With recent advancements in artificial intelligence, people are increasingly worried that powerful technology may eliminate several jobs in the future. Now, a new report by the McKinsey Global Institute says that more women than men stand to lose their jobs by the end of the decade because of the rise of artificial intelligence and automation.
The study found that nearly eight in ten women will be forced to move to another company or lose their job to artificial intelligence and automation in the workplace.
Industries that are expected to shrink the most because of automation are food services, customer service and sales, and office support. Women are overrepresented in these sectors and hold more low-paying jobs than men, so they stand to be more affected.
“Women are heavily represented in office support and customer service, which could shrink by about 3.7 million and 2.0 million jobs, respectively, by 2030,” the report states. Other low-wage jobs held primarily by women including retail salespeople and cashiers will also be affected, according to the report.
As a result, women will need to expand their skill sets to stay relevant in the workplace and move on to other positions. The report advised companies to recruit, hire, and train people who have the potential to learn how to work alongside automation.
In all, the McKinsey Global Institute said that at least 12 million workers in the US will need to change occupations by the end of 2030.
In an interview with CNN, Julia Pollak, a chief economist with ZipRecruiter, called the results “just staggering”.
However, he added, “I think intuitively many of us appreciate that, it'll be easier to automate some of these office jobs than it will be to automate carpenter jobs and electrician jobs and pest removal jobs — many of these manual services and production jobs that are far more male-heavy.”
In March 2023, a report by Goldman Sachs predicted that as many as 300 million jobs could be affected by generative AI. Generative AI systems like ChatGPT can create content very similar to human output and could spark a productivity boom over the next decade, the report said.
