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Technological advances always have threatened jobs-just look at their influence on agricultural employment.
Today, computers are held responsible for loss of jobs.
Jeremy, Rifkin, in his book “The End of Work” warned that information technology could create massive joblessness. He said former farm workers can work in the factory, and displaced factory workers can find work in the office, but there is nowhere for displaced service-sector workers to go. However, Rifkin made his forecast six years ago. Now we can see clearly that it is inaccurate because US employment levels are at a record high.
The real question is not whether computers will end work-but how they will change it.
Do computers really make us more efficient?
Even Alan Greenspan, chairman of the U.S. Federal Reserve, says because we use computer technology widely, we continually speed up the pace of productivity growth.
But according to a new analysis of the effect of computers on productivity, this is only half the story.
The analysis, based on 400 large U.S. companies, shows that firms which have introduced computerized simply put computers on desktops and made no change in organizational structure.
They were, on average, less productive than firms which had not installed computers at all, making the purchasing of the new computers pointless.
The study proves the old truth about technology: it is what you do with it that counts.
In one recent global survey, three-quarters of respondents said computers had made their lives better, and just 4 percent believed computers had made their lives worse.
But one on 10of those surveyed said advances in computer and Internet technology had enable them “to work more.”
Joanne Ciulla, author of “The Working Life.” Warns that information technology “potentially makes us 24-hours-a-day, 365-days-a-year employees.”
Well, yes, it does. But it also makes us potentially 24-hour-a-day, 365-days-a-year, too.
It allows us to work as we wish-perhaps at a steady pace, perhaps in intense outbreaks after we have long walks in the park. We can use out desktop or laptop computers as much for leisure as for work.
Smart companies have realized this and stopped trying to control computer use. There is no point banning personal emailing.
If staffs are increasingly expected to work outside office hours, they should be allowed to play within office hours.
When computers are used creatively, they can loosen up strict system and allow all of us to work more flexibly and humanely. But it is not decided by the computers. It is decided by us.
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