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  • The big misconception about the impact of technology in the workforce is thinking that

  • it's around the corner.

  • Instead it's been with us for years.

  • If you look at the last 20 years or so, we've automated away 4 million manufacturing jobs

  • in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Missouri, Iowa, all the swing states that

  • Donald Trump needed to win in 2016 and did win.

  • Then my friends in Silicon Valley and my friends who work in technology know that what we did

  • to the manufacturing workers we are now going to do to the retail workers, the call center

  • workers, the fast food workers, the truck drivers, and then even bookkeepers, accountants,

  • insurance agents, lawyers, and on and on through the economy.

  • So what happened to the manufacturing worker is a very clear sign of what's going to happen

  • to these other workers moving forward.

  • And I talked a little bit about retail workers, the most common occupation in the economy.

  • Thirty percent of Main Street stores and malls are going to close in the next five years

  • because Amazon is soaking up $20 billion of commerce every year.

  • And many of these workers are making $11 to $12 an hour and don't have a huge savings

  • cushion to be able to make meaningful adjustments.

  • Being a truck driver is the most common job in 29 states.

  • There are 3 and 1/2 million truck drivers in this country, average age 49, 94% male,

  • average education high school or one year of college.

  • They're making about $46,000 a year right now.

  • It's one of the higher paying blue collar jobs in this country.

  • And on the west coast, you have my friends in Silicon Valley who are trying to automate

  • truck driving.

  • And the reason they're doing that is because of the money -- $168 billion in financial

  • incentives for automating away truck drivers.

  • And that's not just labor savings.

  • That's also equipment utilization because a truck never needs to stop whereas human-driven

  • trucks have to stop every 14 hours; fuel efficiency because trucks can convoy together in lower

  • wind resistance and so robot trucks would be able get places with less fuel, fewer accidents

  • because truck drivers right now kill about 4,000 other motorists a year in accidents

  • and that number would come down if you had automated freight.

  • So there's a very, very powerful set of incentives to try and automate truck driving as an occupation.

  • Again, though, you have these 3 and 1/2 million truckers, and only 13% of them are unionized.

  • So there's not going to be a grand negotiation.

  • So imagine being a trucker who's taken out $50,000, $60,000 loan to lease your truck

  • and it's your livelihood and your means of support, and then all of a sudden, you have

  • to compete with a robot truck that doesn't need to sleep.

  • And that is what is around the corner for hundreds of thousands of truckers in this

  • country in the next five to 10 years when robot trucks start to hit our highways.

  • And Amazon is testing out robot trucks as we speak, right now in the Midwest.

The big misconception about the impact of technology in the workforce is thinking that

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