The Fourth Industrial Revolution and the Labour Market : Future-proofing Work in the Innovation Economy

The book posits that when the utility value of technology and the rate of dissemination of technology is high, people who have the necessary competence will both future-proof their jobs in the labour market and also be among the highest-paid workers in the new economy that is emerging from the innovation economy.

The innovation economy is the driver for the development of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and consequently, there is a growing focus on innovation in general and technological innovation in particular. In this context, there is much to suggest that it is the triple impact of artificial intelligence, big data and 5G- and 6G networks that will go beyond the limits of existing competence. This book is about the new competence that is emerging in the wake of artificial intelligence and intelligent robots. It explains how these two technologies are completely fundamental to what is known as the Fourth Industrial Revolution. The author argues that artificial intelligence will promote automation, which will reduce wages rather than increase unemployment statistics. The book posits that when the utility value of technology and the rate of dissemination of technology is high, people who have the necessary competence will both future-proof their jobs in the labour market and also be among the highest-paid workers in the new economy that is emerging from the innovation economy. Further, by making education more compatible with new technology will enable graduates to access more secure and better paid jobs, and all behavioural fields related to new technology will flourish because they can be used in many contexts to steer people’s behaviour in certain directions through the integration of big data and artificial intelligence. The book employs the following scholarly methods: conceptual generalization, scenario-based thinking and historical economic methodology, thus it will be of particular benefit to academic scholars, researchers and graduate students who are concerned with the impact of the fourth industrial revolution on the labour market.