Author: Professor He Qin of capital university of economics and business Institute of Labor Economics.
With the development of science and technology, a new round of scientific, technological and industrial revolution triggered by artificial intelligence will have a sustained, extensive and profound impact on China’s employment. Under the progress of artificial intelligence technology, how to fully implement the "employment priority" policy and achieve higher quality employment has become an important issue of "protecting people’s livelihood".
First, choose the "employment first" intelligent transformation development model
Different from the previous three technological revolutions, the technological progress of artificial intelligence has a stronger effect on empowering enterprises, improving quality and reducing costs, and increasing benefits, and has a more obvious effect on the multiplier effect of man-machine complementarity, the enhancement of workers’ ability and the improvement of employment quality. Therefore, it is necessary to speed up the formulation of tax relief and financial subsidy incentive policies to promote the rapid application of artificial intelligence technology in new scenarios and traditional industries, create benefit sharing among stakeholders in the value chain, create a win-win space for all parties, and reduce obstacles to the application of new technologies. On the one hand, it forces technological innovation through landing application, and improves the usability and ease of use of technology. On the other hand, it promotes industrial intelligence through landing application, which promotes the expansion of employment and the improvement of employment quality, and then realizes the triple spiral of "intelligent industrialization, industrial intelligence and employment expansion".
In the strategic layout of artificial intelligence, the "dual" development model of vertical whole industrial chain cluster development and horizontal related industrial chains driven development is implemented, and employment is given priority, and a matrix employment priority strategy is established. On the one hand, the vertical whole industrial chain promotes employment as a whole, on the other hand, the horizontal related industries promote employment. Taking the intelligent driving industry as an example, its industrial chain includes vehicle manufacturing enterprises, large Internet enterprises, small intelligent driving innovation and entrepreneurship enterprises, service supporting enterprises and public departments. In the vertical direction, a vertical industry chain-driven employment model of "stable employment of large vehicle manufacturing enterprises+employment absorption of large Internet enterprises+creation of new jobs by small intelligent driving innovation and entrepreneurship enterprises, service supporting enterprises and public service departments" can be formed. In the horizontal direction, the application of intelligent driving technology in other industries can be used to promote employment. For example, the application in agriculture, mining, ports, urban transportation and other fields will drive employment horizontally.
In addition, support the emergence of new forms and models of artificial intelligence in new infrastructure, new scenes and industrial applications, such as a large number of data annotator jobs created by artificial intelligence basic data industrial bases in new infrastructure; Small-scale intelligent driving innovation and entrepreneurship enterprises that appear in the automatic driving application scenario include core sensor research and development, chip research and development, key algorithm research and development, emerging car-making enterprises and other technological innovation enterprises, start-ups and new business enterprises. It is necessary to encourage the development of these new forms and modes of enterprises, open up new employment space and enhance employment tension. At the same time, under the new development pattern that the domestic big cycle is the main body and the domestic and international double cycles promote each other, we will promote the intelligent transformation of the global supply chain and promote offshore outsourcing employment and the return of overseas returnees.
Second, activate the domestic consumer market and expand new foreign consumer markets
Employment is an induced demand. To expand employment, it is necessary to expand employment through the expansion of demand for products and services. With the application of artificial intelligence technologies such as computer vision, natural language processing, speech recognition, human-computer interaction, machine learning, knowledge map, biometric identification, virtual reality or augmented reality in products, enterprises will develop more new products and create more intelligent services according to market demand. Therefore, policies to expand the consumption of artificial intelligence products and services should be introduced as soon as possible. The second is to introduce policies to encourage the expansion of artificial intelligence to drive the consumption of industrial products and services. The application of artificial intelligence in different scenarios will change the whole social ecology, and a large number of new products and services will be created in this process. The third is to create new demands, promote new consumption to lead a new quality life, foster new intelligent employment forms and employment patterns, and promote diversified investment, so as to form a strong domestic artificial intelligence product and service market and better meet people’s new expectations for a better life in an intelligent society. Fourth, make use of the first-Mover advantage of China’s artificial intelligence in the application field, innovate more artificial intelligence products and services suitable for the international consumer market, formulate export incentive policies for artificial intelligence technologies, products and services, and smooth and expand the international market.
Third, create the expansion work "based on unique human skills"
The advantage of artificial intelligence is to discover laws from a large number of data, especially unstructured data, and help humans to complete repetitive and standardized work that can make decisions only by simple thinking. In terms of quantifiable and standardized programs, artificial intelligence is better than human beings. However, human beings have the uniqueness of thinking, creation, communication, emotional communication, cooperative spirit, curiosity, enthusiasm, like-minded driving force, emotion, understanding of good and evil, understanding of beauty and ugliness, and are better at engaging in creative work. Artificial intelligence and human beings are good at each other. It is expected that artificial intelligence will quickly occupy many standardization fields in the future, and human beings will find new areas of expertise in the supply of various differentiated and personalized products and services. According to the comparative advantages of man and machine mentioned above, the "people-oriented" work fields that human beings may expand in the future include: nursing work for the elderly, the infirm and the mentally ill; Basic education and special education; Experience economy work that serves individual needs; Handicrafts that meet the creative needs of young people, creative economy jobs such as VRMR game experience, etc., in addition, some new occupations have emerged, such as data annotator, intelligent manufacturing engineer, virtual reality engineer, artificial intelligence trainer, artificial intelligence trainer, drone assembly and adjustment worker, etc. The government should promptly formulate incentive policies to encourage society to create expansion jobs based on unique human skills.
Fourth, encourage non-standardization work in the process of intelligence.
The progress of artificial intelligence technology brings new employment forms, organizational forms and working methods. Non-standard employment is an inestimable field to absorb unemployed workers, which represents the originality and adaptability of the labor force. Develop a variety of non-standardized flexible employment methods to appropriately alleviate the employment pressure, increase the flexibility of the labor market, and meet the employment needs of different labor groups. At present, the flexible employment modes of international concern mainly include: part-time employment, short-term employment, dispatched employment, seasonal employment, standby employment, part-time employment, remote employment, contracted employment, independent employment, self-employment and family employment. In addition, in order to reduce the unemployment risk of artificial intelligence technology and alleviate inequality, we should choose to introduce active labor market policies, such as job incentives and employment assistance, so as to provide solutions for the surplus of low-skilled labor. The public sector or social organizations should indirectly provide employment opportunities for the unemployed, including temporary posts or short-term skills training courses. At the same time, workers should take the initiative to embrace new technology, use technology to find new opportunities, make up for the shortage of full-time jobs by engaging in freelance and part-time jobs, and alleviate the labor market tension caused by technological unemployment.
Secondly, with the application of artificial intelligence technology in digital platform, a large number of new employment forms, such as live broadcast, online literature, intelligent scene experience, etc., are often not fully covered by the current formal social security system, so the government’s social security supporting policies should be matched with it, so that the new non-standardized work brought by artificial intelligence can bring higher income level, freedom, satisfaction and happiness to workers, thus achieving higher quality employment.
Finally, we can consider using artificial intelligence technology to establish a flexible employment platform for digital talent supply and demand. Accurate matching through big data can reduce job search time, loosen restrictions on the free flow of talents and data, and provide free data to help workers find new opportunities, stimulate innovation and improve economic efficiency.
(This paper is the research achievement of the National Social Science Fund’s key topic: the research on the impact of artificial intelligence on the labor market and the transformation of workers’ knowledge and skills (19AGL025). )