模拟联合国
策划书
Model United Nation
四川大学商务英语口语协会（BESA）
Business English Speaking Association
目录
 活动背景
 活动目的/意义
 四川大学商学院商务英语口语协会简介
 活动概述
 活动注意事项
 经费预算
 奖项介绍
一、活动背景：
随着全球化潮流席卷全球，各国文化交流日益频繁，高等教育的国际化需求更为迫切。
四川大学作为国内知名双一流学府，致力于开展广泛深入的国际交流与学习，时刻保持与国际
接轨。
“实践及国际课程周”是四川大学，实施高端国际化教育、培养具有国际竞争力人才的
一个重要载体。为了让每个商学院学子在川大校园都能与世界一流大学学生交流互动并共做专
题研究，商学院已经连续 6 年承办实践周国际交流营，今年商学院邀请了来自美国亚利桑那
州立大学、英国诺丁汉大学的 10 名留学生。
四川大学商务英语口语协会近年来一直在学院领导的协助下开展工作，带领留学生开展
不同的活动，以促进双方的文化的交流与碰撞，并期望通过活动能够培养双方的友好感情。并
且口协一直秉承着商学院的优良学风，希望留学生能通过活动感受到川大商科学子的风采。
二、活动目的/意义
模拟联合国 (Model United Nations)，简称模联(MUN)，是对联合国大会和其它多边机
构的仿真学术模拟，是为青年人组织的公民教育活动。在活动中，青年学生们扮演不同国家或
其它政治实体的外交代表，参与围绕国际上的热点问题召开的会议。代表们遵循议事规则，在
会议主席团的主持下，通过演讲来阐述观点，为了“国家利益”辩论、磋商、游说。他们与友
好的国家沟通协作，解决冲突；通过写作决议草案和投票表决来推进国际问题的解决。在模拟
联合国，青年学生们通过亲身经历熟悉联合国等多边议事机构的运作方式、基础国际关系与外
交知识，并了解世界发生的大事对他们未来的影响，了解自身在未来可以发挥的作用。
模拟联合国对许多大学生和高中生来说，已经不再是陌生的词汇，这项活动发源于美国，
已有 60 多年的历史，自从 90 年代以来，模拟联合国活动进入中国，最有特色的当属北京大
学的模联活动。其他的高校同样在此活动中做出了坚持不懈的努力，模拟联合国活动，作为一
项发展比较成熟的活动，对参与的学生而言，可以说是受益匪浅，对培养他们搜集材料、整理
材料、分析材料能力，对培养独立思考和协同合作的能力作用很大。同时，模拟联合国活动对
目前的教学研究也有很重要的启示。从全国范围看，高校模联活动是自 2000 年后才逐渐发展
起来的，因此相对于欧美国家来说，起步比较晚。但时至今日，全国已有 30 多所高校都主办
过或派代表参加过国内外模拟联合国大会，模联活动发展迅速。大多数院校以建立模联社团并
多次组织模联活动当前中国高校模拟联合国活动仍处在不断探索和完善的阶段 。
在商学院的协助下，口协已领衔举办多年的商学院模拟联合国大会，有效锻炼了同学们的
口语能力，开拓了同学们的视野。本次模拟联合国大会以“人工智能对劳动力再就业的影响”
（Reemployment of labor replaced by Artificial intellegence）为主题，旨在参加学生能
够在商科的系统分析之下，分析人工智能的出现对商业，经济各领域的影响，并且能够提出自
己独特的见解。
三、四川大学商商务英语口语协会简介
四川大学商务英语口语协会 BESA (Business English Speaking Association)，由三个
12 级的女神男神大学霸于 2014 年 6 月创立，是由共青团四川大学委员会商学院分团委领导，
挂靠于四川大学商学院的校级学术性社团，受四川大学学生社团联合会监督管理，现已发展成
为商学院最具竞争力和活力的新兴学术社团之一。我们曾顺利举办了“口语派”，商院模联，
英语演讲比赛，英语配音大赛及商务英语知识竞赛等主题丰富的活动。
商英口语协会利用商学院得天独厚的氛围，主要开展商务英语口语相关活动，增强同学实
践能力，营造现代校园商务英语新理念。同时丰富校园课余文化生活，锻炼同学们的综合素质，
提高英语的口语表达能力，为以后同学出国留学或在外企工作打下坚实的英语口语交流基础，
实现无障碍使用英语工作的能力。
四、活动概述
1.活动人员安排：
来自美国亚利桑那州立大学、英国诺丁汉大学的 10 名留学生及商学院同学 10 名，分别
担任 20 个国家的代表，主席 3-4 位，志愿者 3-4 人，MPC2 人
2.活动时间及地点：“实践及国际课程周”期间，望江校区商学院（尽量选择比较好的教室）
3.活动背景：
主题：“人工智能对劳动力再就业的影响”
（Reemployment of labor replaced by Artificial intellegence）
68 年前，图灵实验定义了人工智能的标准。68 年后，人工智能的水平呈现爆发式的
增长。大到工厂车间全数字化机床流水生产线，小到 Alpha go 横扫各路棋圣难求一败，AI
已经达到取代人类大量工作的的水平。
然而，与此同时，自 2008 年金融危机之后，世界经济的发展一直处于一个低潮期，
政府债务累累，失业率高居不下，有些地区失业率甚至超过 20%。AI 的大量运用，必将导致
大量初级劳动力丧失工作机会，进一步发酵失业问题，使得社会阶层差距越来越大，造成更为
严重的社会问题。
现在，面临着这前所未有的生产方式巨变，代表国的每一个决定都将影响数以万计人
民的未来，未来持续发展的的道路，等待着指引。
4、活动时间安排
第一次行课（活动前）：模联流程讲解，国家分配
第二次行课（活动上午）：大会正式召开，要求参会人员正装出席，正式流程，每
个国家两分钟 presentation，预计 13 个国家。邀请老师或学长学姐在每五个国家讲
完之后进行对其演讲的评价，以及修正意见。并在课堂结束后完成 bloc 分组
第三次行课（活动下午）：每个 bloc 对自己的工作文件（working paper）进行
有 PPT 的阐述，并针对其中的几个有争议的问题进行讨论和辩论。
第四次行课（活动第二天上午）：每个 bloc 对自己的决议草案（draft resolution）
进行最后的展示，投票，大会完。并进行颁奖环节。
五、活动注意事项
1、在会议开始前会发放本次会议的 background paper,请参加会议的同学务必仔细阅读，
并在大会开始前递交 position paper.
2、主席团的选举
主席团：
主席需要组织每一场会议的进行，执行会议的章程，确定发言顺序，对提问进行
表决，以及宣读决议。主席有权力自行裁决以确保会议顺利进行。总而言之，主席在
会议的进行中拥有至高无上的权利，负责维持会议的正常秩序。主席有权接受或否决
人和动议。
会议指导需熟悉委员会构成、会议进程以监督整个决议案的进度，协助参会代表
完成工作文件和决议草案。会议指导必须审阅决议草案中的各个细节，包括文件的格
式，必要的起草国和签约国，修正，以及决定该草案是否应提交并投票。当主席认为
必要时，会议指导还应适当调节会议的议程。
主席助理负责进行点名、记录投票和决议草案以确保会议有序进行。另外，主席
助理还要保证主席团与评审团随时保持联络。
3、做好与负责老师的沟通工作，提高此次活动的参与度与积极性；
4、 做好活动现场的安全保障与秩序维持工作，文明有序的组织和开展活动；
5、做好翻译工作的安排，以确保活动能够明确清晰的进行；
6、以上活动内容和分组根据具体志愿者人数和现场的实际情况进行调整；
7、活动结束后进行对会场的打扫清理工作。
六、经费预算
物品
立牌
工作牌
水
签字笔
纸
奖状
熊猫玩偶
单价（元） 数量
5
7
2
5
30 一包
3
25
总价
20
10
40
30
7
5
共计:576
七、奖项介绍
Best Delegation
(1 per Committee)
Outstanding Delegates (2 per committee)
Best Speech
(1 per committee)
Best Presentation (1 per committee)
Best Position Paper (1 per committee)
Best Role Player (1 per committee)
附：本次模联的背景资料（background guiding）
100
70
80
150
30
21
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Sichuan University Model United Nations Conference 2018
Economic and Social Council: Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
Sichuan University
Model United Nations Conference 2018
Background Guiding
Reemployment of Labor Replaced by
Artificial Intelligence
Economic and Social Council
(ECOSOC)
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Sichuan University Model United Nations Conference 2018
Economic and Social Council: Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
Contents:
Welcome Letter………………………………………………………………………3
1 General Introduction to the Council………………………………………………4
2 Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence…………………...6
2.1 Introduction to AI……………………………………………………………6
2.2 Situation Analysis on AI Replacing Labor Force……………………….10
2.2.1Categories of Labor Work Replaced/Being Replaced by AI…....11
2.3 Past Solutions to AI Replacing Labor Force……..…………….………14
2.3.1 China……………………………………………….......................14
2.3.2 The United States of America…………………………………....14
2.3.3 India……………….………………………………………………..15
2.3.4 Germany…………….……………………………………………..16
2.4 Possible Solutions………………………………………………...….....17
2.5 Balanced future…………………………………………………...……..18
2.6 Questions to Consider…………………………..……………….……..22
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Economic and Social Council: Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
Welcome letter
Dear delegates,
Welcome to the second committee of Sichuan University Model United
Nations Conference 2018, we dais would love to extend our warmest welcome
to all delegates attending the meeting.
No matter in developed countries or developing countries, people’s life is more or less
changed by modern technology, of which artificial intelligence (A.I.) is one of the
outstanding representatives. As we found that A.I. could complete certain work more
efficiently and better than human beings, many industries have chosen to replace part of
the labor force by A.I. so that humans can do something of more creativity. Though the
effectiveness was greatly improved, people who are engaged in simple physical labor are
forced to face with unemployment and the number actually accounts for a large
proportion of total employment. Therefore, the welfare of unemployed workers is
reduced while the unstable factors are growing in societies due to the potential high rate
of unemployment caused by large-scale replacement of labor force by A.I. in the near
future, to reach a balance of AI development and traditional labor force employment,
we need every UN member to give constructive perspectives.
As one of the core missions of ECOSOC is to monitor the social affairs of member
states and to work for protection of human rights, we are calling upon for a better
solution to the existing situations. We, after all, still have a long way to go
considering all problems caused by A.I. in our human society.
This Background Guide will guide you in your research on this issue, and the dais
hope that you can, with stamina and the spirit of meticulousness, spend enough time
and efforts on carrying on your own research and analysis under the perspective
provided by this guide.
We sincerely hope that all the delegates can gain a better understanding of this issue,
as well as the pleasure of collision of different ideas during meeting. We are truly
looking forward to meeting you in the conference.
Dais of sub-committee two
2018.4
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Economic and Social Council: Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
1. General Introduction to the Council
The United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) aims to bring people and
issues together to promote collective action for a sustainable world.
1.1 Overview
The United Nations Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) is one of the six principal
organs of the United Nations, established in 1945, responsible for coordinating the
economic, social, and related work of 15 UN specialized agencies, their functional
commissions and five regional commissions.
The ECOSOC has 54 members. It holds one four-week session each year in July, and
since 1998, it has also held an annual meeting in April with finance ministers heading
key committees of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
ECOSOC serves as the central forum for discussing international economic and social
issues and formulating policy recommendations addressed to member states and the
United Nations system. A number of non-governmental organizations have been
granted consultative status to the Council to participate in the work of the United
Nations.
It is the central platform for fostering debate and innovative thinking, forging consensus
on ways forward, and coordinating efforts to achieve internationally agreed goals. It is
also responsible for the follow-up to major UN conferences and summits.
1.2 Reform, Mandate and Objectives
ECOSOC has undergone reforms (A/RES/61/16, A/RES/68/1) in the last decade to
strengthen the Council and its working methods, giving special attention to the
integrated and coordinated implementation of, and follow-up to, the outcomes of all
major United Nations conferences summits in the economic, social, environmental
and related fields.
General Assembly resolution 68/1 contains the most far-reaching reform of the
Economic and Social Council in over a decade. It mandates the Council to: provide
substantive leadership to the United Nations system through adoption of an annual
theme; play a key role in monitoring and promoting the balanced integration of the
three dimensions of sustainable development in the work of the ECOSOC system,
including by convening an integration segment; spread the segments of the Council
throughout a new annual cycle, beginning in July. Through the adoption of the
resolution, Member States requested the Council to exercise new leadership in the
global development agenda.
The objectives of ECOSOC are stipulated in ECOSOC’s official website as follows:
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Economic and Social Council: Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
(a)
(b)
(c)
(d)
(e)
(f)
(g)
(h)
(i)
(j)
(k)
(l)
Promoting sustainable development;
Advancing policy integration;
Developing cooperation forum;
Financing for sustainable development;
Coordination humanitarian action;
Guiding operational activities for development;
Providing coordination and oversight;
Building partnerships;
Engaging youth;
Raising awareness on emerging issues;
Advising on Haiti’s long-term development;
Working with civil society.
The Council has 54 member states out of the 193 UN member states, which are
elected by the United Nations General Assembly for overlapping three-year terms.
Seats on the Council are based on geographical representation with 14 allocated to
African states, 11 to Asia-Pacific states, 6 to East European states, 10 to Latin
American and Caribbean states and 13 to West European and other states.
1.3 New Functions and Working Methods
For the work organization, the Council holds several short sessions and many
preparatory meetings, round tables and panel discussions with the members of civil
society throughout the year, to deal with the organization of its work. It holds a
High-level, Coordination, Operational Activities, Humanitarian Affairs Segments and
Coordination Management Meetings.
At the High-level Segment, national cabinet ministers and chiefs of international
agencies and other high officials discuss major economic, social and environmental
policy issues. A Ministerial declaration is generally adopted on the theme of the
High-level Segment, which provides policy guidance and recommendations for action.
The official languages of the Economic and Social Council are Arabic, Chinese, English,
French, Russian and Spanish. The year-round work of the Council is carried out in its
subsidiary and related bodies.
Ever since the reform, some new elements are added to suggest the new functions
and working methods of the ECOSOC. Through following new elements, the Council
will aim to provide system-wide, forward looking guidance to its subsidiary bodies,
and thus provide leadership to the United Nations development agenda at large in
an integrated manner.
(a) A new High-Level Political Forum: As an immediate outcome of the 2012 Rio
Conference on Sustainable Development, a high-level political forum on
sustainable development (HLPF) will be convened under the auspices of ECOSOC.
(b) An annual theme: The adoption of an annual theme will be addressed by all
subsidiary bodies, including the functional commissions, expert bodies, as well as
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Economic and Social Council: Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
the Executive Boards of United Nations funds and programs, within their
respective mandates, expertise and responsibilities.
(c) A new integration segment: The Council will organize an annual integration
segment, which will make full use of its multidisciplinary network of specialized
bodies.
(d) New reporting processes: The Council will focus attention on issues that require
a prioritized and coordinated substantive response from the United Nations
system as a whole.
(e) Increased visibility: The new ECOSOC will aim to increase its visibility and impact
of its work through broader outreach. It will seek to improve its public profile,
including by effectively communicating its role, work and achievements to the
public in a compelling manner.
(f) More efficient oversight: Annual reports of the subsidiary bodies will be
considered at one of the four new Coordination and Management Meetings
(CMMs) to be held throughout the year, at the discretion of the Council.
(g) The changing development cooperation landscape: Non-state actors, such as civil
society, philanthropies, and the private sector are taking an increasing share in
international cooperation. These developments take place amidst calls for
greater accountability of both donors and recipients of aid.
(h) Seeking increased focus on Accountability: The Council and the HLPF, under its
auspices, will serve as platform for accountability in the post 2015 era.
(i) Greater responsiveness to non-state actors: Article 71 of the Charter provides
the Council the sole authority to engage non-state actors. The Council is
expected to respond to those more open methods of collaboration.
(j) A redesigned calendar for the Council: Key to the reform efforts of the Council
are ways to reorganize and streamline its various functions in a more flexible
calendar of meetings that responds to new mandates.
1.
2.
3.
4.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Nations_Economic_and_Social_Council
https://www.un.org/ecosoc/en/about-us
https://www.un.org/en/ecosoc/about/index.shtml
https://www.un.org/en/ecosoc/newfunct/pdf14/the_new_ecosoc_31_march_20
14.pdf
5. https://www.un.org/ecosoc/en/FAQ
2. Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
2.1 Introduction to AI
2.1.1 Definition and Types
Artificial intelligence (AI, also machine intelligence, MI) is intelligence demonstrated by
machines, in contrast to the natural intelligence (NI) displayed by humans and other
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Economic and Social Council: Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
animals. In computer science AI research is defined as the study of "intelligent
agents": any device that perceives its environment and takes actions that maximize
its chance of successfully achieving its goals. Colloquially, the term "artificial
intelligence" is applied when a machine mimics "cognitive" functions that humans
associate with other human minds, such as "learning" and "problem solving".
The scope of AI is disputed: as machines become increasingly capable, AI becomes
whatever hasn’t been done yet. Capabilities generally classified as AI as of 2017
include successfully understanding human speech, competing at the highest level in
strategic game systems (such as chess and Go), autonomous cars, intelligent routing
in content delivery network and military simulations.
AI can be categorized in many ways. One common example classifies AI systems as
either weak AI or strong AI. Weak AI, also known as narrow AI, is an AI system that is
designed and trained for a particular task, such as Apple’s Siri. Strong AI, also known
as artificial general intelligence, is an AI system with generalized human cognitive
abilities so that when presented with an unfamiliar task, it has enough intelligence to
find a solution.
2.1.2 History
The idea that a machine, by shuffling symbols as simple as "0" and "1", could
simulate any conceivable act of mathematical deduction, was first put forward by
Alan Turing. Along with concurrent discoveries in neurobiology, information theory
and cybernetics, this led researchers to consider the possibility of building an
electronic brain. The first work that is now generally recognized as AI was
McCullough and Pitts' 1943 formal design for Turing-complete "artificial neurons".
The field of AI research was born at a workshop at Dartmouth College in 1956.
Attendees Allen Newell (CMU), Herbert Simon (CMU), John McCarthy (MIT), Marvin
Minsky (MIT) and Arthur Samuel (IBM) became the founders and leaders of AI
research. Their results were described by the press as astonishing.
By the middle of the 1960s, research in the U.S. was heavily funded by the
Department of Defense and laboratories had been established around the world.
Therefore, AI’s founders were optimistic about the future.
They failed to recognize the difficulty of some of the remaining tasks. Progress
slowed and in 1974. The next few years would later be called an "AI winter", a period
when obtaining funding for AI projects was difficult.
In the early 1980s, AI research was revived by the commercial success of expert
systems, a form of AI program that simulated the knowledge and analytical skills of
human experts. By 1985 the market for AI had reached over a billion dollars.
However, beginning with the collapse of the Lisp Machine market in 1987, AI once
again fell into disrepute, and a second, longer-lasting hiatus began.
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Economic and Social Council: Reemployment of Labor Replaced by Artificial Intelligence
In the late 1990s and early 21st century, AI began to be used for logistics, data mining,
medical diagnosis and other areas. Deep Blue became the first computer chess-playing
system to beat a reigning world chess champion, Garry Kasparov on 11 May 1997.
Advanced statistical techniques (loosely known as deep learning), access to large
amounts of data and faster computers enabled advances in machine learning and
perception. By the mid-2010s, machine learning applications were used throughout
the world.
In March 2016, AlphaGo won 4 out of 5 games of Go in a match with Go champion Lee
Sedol, becoming the first computer Go-playing system to beat a professional Go player
without handicaps. In the 2017 Future of Go Summit, AlphaGo won a three-game match
with Ke Jie, who at the time continuously held the world No. 1 ranking for two years.
This marked the completion of a significant milestone in the development of Artificial
Intelligence as Go is an extremely complex game, more so than Chess.
2.1.3 Goals
The overall research goal of artificial intelligence is to create technology that allows
computers and machines to function in an intelligent manner. The general problem
of simulating (or creating) intelligence has been broken down into sub-problems.
These consist of particular traits or capabilities that researchers expect an intelligent
system to display. The traits described below have received the most attention.
(a) Reasoning and problem solving: Early researchers developed algorithms that
imitated step-by-step reasoning that humans use when they solve puzzles or
make logical deductions. As many researchers realize most humans solve most of
their problems using fast, intuitive judgments, modern statistical approaches to
AI (e.g. neural networks) mimic this human ability to make a quick guess based
on experience, solving many problems as people do.
(b) Knowledge representation: Knowledge representation and knowledge
engineering are central to AI research. Many of the problems machines are
expected to solve will require extensive knowledge about the world.
(c) Planning: Intelligent agents must be able to set goals and achieve them. They
need a way to visualize the future—a representation of the state of the world
and be able to make predictions about how their actions will change it—and be
able to make choices that maximize the utility (or "value") of available choices.
(d) Learning: Machine learning, a fundamental concept of AI research since the
field's inception, is the study of computer algorithms that improve automatically
through experience.
(e) Natural language processing: Natural language processing gives machines the
ability to read and understand human language. A sufficiently powerful natural
language processing system would enable natural language user interfaces and
the acquisition of knowledge directly from human-written sources, such as
newswire texts.
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(f) Perception: Machine perception is the ability to use input from sensors (such as
cameras, microphones, tactile sensors, sonar and others) to deduce aspects of
the world.
(g) Motion and manipulation: The field of robotics is closely related to AI. Intelligence is
required for robots to handle tasks such as object manipulation and navigation, with
sub-problems such as localization, mapping, and motion planning.
(h) Other goals include social intelligence, creativity and general intelligence.
2.1.4 Risks and Ethics
The field was founded on the claim that human intelligence "can be so precisely
described that a machine can be made to simulate it". This raises philosophical
arguments about the nature of the mind and the ethics of creating artificial beings
endowed with human-like intelligence.
Widespread use of artificial intelligence could have unintended consequences that are
dangerous or undesirable. Scientists from the Future of Life Institute, among others,
described some short-term research goals to see how AI influences the economy, the
laws and ethics that are involved with AI and how to minimize AI security risks. In the
long term, the scientists have proposed to continue optimizing function while
minimizing possible security risks that come along with new technologies.
According to Stephen Hawking, “The development of full artificial intelligence could
spell the end of the human race. Once humans develop artificial intelligence, it will
take off on its own and redesign itself at an ever-increasing rate. Humans, who are
limited by slow biological evolution, couldn't compete and would be superseded.”
Concern over risk from artificial intelligence has led to some high-profile donations
and investments. In January 2015, Elon Musk donated ten million dollars to the
Future of Life Institute to fund research on understanding AI decision making. The
goal of the institute is to "grow wisdom with which we manage" the growing power
of technology. Musk also funds companies developing artificial intelligence such as
Google DeepMind and Vicarious to "just keep an eye on what's going on with
artificial intelligence. I think there is potentially a dangerous outcome there."
Development of militarized artificial intelligence is a related concern. Currently, 50+
countries are researching battlefield robots, including the United States, China,
Russia, and the United Kingdom. Many people concerned about risk from super
intelligent AI also want to limit the use of artificial soldiers.
Moreover, the relationship between AI and humans is more than sophisticated.
Some say that AI can never successfully simulate genuine human empathy, so the
use of AI in mental field devalues human life. Others add that the question whether
AI will have a conscious mind will lead to problems such as taking care of the feelings
and rights of AI.
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What is going on between automation and employment is also complicated. While
automation eliminates many old jobs, it also creates new jobs through microeconomic and macro-economic effects. Economists point out that in the past
technology has tended to increase rather than reduce total employment, but
acknowledge that "we're in uncharted territory" with AI.
In the 21st century, we are facing the opportunities and challenges posed by AI. How
to live with AI? And how can workers in this era survive AI? Is it possible that we can
ever use AI to a proper extent without being replaced? These are all urgent problems
to be solved.
1. https://searchenterpriseai.techtarget.com/definition/AI-Artificial-Intelligence
2. https://www.techopedia.com/definition/190/artificial-intelligence-ai
3. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Artificial_intelligence
4. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2015/sep/06/will-robotscreate-destroy-jobs
5. http://go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=GVRL&u=mcc_pv&id=GALE|CX1930200017&
v=2.1&it=r&sid=GVRL&asid=cd5adac2
2.2 Situation Analysis on AI Replacing Labor Force
With the rapid development of high-technology and the widespread of Internet,
in order to improve productivity and reduce the costs, an increasing number of
governments and companies prefer to spend money making use of artificial
intelligence rather than hire more
employees. In the UK, Deloitte
and the University of Oxford
predicted that 10 million unskilled
jobs could be taken over by
robots. University of Oxford
researchers Carl Benedikt Frey
and Michael Osborne estimated
in 2013 that 47 percent of total
U.S. jobs could be automated and taken over by computers by 2033.1Most blue-
1
http://fortune.com/2015/02/25/5-jobs-that-robots-already-are-taking/
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collar work, especially low-skilled and low-paid jobs are mostly concerned during the
process and the white-collar work, including the knowledge-based jobs have been in
danger as well.
2.2.1 Categories of Labor Work Replaced/Being Replaced by AI
a)
Blue-collar workers
1) Manufacturing
Manufacturing was one of the foremost industries which were affected by
Artificial Intelligence. Automatic production line is used extensively in the world, as
a result, the employment is only one in tenth in the United States. Take Foxcann as
an example, the No.1 EMS in electronic industry, it employs more than one million
workers in China. However, in 2011, the company installed 10,000 robots, called
Foxbots. Nowadays the company is installing them at a rate of 30,000 per year. On
June 26, 2013, Terry Gou, Foxconn’s CEO, told his annual meeting that “We have
over one million workers. In the future we will add one million robotic workers.” This
means, of course, that the company will avoid hiring those next million human
workers.2
2) Telemarketers:
Some people probably have already received robot-calls on behalf of various
products and services, which seemed to be more persuasive and convincing. Career
growth in the telemarketing space is expected to decline by 3% by the year 2024. 3
What had happened to this career in the past decades? AI can analyze sales calls far
faster than any sales manager could -- in fact, it would take 9 years of nonstop sales
call analysis for a human being to compete, and that’s if they didn’t take vacation or
sleep. 4 Miraculous competence not only improves productivity but also reduces
the companies’ cost, especially workers’ salary. Besides, as a job without requiring a
2 https://hbr.org/2014/12/what-happens-to-society-when-robots-replace-workers
3 https://willrobotstakemyjob.com/41-9041-telemarketers
4 https://willrobotstakemyjob.com/41-9041-telemarketers
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high level of skills, profound knowledge and social intelligence, it is more likely to be
replaced by AI at the first place.
3) Drivers
Nowadays, it is common to see the news about self-driving, therefore, the
demands of drivers tail off. On Sept. 20 2016, the Obama administration even put its
weight behind automated driving, for the first time releasing federal guidelines for
the systems. Robots could replace 1.7 million America truckers in the next decade. 5
Trucking will likely be the first type of driving to be fully automated – meaning
there’s no one at the wheel. One reason is that long-haul big rigs spend most of their
time on highways, which are the easiest roads to navigate without human
intervention.
b) White-collar workers
1) Financial analyst and advisor
One Japanese insurance company, Fukoku Mutual Life Insurance, is reportedly
replacing 34 human insurance claim workers with “IBM Watson Explorer,” starting
by January 2017. 6 The AI can scan hospital records, patient’s history and other
documents to determine insurance. Besides improving productivity by 30%, the
company saves roughly $1.1 million per year on employee salaries by using the IBM
software. Fukoku Mutual will spend $1.7 million (200 million yen) to install the AI
system, and $128,000 per year for maintenance. 7 Meantime, there are other
Japanese insurance companies that explore and search for IBM system, which
indicates that more financial assistants and insurance claim workers will be involved
into the fight for unemployment.
5
http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-fi-automated-trucks-labor-20160924/
6
https://qz.com/875491/japanese-white-collar-workers-are-already-being-replaced-byartificial-intelligence/
7 http://mainichi.jp/english/articles/20161230/p2a/00m/0na/005000c
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2) Lawyers
Owing to the unthinkable and astonishing hightechnology, robots can be more intelligent, skillful and
experienced compared to a flesh-and-blood lawyer. A
machine can scan through hundreds of thousands of
documents and find the relevant information for a case
or trial more efficient and accurate. The Deloitte
Insight report, which predicts “profound reforms”
across the legal profession within the next 10 years, finds that 39% of jobs (114,000)
in the legal sector stand to be automated in the longer term as the profession feels
the impact of more “radical changes.”8 The automatic platforms have already existed
in the modern society. For instance, NexLP, an AI platform which offers E-Discovery,
searches documents for information relevant to lawsuits and other litigation. Those
platforms will mine documents for evidence that will be useful in litigation, to review
and create contracts, raise red flags within companies to identify potential fraud and
other misconduct or do legal research and perform due diligence before corporate
acquisitions.9 Increasing automation of the legal industry promises to enhance the
efficiency of scanning documents and analyzing the cases, nevertheless, the trend will
lead to redundancy in the legal system.
3) Financial and sports reporters
Interviewing people, summarizing the records and writing the results are the
routines of a journalist. Can you imagine a world that everyone is interviewed by a
robot or the talk shows are controlled by robots? This has already happened. The
Associated Press, the biggest news agency in America, has run an experiment of
automatically creating corporate earnings reports since June 2014 with software
from Automated Insights and data from Zacks Investment Research. After working
8
https://www.legaltechnology.com/latest-news/deloitte-insight-100000-legal-roles-to-beautomated/
9 https://www.cnbc.com/2017/02/17/lawyers-could-be-replaced-by-artificialintelligence.html
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through problems at the outset, the process is virtually error-free, which likely beats
what humans would do. 10 Human beings may be bored with the monotonous work
while robots won’t and they can weave the data into a compelling native as a skilled
and experienced reporter do.
2.3 Past Solutions to AI Replacing Labor Force
Technology is not the end of human society. The economic incentives,
government’s attitude and public policy can all play a significant role in shaping the
direction and effects of technological change. Keeping the workers attached to new
technology and helping unemployed persons adapt to the changing society and find
the suitable jobs are all the goals that governments want to achieve.
2.3.1 China
1) Substance Security System
In order to guarantee the basic life of unemployed person, the
Chinese government proposed new policies during the CNPC & CPPCC in
2017. The government would continue improving the
Substance Security System both in urban and rural areas. Besides, encouraging the
enterprises to retain employees, the government will carry out specific measures,
including tax allowances and exemption.
2.3.2 The United States of America
1) Emphasize the development in AI industry to create more jobs
Government has an important role to play in advancing the AI field by
investing in research and development. The rapid growth of AI has also dramatically
increased the need for people with relevant skills from all backgrounds to support
and advance the field. Prioritizing diversity and inclusion in STEM fields and in the AI
community specifically is the key part to solve the potential problems.
10
http://fortune.com/2015/02/25/5-jobs-that-robots-already-are-taking/
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2) Educate and train Americans for jobs of future.
As technology changed the nature of work and skills demanded by the labor
market, people were supposed to be prepared with the education and training that
can help them to continue to succeed. America puts emphasis on mass primary
education, providing all children with access to high-quality early education so that
all families can prepare their students for continued education, as well as investing in
graduating all students from high school college- and career- ready, and ensuring
that all Americans have access to affordable post-secondary education. Meantime,
expanding the availability of job-driven training and opportunities for lifelong
learning, as well as providing workers with improved guidance to navigate job
transitions are also the vital steps.
3) Aid workers in the transition and empower workers to ensure broadly
shared growth.
This includes steps to modernize the social safety net, including exploring
strengthening critical supports such as unemployment insurance, Medicaid,
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), and Temporary Assistance for
Needy Families (TANF), and putting in place new programs such as wage insurance
and emergency aid for families in crisis.
2.3.3 India
1) Much of India’s IT-BPM (Business Process Management) sector relies on outsourced
work from western economies, where the cost of labor force is too high. In this case, AI
could easily be turned into an opportunity. In 2017, a survey indicated that 4000
machine learning and AI programmers were required in Bangalore alone. Microsoft
Research India’s MD pointed out in October last year that India was well-placed to reap
the benefits of the shift to AI. Some companies have already cut their workforce, and
NASSCOM’s annual review predicted a 20-25% reduction of jobs in
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the industry in just the next three years.11 As the FICCI-NASSCOM-EY report
indicated, this would require substantial focus on using target educational
technology courses, especially through the burgeoning private sector.
2) National Career Service Scheme
The Government of India has initiated National Career Service Scheme
whereby a web portal named National Career Service Portal has been launched by
the Ministry of Labour and Employment (India). Through this platform, job-seekers
have the chances to seek the job information and employers can update related
information as well, which can also decrease the information asymmetry. Not only
private vacancies, contractual jobs available in the government sector are also
available on the portal.
2.3.4 Germany
Germany has instituted the crucial policies to response to the irreversible
trend—-Artificial Intelligence is replacing the work force. Unify service and business
model through the integration of relevant international standards; upgrade the old
system to the real-time system; most importantly, guide the employees to
participate in work groups, CPD and technology development system. All these
policies are placed on the agenda.
2.4 Possible Solutions
The general idea requires enterprises to take up social responsibilities, sharing parts
of the extra benefits obtained by the application of AI into solving the consequential
problems caused by unemployment. This committee needs to work on guidelines for
enterprises and governments to follow, a mechanism to monitor and a censorship to
restrain misbehaviors. Here are a few suggestions for you to dig into.
11
http://businessworld.in/article/Need-Of-Re-skilling-To-Prepare-For-The-Jobs-OfTomorrow-/31-03-2018-145010/
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Long Term Solutions:
In the upcoming second machine age the solution would be as it was in the past that
transit the upcoming generations into a better and secure job. So by encouraging the
present generations into studying the subjects that won’t be replaced by AI is the
long term goal. “Like we take an historical perspective then technical change has
always destroyed some jobs and created others, and this would in some sense be no
different from that," Manning said. "There will be some people who have spent 20
or 30 years specialized in a job and suddenly there is no demand for that. They suffer
big losses but in the long run that washes out, no young people go into those jobs
and they go into something else and there is always something else to go into.”
“If you look back to the first machine age the vast majority of Americans worked in
agriculture. Now it's less than two percent," he said. "Those people [working in
agriculture] didn't simply become unemployed, they reskilled. One of the best ideas that
America had was mass primary education. That's one of the reasons it became an
economic leader and other countries also adopted this model of mass education, where
people paid not only for their own children but other people's children to go to school."
We put a lot of effort into reskilling people in these earlier eras. It was very costly and
not simple, but ultimately it was successful.” Reskilling the population to keep up with
technological development should be put in every government’s agenda. The whole idea
is to use AI to create more profits to facilitate the progress in social welfare, such as
holistically improve education nationwide, so that later generations can receive better
education without financial burden, thus lifting the knowledge level of an entire
generation so that they can devote to higher level of intellectual work. To illustrate this,
we can assume a generation where except a few people attend college and work on
curing cancer while the rest never make it to high school and are doing basic repetitive
labor. By applying AI to replace the basic labor force, efficiency and profits boost,
leading to educational system blooming. Two generations later, AI still works on basic
manufacturing while almost everyone attend college or even further education, and
everyone is working on curing different diseases and inventions that facilitate our wellbeing. In this case, instead of regarding this transition as a loss of value in society, we are
investing the future.
Short Term Solutions:
1. Adaptation
It’s not only individual efforts to go through this transition but also governments’
involvement. Governments need to assist the replaced to not get eliminated by AI
but combine their own skills with the advance features of AI.
There were women at NASA known as “human computers.” Then a huge, new computer
was brought in, capable of doing much of their work in much less time. One of the
women in particular, Dorothy Vaughan, recognized this and adapted. She taught
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herself and her team to program it. In short, they evolved their own roles.
2. Compensation:
During the early phase after losing a job, an unemployed is under tremendous
pressure of sustaining a family. That’s why the priority of the governments is to ensure
a smooth transition from employment to unemployment, guarantee the basic living
expenses until certain point.
This idea is furthered as follows:
Universal basic income #1: This is a step further down the road. Everyone would qualify
for a certain level of income from the state, but the level of guaranteed income would
be fairly modest because we would still want people to work. Unemployment wouldn’t
be as stigmatized as it is in today’s welfare state, but neither would widespread
joblessness be truly accepted as a permanent fact of life. Some European countries are
moving toward a welfare state with cash assistance for everyone.
Universal basic income #2: It’s available to everyone, and the income level is
substantial enough to provide a satisfying standard of living. This is what we’ll most
likely get once we accept that mass unemployment isn’t a sign of lazy workers and
social decay, but the inevitable result of improving technology. Since there’s no
personal stigma attached to joblessness and no special reason that the rich should
reap all the rewards of artificial intelligence, there’s also no reason to keep the
universal income level low. After all, we aren’t trying to prod people back into the
workforce. In fact, the time will probably come when we actively want to do just the
opposite: provide an income large enough to motivate people to leave the
workforce and let robots do the job better.
Other more comprehensive solutions are expected from this conference.
2.5 Balanced future:
When the rapid development of artificial intelligence brings about the industrial
revolution and upgrades the entire industry chain, the previous industrial structure
and labor force will be affected. If the reason why artificial intelligence is replacing
traditional labor force is going to be discussed, the advantages of artificial
intelligence should be taken into consideration:
a) Capitalized cost:
The wide application of artificial intelligence and robot will reduce the expense of
the production and operation process of enterprises. It is estimated that AI-enabled
automation of knowledge work could cut employment costs by $9 trillion by 2020
(BAML). Coupled with the efficiency gains worth $1.9 trillion driven by robots, it is
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hopeful to witness that there’s a chance for near-complete automation of core,
repetitive businesses functions in the future.12
b) Efficiency:
Time and space will be saved by the operation of artificial intelligence through
automatic management of pipeline and massively intensive production. Artificial
intelligence has the ability of increasing the efficiency of businesses by automating
tasks that are currently done manually or semi-manually.
c) Amount of information:
Information from various dimensions can be collected by artificial intelligence, which
helps the managers and experts have a possibility of more diversified consideration than
before. The Economist highlighted the important role of data in a recent cover story in
which it stated “the world’s most valuable resource is no longer oil, but data.” Artificial
intelligence or AI, has become pervasive in business in every industry where decision
making is being fundamentally transformed by Thinking Machines. The need for faster
and smarter decisions and the management of big data that can make the difference is
what is driving this trend. The convergence of big data with AI is inevitable
as the automation of smarter decision-making is the next evolution of big
data.13 d) Diversification:
Artificial intelligence has the capability of meeting diversifying requirement of users.
The information of user’s searching habits will be collected by big data, after this
process, artificial intelligence analyzes their various demands and deduces search
recommendations.
Artificial intelligence as a rising industry, for the reason that it has huge advantages of
industrial upgrading, attracted a lot of investments in recent years. Venture capital
investment in AI startups grew by 40% between 2013-2016, according to McKinsey
12
Levi Shapiro; Investing In Artificial Intelligence- Nathan Benaich, Playfair Capital; 01/03/2016; The
Jerusalem
Post;http://www.jpost.com/Blogs/Unleavened-Media/Investing-In-Artificial-Intelligence-NathanBenaich-Partner-Playfair-Capital-439238
13
James Canton; From Big Data to Artificial Intelligence: The Next Digital Disruption; 06/12/2017; the
Huffington Post;https://www.huffingtonpost.com/james-canton/from-big-data-to-artifici_b_10817892.html
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Global Institute. Anecdotally, internet giants such as Facebook, Google, Amazon and
Apple have bought up hundreds of innovative startups over the past decade. A
report by McKinsey Global Institute estimates that established firms spent $2 to $3
billion on AI-related acquisitions in 2016, and between $18 and $27 billion on
internal corporate investment in AI-related projects in 2016. Surely, the number will
rapidly increase in the future.14
Consequently, increasing investment of artificial intelligence will affect the expense
of enterprises in other areas. Especially, with four advantages, artificial intelligence
has a better investment prospects and higher rates of return than other factors of
production, such as wage of workers. In 2010, the US Council of Economic Advisors
already investigated the relationship between AI and hourly wage. The chart shows
the probability of automation by an occupation’s median hourly wage, which
obviously reflect the percentage of less than 20 dollars is about 80%. And that means
that a lot of base-wage workers will be replaced by artificial intelligence and AI is
likely to hit the poor and low-skilled workers hardest.15
Nevertheless, dramatically, not only the bottom workers are replaced, but some of
the middle skill jobs will also be replaced. According to the survey of OCED, it shows
the Middle skill jobs have disappeared across the rich world (1995-2015).16
14
Washington Bytes; Artificial Intelligence And Big Data: Good For Innovation?; 07/09/2017 Forbes;
https://www.forbes.com/sites/washingtonbytes/2017/09/07/artificial-intelligence-and-big-data-good-forinnovation/3/#1f17898c401c
15
Probability of automation by an occupation's median hourly wage; https://www.theatlas.com/charts/By_3p0G
16
Middle skill jobs have disappeared across the rich world (1995-2015);https://www.theatlas.com/charts/H1XkVvQW
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In the past two decades, the situation is that middle skill jobs is undergoing a
diminishing process in developed countries and these countries tend to have a more
developed level of artificial intelligence, therefore artificial intelligence will not only
replace the underlying workers, even middle-level skill jobs or high skill jobs are likely
to be replaced. We should take the impact of artificial intelligence on different skill
levels into consideration, in other words, what kind of skills are vulnerable to
artificial intelligence? Actually, it is not a profession that is replaced by technology,
but a skill that can be replaced. In fact, it is not the low skill jobs that are easily
replaced by artificial intelligence, nor does it mean that the elite professions are
difficult to be replaced with artificial intelligence. Simple mechanical repetition and a
lack of creativity, however, are not the easiest jobs to be replaced. The most easily
replaced occupations meet the following two requirements:
1. With high added value
2. More mechanical repetition, high degree of substitution (standardization
process)
Therefore, the future balance between artificial intelligence and job market (labor force)
need to be analyzed from two dimensions: the integral impact of AI as a new form of
technology to job market; the constitutive impact of AI as a skill factor to job market.
Artificial Intelligence, as a symbolic technological progress of the fourth technological
revolution, will gradually play a more important role in the market with the
improvement of its production efficiency. In the short term, it will impact the job
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market and form a substitute role for some jobs with mechanical repetition. The new
mode of production requires new matching processes and production engineering, and
the remaining workforce will be forced to enhance their ability to collaborate with
artificial intelligence, which is an incentive influence. In areas where some artificial
intelligence technologies are not mature enough to replace people or coordinate with
machines, artificial intelligence will turn into an intelligent work assistant to help people
work efficiently. For example, business intelligence data analysis is a way to play a
supplementary role. Finally, the emergence of artificial intelligence is bound to bring a
variety of business and consumer needs or expectations, reorganization of various
application situations, bring new employment opportunities, such as artificial
intelligence application research. This is its creative role in the labor market.
What’s virtually certain is that AI will cause upheaval in the labor markets. And the
best way to combat that may be more of the same. The last 200 years of
technological revolutions have taught economists that job creation and destruction
go hand in hand. When technologies such as the internal combustion engine,
electrification, and information technology were embraced by the market, new jobs
were generated as fast as old ones disappeared for the most part. Better products
were built. Economies became more efficient. Living standards rose.
In the short run, not all workers will have the training or ability to find the new jobs
created by AI. The worry is that the temporary condition could become the norm.
The approach is promoting policies that bring labor markets back into equilibrium as
fast as possible. Skills training, job search assistance, and policies such as the earned
income tax credit and Temporary Assistance for Needy Families that boost incomes.
The government should call for measures to strengthen “what is already successful
in our social safety net” rather than more radical policies such as a basic income, a
guaranteed minimum payment to some or all citizens.17
2.6 Questions to Consider:
To sophisticatedly deal with this issue, delegates are expected to extend their
research beyond the Background Guide of this committee. The following questions
provide some directions for you to comprehend this situation more thoroughly and
come up with more constructive solutions:
1) What’s the condition of AI and employment in your country? If you are in a country
where the AI technology is not advanced enough, will you choose to slow down or
stop developing the technology because of worrying about employment?
17
An Obama official says the biggest threat from AI is that we won’t invest enough in it; 17/06/2016; Quartz
Media LLC;https://qz.com/731534/obama-official-warns-ai-taking-well-paying-jobs-but-says-the-best-solution-ismore-ai/
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2) Will Artificial Intelligence contribute to unemployment or stimulate the
occurrence of more jobs?
3) Who do you think should play the leading role when we deal with the problem of
AI replacing labor force? The government, the company, the community or
anyone else?
4) Should there be certain fields that AI is forbidden to apply to even when AI is
more capable?
5) How to foster cooperation between countries to tackle the problems?
6) What precautions should government take considering the potential of social
destabilization caused by massive unemployment?
7) How to put the short-term and long-term solutions into practice considering your
country’s status quo? What are the obstacles and what are the possible solutions?
These questions are aimed to help delegates to organize discussion more organized
and solution-oriented, but not to set boundaries on your discussion. Delegates are
more than welcome to address this issue from all different perspectives.
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