means for different cities, particularly in Australia," he said.
Professor Pratchett said cities are ranked in the Knowledge City Index based on how resilient or capable they will be to meet future challenges.
"The debate around knowledge cities talks about the idea that there are chance relationships that emerge from being near people and knowledge precincts," he said.
"One of our measures is knowledge mobility, that is the capacity of a city to attract people from outside of the city to come and work there.
"What we've found is that geography is really, really important."
Professor Pratchett and his team examined 25 cities across Australia and used six factors to create the index.
"We then used a data standardisation process to bring those things together and so our knowledge city index takes into account size as well," he said.
Regional mayors keen to meet future challenges
However, Professor Pratchett said he was open to discussion and tweaking the index based on feedback.
How was the index calculated?
- Knowledge capacity, or the educational qualifications of the city's residents
- Knowledge mobility, or the extent to which the city can attract people from outside its boundaries
- Digital access, or the the physical infrastructure of the knowledge economy, including internet
- Knowledge industries, the number of people employed in knowledge industries in the city
- Income, or the number of workers earning more than $104,000 per annum
- Smart work, or the proportion of workers who work from home instead of commuting
"I would gladly engage with all 25 mayors of those cities," he said.
"[We want to] understand more about those cities come out with the measures that they do, and how we might then enhance public policy debate."
Despite coming in last, the regional Queensland city of Bundaberg is keen to keep up with a changing world.
"At the end of the day, the young entrepreneurs are actually getting in, being supported by their regional council and we're really kicking some goals," Mayor Jack Dempsey said.
Canberra came in second in the index despite its small population, followed by Melbourne and other capitals. Sydney, Australia's biggest city, came in on top.
"It certainly is gratifying, this idea that the investment the city has made over the past 12 years on sustainable, inclusive, creative economy is actually paying off," Sydney councillor Jess Scully said.
However, Newcastle Mayor Nuatali Nelmes said there were hurdles with technological change, when especially older residents cannot keep up.
"One of the bigger challenges I find is actually communicating the broader population," Ms Nelmes said.
"Making sure that it is inclusive of seniors in our community, people who have English as a second language and people who don't have access to technology."
Topics: work, robots-and-artificial-intelligence, australia
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