The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has today (Monday) published analysis showing which occupations are at highest risk of being automated in the future (1.5 million jobs in England).
As the table below reveals, those at highest risk of automation include low-skilled roles such as waiting staff, shelf stackers and sales occupations.
Women and young people most at risk
The analysis shows that 70.2% of the roles at high risk of automation are currently held by women.
In addition, people aged 20 to 24 years are most likely to be at risk of having their job automated, when compared with other age groups.
The ONS say that the three occupations at the lowest risk of automation are medical practitioners, higher education teaching professionals, and senior professionals of educational establishments.
New opportunities
Although some might see the prediction by the ONS as foreboding, it could also be seen as an opportunity for low-skilled workers to go back to further education or re-train.
As has been shown in the past, when technology evolves, so does the job market and the opportunity that brings for new roles to emerge.
Emerging industries
Look back at the number of people who used to be employed as operators at the thousands of telephone exchanges across the country.
Advances in technology led to the automation of those roles, but new industries were created, opening up what is now a vast array of options for workers.
The stats
You can see the analysis in full on the ONS Website, but the tables below also give a flavour of the results (refresh the page is table hasn’t loaded properly).
Mouse over the dots and see the data at the top of the table change or click on the drop down menu to see the various occupations and corresponding data:
Thanks to Steve for the heads-up
Image: Anthony Ginsbrook on unsplash under CC BY 2.0
