Work of the Past, Work of the Future

Working Paper: NBER ID: w25588

Authors: David Autor

Abstract: Labor markets in U.S. cities today are vastly more educated and skill-intensive than they were five decades ago. Yet, urban non-college workers perform substantially less skilled work than decades earlier. This deskilling reflects the joint effects of automation and international trade, which have eliminated the bulk of non-college production, administrative support, and clerical jobs, yielding a disproportionate polarization of urban labor markets. The unwinding of the urban non-college occupational skill gradient has, I argue, abetted a secular fall in real non-college wages by: (1) shunting non-college workers out of specialized middle-skill occupations into low-wage occupations that require only generic skills; (2) diminishing the set of non-college workers that hold middle-skill jobs in high-wage cities; and (3) attenuating, to a startling degree, the steep urban wage premium for non-college workers that prevailed in earlier decades. Changes in the nature of work—many of which are technological in origin—have been more disruptive and less beneficial for non-college than college workers.

Keywords: Labor Markets; Wage Inequality; Occupational Polarization; Automation; International Trade

JEL Codes: J23; J24; J31; J6; O33; R12

Causal Claims

Cause	Effect
Automation and international trade (F10)	Elimination of middle-skill jobs (F66)
Elimination of middle-skill jobs (F66)	Noncollege workers moving into low-wage occupations (J69)
Noncollege workers moving into low-wage occupations (J69)	Decline in real wages (F66)
Diminishing urban noncollege occupational skill gradient (J69)	Decline in urban wage premium for noncollege workers (J39)
Elimination of middle-skill jobs (F66)	Decline in real wages (F66)
Diminishing urban noncollege occupational skill gradient (J69)	Decline in average wages for noncollege workers in urban areas (J39)