New Frontiers: The Origins and Content of New Work, 1940-2018

David Autor, Caroline Chin, Anna Salomons, Bryan Seegmiller

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleScientificpeer-review

Abstract

We answer three core questions about the hypothesized role of newly emerging job categories ("new work") in counterbalancing the erosive effect of task-displacing automation on labor demand: what is the substantive content of new work, where does it come from, and what effect does it have on labor demand? We construct a novel database spanning eight decades of new job titles linked to U.S. Census microdata and to patent-based measures of occupations' exposure to labor-augmenting and labor-automating innovations. The majority of current employment is in new job specialties introduced since 1940, but the locus of new-work creation has shifted from middle-paid production and clerical occupations over 1940-1980 to high-paid professional occupations and secondarily to low-paid services since 1980. New work emerges in response to technological innovations that complement the outputs of occupations and demand shocks that raise occupational demand. Innovations that automate tasks or reduce occupational demand slow new-work emergence. Although the flow of augmentation and automation innovations is positively correlated across occupations, the former boosts occupational labor demand while the latter depresses it. The demand-eroding effects of automation innovations have intensified in the past four decades while the demand-increasing effects of augmentation innovations have not.
Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)1399-1465
Number of pages67
JournalQuarterly Journal of Economics
Volume139
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Aug 2024
Externally publishedYes

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'New Frontiers: The Origins and Content of New Work, 1940-2018'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this