By Mark Williams and Doug Caruso, The Columbus Dispatch
COLUMBUS – Nearly half of Ohio workers hold jobs that a University of Oxford study identified as likely to be automated in the future, including tens of thousands of cashiers, truck drivers, fast-food workers and warehouse laborers.
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In a 2013 study, researchers Carl Benedikt Frey and Michael A. Osborne rated 702 jobs on a scale from zero, meaning they can’t be automated, to one, meaning they certainly will be automated. Of those, 297 jobs rated a 0.7 or higher, meaning there is at least a 70 percent chance the jobs will face disruption from computerization and automation.
The researchers gave a higher likelihood of automation to lower-paid, repetitive jobs that require little or uncomplicated personal interaction and lower levels of education.
To gauge the potential effects of automation on Ohio’s employment, The Dispatch compared the high-risk jobs in the study to U.S. Bureau of Labor statistics surveys that show how many Ohioans hold them. As of March 2016, the last time the bureau released statewide job statistics, Ohio had 163,790 people engaged in food preparation and serving jobs, including fast-food jobs. There were 117,390 cashiers, 111,230 laborers and freight handlers, including warehouse workers, and 70,740 drivers of heavy trucks.
Adding up all of the jobs that are at least 70 percent at risk shows that about 2.5 million jobs in Ohio are at stake. Total employment in the state was about 5.5 million in December.
Taken together, the average pay of all of the Ohio workers in all 297 jobs rated as the most likely to be automated added up to nearly $83.6 billion in 2016, according to the labor department’s statistics. That includes 169,300 office clerks, secretaries and administrative assistants, 98,150 waiters and waitresses, and 61,590 bookkeeping, accounting and auditing clerks.
Conversely, about 1.3 million Ohioans work in 217 jobs that are rated the safest from automation. Teachers, nurses, home health aides, computer systems administrators and pharmacists all rate a 0.3 or lower. So do police officers, firefighters, child-care workers, medical assistants and electricians.