{"title":"The impact of robots on labor demand: evidence from job vacancy data in South Korea","authors":"Hyejin Kim","doi":"10.1007/s00181-024-02585-0","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<p>The debate about the impact of robots on employment has been lively. In this paper, I examine the effect of robots on local labor demand in South Korea, one of the most technologically advanced countries in terms of robotics. Using the regional variation in robot exposure constructed from national industry-level robot adoption data and the initial distribution of industrial employment in cities, I find that robots did not reduce local labor demand. However, I estimate declines in labor demand in the manufacturing sector and routine jobs. An increase in one robot per 1000 workers in terms of exposure to robots is correlated with a decline in the job vacancy growth rate of 2.6%p in the manufacturing sector and of 2.5%p in routine jobs. No significant relationship is found between robot exposure and labor demand in the service sector or non-routine jobs.</p>","PeriodicalId":11642,"journal":{"name":"Empirical Economics","volume":"2013 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":1.9000,"publicationDate":"2024-04-16","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Empirical Economics","FirstCategoryId":"96","ListUrlMain":"https://doi.org/10.1007/s00181-024-02585-0","RegionNum":4,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"ECONOMICS","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
The debate about the impact of robots on employment has been lively. In this paper, I examine the effect of robots on local labor demand in South Korea, one of the most technologically advanced countries in terms of robotics. Using the regional variation in robot exposure constructed from national industry-level robot adoption data and the initial distribution of industrial employment in cities, I find that robots did not reduce local labor demand. However, I estimate declines in labor demand in the manufacturing sector and routine jobs. An increase in one robot per 1000 workers in terms of exposure to robots is correlated with a decline in the job vacancy growth rate of 2.6%p in the manufacturing sector and of 2.5%p in routine jobs. No significant relationship is found between robot exposure and labor demand in the service sector or non-routine jobs.
期刊介绍:
Empirical Economics publishes high quality papers using econometric or statistical methods to fill the gap between economic theory and observed data. Papers explore such topics as estimation of established relationships between economic variables, testing of hypotheses derived from economic theory, treatment effect estimation, policy evaluation, simulation, forecasting, as well as econometric methods and measurement. Empirical Economics emphasizes the replicability of empirical results. Replication studies of important results in the literature - both positive and negative results - may be published as short papers in Empirical Economics. Authors of all accepted papers and replications are required to submit all data and codes prior to publication (for more details, see: Instructions for Authors).The journal follows a single blind review procedure. In order to ensure the high quality of the journal and an efficient editorial process, a substantial number of submissions that have very poor chances of receiving positive reviews are routinely rejected without sending the papers for review.Officially cited as: Empir Econ