机器人时代的人类工作

In recent months, anthropologists have been rummaging through the grassroots of America’s workforce jungle in search of an answer to one of the great questions of our time: what happens to human jobs when robots arrive?

最近几个月，人类学家一直在考察整个美国劳动力群体，以寻找我们这个时代最重要问题之一的答案：如果机器人来临，人类就业会怎样?

You might expect the answer to be very depressing. If there is one thing on which almost all economists agree, it is that digital technologies are performing many jobs once done by humans.

你可能会猜，答案非常令人沮丧。如果有一件事是几乎所有经济学家都同意的，那就是数字技术正在完成曾经由人类完成的很多工作。

Manufacturing offers a particularly stark example of this. A study by Ball State university suggests that 5.6m US manufacturing jobs were lost between 2000 and 2010 — almost nine in 10 thanks to automation, not trade. It could be worse: McKinsey, a consultancy, estimates that 45 per cent of the tasks currently done by humans could be automated as the pattern spreads into the service sector. This equates to $2tn in annual wages — and millions of jobs.

制造业提供了一个尤为明显的例子。波尔州立大学(Ball State university)的一项研究显示，2000年至2010年，有560万个美国制造业岗位消失，几乎十分之九是因为自动化，而非贸易。情况还可能更糟：咨询公司麦肯锡(McKinsey)估计，随着自动化模式扩大到服务业，在目前由人类完成的工作中，有45%可能会实现自动化。这相当于数以百万计的就业岗位和2万亿美元的年薪。

That sounds scary. There is, however, an intriguing twist. When anthropologists have conducted “participation observation” among American workers — that is, observing at what is actually happening in people’s everyday lives, rather than looking at top-down statistics — they discovered a more complex story than the raw numbers suggest.

这听上去很可怕。然而，其中有一个有趣的转折。当人类学家对美国劳动者进行“参与观察”(即观察人们每天的实际日常生活，而不是考察自上而下的统计数字)时，他们发现了一个比原始数据揭示的更复杂的情况。

Yes, machines are wiping out some human jobs but people are also working with robots in new roles. That more upbeat story tends to be obscured, yet it deserves a great deal more attention — particularly when president-elect Donald Trump takes office next month.

确实，机器正消灭一些人类的工作，但人们还在新的岗位上与机器人合作。这种更乐观的情况往往不那么直观，但应获得更多关注，特别是美国当选总统唐纳德•特朗普(Donald Trump)下月上台之时。

Consider the findings of Benjamin Shestakofsky, an anthropologist who spent 19 months inside a California company that uses digital technologies to connect buyers and sellers of domestic services. Mr Shestakovsky initially assumed that his research would show how machines were replacing human workers. When he did grassroots analysis he realised that the company was growing so fast, with such big and complex computing systems, that it was constantly drafting more humans — not robots — to monitor, manage and interpret the data. “Software automation can substitute for labour but it also creates new human-machine complementaries,” he told an American Anthropological Association meeting recently, noting that companies “are creating new types of jobs”.

考虑一下人类学家本杰明•舍斯塔科夫斯基(Benjamin Shestakofsky)的研究结果吧，他曾在一家加州公司待过19个月，该公司利用数字技术为家政服务的买家和卖家搭桥。他起初认为，他的研究将展示出机器正如何取代人类劳动者。在他进行基础分析时，他发现，该公司增长非常迅速，有着巨大且复杂的计算系统，它正不断选派更多人类(而非机器人)监控、管理和解读这些数据。“软件自动化可以取代劳动力，但它也会产生新的人机互补，”他最近在美国人类学协会(American Anthropological Association)的一次会议上表示。他指出，企业“正创造新的工作种类”。

Shreeharsh Kelkar, another anthropologist, saw the same pattern in the education world. Until recently it was presumed that the rise of digital teaching tools would make human teachers less important. But watching educators in action, Mr Kelkar found that human teachers are working with these digital tools to be more efficient. The issue is not that computers are automating jobs away, he says, but that “assemblages of humans and computers are emerging”.

另一位人类学家施里哈什•克尔卡(Shreeharsh Kelkar)在教育行业也看到了同样的情况。直到不久前，人们还认为，数字教学工具的出现将让人类教师的重要性降低。但在实际观察教育者的过程中，克尔卡发现，人类教师正利用这些数字工具提高效率。他表示，问题不是电脑自动化正让工作消失，而是“人类与电脑正在合作”。

An obvious response is that it is far from clear whether these anecdotes are typical, nor does anyone know whether these new “assemblages” of human and machine will create enough jobs to offset those lost to automation. In addition, new digitised jobs may seem less attractive than the old roles since they are often structured as “contingent work”, with self-employed workers who provide services on demand.

一种可以预见的反应是，认为现在还远不清楚，这些轶闻是否典型，人们也不知道这些人类与机器的新“合作”是否会创造足够多的就业，来抵消自动化导致的就业损失。另外，新的数字化工作似乎不如旧工作那样吸引人，因为它们通常被设置成“临时工作”，由自由职业者按需提供服务。

Still, the findings of the anthropologists should not be ignored. For one thing, they suggest that there is a burning need for policymakers to obtain much better data on what is really happening in the American workplace. Anthropological studies are small scale, while the macro-level data are surprisingly weak, partly because the Bureau of Labor Statistics tends to collect data through traditional channels. “We don’t know what is going on with contingent work today,” says Mary Gray, an anthropologist who works at Microsoft. “The tech companies don’t track labour any better than the BLS.”

然而，人类学家的发现不应被忽视。首先，这些发现意味着，政策制定者亟需获取有关美国劳动场所实际状况的更全面信息。人类学研究的规模较小，而宏观层面的数据惊人地薄弱，部分原因是美国劳工统计局(Bureau of Labor Statistics)往往通过传统渠道收集数据。“我们不知道目前临时工作的情况，”在微软(Microsoft)工作的人类学家玛丽•格雷(Mary Gray)表示，“科技公司对劳动力状况的追踪并不比劳工统计局好。”

Second, if anyone does manage to paint an accurate portrait of that labour force, they need to show this to Mr Trump. In recent months the president-elect has repeatedly stated that he is determined to keep more manufacturing business in America, partly because he — wrongly — likes to blame the loss of manufacturing jobs to competition from China or Mexico. But if he does succeed in this goal of America First he will — paradoxically — only accelerate the automation trend as companies will scramble to cut costs. This is not necessarily a bad thing but it suggests that Mr Trump’s hopes of recreating old-style American jobs is wrong-headed.

其次，如果有人成功准确描绘了劳动力状况，他们还需要向特朗普说明这点。最近几个月，这位当选美国总统多次表示，他决定将更多制造业留在美国，部分原因是他(错误地)喜欢将制造业就业损失归咎于来自中国或墨西哥的竞争。但如果他成功实现了“美国优先”的目标，他反而只会加快自动化趋势，因为企业急于降低成本。这并不一定是坏事，但它表明，特朗普恢复旧式美国就业的希望是错误的。

That leads to the third point: the urgent need for a bigger policy debate about how to prepare workers for this new world. Workforce training needs to change to instil more digital skills.

接下来是第三点：迫切需要就如何让劳动者适应新的世界展开更大的政策辩论。需要改革劳动力培训，让劳动者掌握更多数字技能。

New types of social security, health and pension systems are necessary to accommodate contingent workers. Some policymakers understand this. Senators such as Mark Warner, a Democrat, for example, are pushing for new safety nets for contingent workers. But if this debate is to secure any serious traction, it is imperative that the technology sector itself steps in. Hitherto, Silicon Valley has not been particularly vocal on these questions, but Mr Trump seems intent on pulling them into the spotlight: last week he summoned tech leaders to Trump Tower to “reassure” them about his plans.

新型的社会保障、健康和养老体系是容纳临时工作者的必要举措。一些政策制定者明白这点。例如民主党人马克•沃纳(Mark Warner)等参议员正推动为临时工作者建立新的保障网络。然而，如果这场辩论要获得巨大支持的话，科技行业本身必须介入。到目前为止，硅谷在这些问题上并不特别积极，但特朗普似乎决心把他们推到聚光灯下：最近，他召集科技界领袖到特朗普大厦(Trump Tower)，让他们对他的计划“放心”。

So Silicon Valley should seize this chance and start a dialogue about how to help humans deal with all those robots in the workforce. Otherwise, the day will come when Silicon Valley itself could find itself being blamed for American job losses.

因此，硅谷应抓住这个机会，就如何帮助人类应对劳动力中的所有那些机器人展开对话。否则，硅谷终有一天会发现自己将因为美国就业损失而受到指责。