The traditional profession in Bangladesh, where obtaining a university education is necessary to secure a well-paid white-collar job, is fast becoming obsolete. It is not so because people lost their jobs abruptly, but it is the quiet, powerful takeover by Artificial Intelligence (AI). The robotization of most white-collar jobs at the entry level is becoming increasingly prevalent, and young graduates are being left with a degree and no prospects of employment. This change is driving a youth unemployment crisis, but it is also resulting in a profound re-evaluation of what constitutes a good job.
This is how traditional corporate roles are essentially vulnerable. Across the world, specialists say that in the near future, AI may end up occupying up to half of all white-collar roles of lower rank. The same trend is already being witnessed in Bangladesh, where youth unemployment stands at a high rate of 7.2 per cent, which is much higher than the rate of older employees. It is only becoming worse with the emergence of robots and massive automation in the logistics and manufacturing sectors.
The most valuable and safe jobs are in sharp contrast, those that need physical dexterity, creativity, and human contact. These are the “AI-proof” jobs. AI is not capable of repairing a broken pipe, wiring a new building, and not capable of giving personalised physical training, or the caring attention required in the medical field. This has been proven through research that has revealed construction, plumbing, and other skilled trades have little to no chances of automation as compared to administrative and legal employment, which would be the most vulnerable to automation. Instead, the working, blue-collar citizen, the electrician, the mechanic, the nurse has become the financially secure one, who has a future.
The greatest obstacle to this solution is, however, the cultural bias that is entrenched in Bangladesh. The society, for generations, has taught that an office job is a prestigious one and manual or skilled trades are somehow lesser. Such an archaic perception is currently the key obstacle to the way of young people getting decent employment. It is time to cease frowning upon any straightforward, needed labour.
Source – https://today.thefinancialexpress.com.bd/editorial/ai-and-future-of-white-collar-jobs-1760797512