The impact on our work

In recent years, the transport sector has undergone a significant transformation as a result of rapid advances in digitalisation, automation and artificial intelligence (AI). These advances will only accelerate in the coming years and the impact will be even greater than it is now.

Not fewer, but different jobs
Until recently, we thought that automation and digitalisation would be job eaters. But it is not machines or technological developments that pose a threat to employment. No: it is the business models behind them. That’s what this is really about.

Many studies make predictions about jobs disappearing. The drivers of heavy goods vehicles is one such frequently quoted occupation. But not according to Arjen van Halem, former business manager at STZ consultancy & research. At a round table conference organised by the Belgian Transport Union in 2018, he said: “A number of major agencies have calculated that millions of jobs will be lost. But if you look at the details more closely, you will see that it is not such a big deal at all. Because every occupation is made up of multiple tasks. For instance, a truck driver does much more than just drive a truck. He (or she) also has to ensure security, load and unload goods and check papers. A machine cannot take
over all those tasks at the same time. If you watch videos on the Internet, you often see the image of a self-driving truck and a driver sitting relaxed reading the newspaper. But that is a complete misrepresentation. A truck driver will be more akin to an aircraft pilot in the future. His plane will take off and land automatically, but the pilot at the controls will still be very highly trained in order to intervene when necessary. That’s exactly how things will also evolve in the goods transport industry.” Van Halem has now been proven right. Five years later, there has not been a mass breakthrough of self-driving trucks.

Experts tell us that jobs will disappear, but jobs will also be created: A McKinsey report predicted back in December 2017 that by 2030, 75 to 375 million workers – some 3 to 14 per cent of the global workforce – would have to switch occupations due to the disruptive impact of digitalisation and automation. That report also revealed that even then, more than 50 per cent of existing professional occupations were technologically eligible for digitalisation or automation.

According to the World Economic Forum, around 85 million jobs will be lost by 2025 whereas 97 million jobs will be created. That’s a net gain of 12 million jobs. The 2020 report states that half of workers will need to retrain by 2025 to keep up with technological advances.

Demand for new skills

But what about worker protection? Self-driving trucks and buses, remotely operated straddle carriers, digital orders, artificial intelligence, OCR recognition of containers and so on. In any event, all of these will thoroughly shake up our economic activity.

From a trade union perspective, that transformation certainly brings additional challenges with it. Our job is to protect the rights and welfare of workers. Technological transition should not mean sidelining employees. In itself, we embrace a great deal of technological innovation: after all, much of the technology used in cars, trucks, ships and aircraft contributes greatly to enhanced road safety and working comfort.

I am myself particularly concerned about the impact that all this will have on the content of jobs and the sorts of jobs that we will end up doing. It will undoubtedly be the case that higher qualifications will be required of people currently working in the transport sector if they want to continue working in the industry in the future.

Role of the unions

In a context where technological developments are accelerating, we will therefore have to focus on training, career guidance, health, privacy and the right to disconnection – i.e. the right not to be disturbed once the working day is over.

People leaving school today who are able to do something now will not be able to do the same thing in 20 years’ time if they want to stay working. We need to make sure that the right training is there and that people use it properly.

Retraining and upskilling programmes must be enforced from employers so that workers are able to keep up with developments. That way, workers become and remain equipped with the necessary skills that will enable them to adjust to changes in the labour market. Yet of course, it should only be proper that this retraining of workers takes place during working hours and that employers pay for it.

Furthermore, we need to commit to ongoing career support and guidance, as this will be the basis for identifying the type of training required. And, when screening for current skills, we also need to consider the skills that will be required in the future. The way each business is organised should also be screened on an ongoing basis to create a match between developments there and the way occupations are evolving so that they can be built into a training plan.

Other things we need to address as a union include fair pay, health and safety, reasonable working hours, privacy and the right to disconnect. Technological innovation must not be allowed to be an excuse for compromise in this area. This should include paying due attention to the welfare of workers, in addition to the obvious focus on employment itself. And there must be no technological progress if that progress means social decline.

We – the unions – must take care of our people. Because if we don’t take care of them, no one else will. But this will not happen by itself. Trade unions will have to change and adapt their approaches, strategies and structures to the challenges created by technology. And developing new organisational models to reach new types of workers is also essential.

Organising platform workers

Digital platforms are popping up all over the world. They call themselves digital service providers and they provide a link between people seeking a service and others wanting to provide that service. There’s Uber in the taxi sector, Amazon in logistics, Deliveroo and Just Eat Takeaway in meal delivery. All of these are turning our industries upside down.

Bogus self-employment
It may seem like a good thing, but actually it’s not. Because these are people who work to earn a living, but they are not actually employed by those platforms. The business model of those platform companies is based on bogus self-employment. They make people work for those companies, but they don’t take any responsibility for them: certainly not in terms of an employment contract, or social security or insurance.

According to Wikipedia, Uber employed 32,800 staff worldwide at the end of 2022, but the company itself denies actually being an employer in many cases. Uber doesn’t feel that their drivers or couriers are actually employees of the company. The way they see it, they are partners, not members of staff. This means they do not have the rights and obligations that employees of the company would have. Above all, that means they lack the rights that employed workers have.

Uber – and many other platform companies with them – operate a perverse business model. It’s a model where the burdens are passed on to employees and the benefits flow mainly to the company.

As a union, we have a mission on two fronts. First and foremost, we oppose the platform economy business model itself and the accompanying misclassification of workers in these emerging industries. Second, we unite and strengthen those platform workers – they’re employees of the companies they work for, in our view – by organising them. We take their interests, needs and problems seriously and fight to achieve a better working and living situation for them.

Because that is what trade unions have been doing since their inception: standing up for those in need of protection, help and assistance. And translating those needs collectively to force improvements for everyone in the same situation to benefit from.

At the present time, there are 28 million employees operating in the platform industry in the EU. By 2025, there will be 43 million of them. So many workers who have no voice will no doubt realise for themselves that they need to organise. And they will do so in various places around the world. And when they do, unions must be ready to support them.

Bringing order to the booming logistics sector

This not only created exponential growth in e-commerce generally, but also generated equally large growth in the logistics sector. Consumers developed new habits, as well as new expectations. If they ordered something online today, they expected it to be delivered to their home tomorrow, at the latest.

Each morning I see as many as fifteen delivery vans driving in and out of my street. Business is booming for companies such as Amazon, PostNL, DPD and GLS. And the online ordering habit has continued long after the lockdowns were over.

7.5 million dollars per hour
E-commerce and gig platforms such as Uber and Deliveroo saw their turnover increase by 50 per cent between 2019 and 2020. Other companies, like PostNL, GLS, DPD and other package deliverers also did well. Unfortunately, it wasn’t just these companies’ business figures that went up sharply. The number of complaints from workers about poor working conditions and exploitation by their employers also spiked.

Large multinationals, such as Amazon, developed an aggressive overall strategy. They reorganised and restructured to the tune of big money. In the third quarter of 2021, Amazon generated a turnover of 110.8 billion dollars. That was 15 per cent more than in the same period of the previous year.

Amazon is the world’s largest e-commerce company and its presence is also creeping up stealthily on Belgium. Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, sees his own personal wealth grow by 7.5 million dollars… every hour. A Belgian trucker would have to work for more than 450,000 hours (that equates to 206 years!) to achieve the same thing. In the meantime, as Bezos stuffs the money in his pockets to organise little trips into space
for the rich and famous, Amazon workers barely make a minimum wage.

An informal ETF survey of European trade unions conducted in summer 2023 has shown that the problems facing logistics workers are the same across Europe. Subcontracting and outsourcing are the rule of the game in the sector. Often, temporary workers are used, who have non-permanent contracts, or bogus self-employed workers. This makes it difficult for staff to organise into a union. Digitalisation and the use of artificial intelligence mean there is also a lack of transparency. In many cases, the sector is run by aggressive managers who don’t shy away from intimidation. And often there’s a lack of personal/ individual protective equipment.

Anti-union
A final reflection on the logistics sector and the challenge facing the trade unions there. In 2022, in the United States, Amazon spent 14.2 million dollars on anti-union consultants. What does it mean for a company that spends so much money to keep the unions out? Does it not indicate that just those very employees have every interest in having unions working for them within their company?

Robots will have to pay!

After all, robots don’t buy goods, don’t pay taxes and therefore don’t contribute to general welfare. Today, the (European) social model is built on the fact that you tax and then reuse some of the surplus value on labour to pay for things like social security.

That surplus value on labour will always increase thanks to automation. It will not only be produced by workers, but increasingly by machines or by software and everything around it. And if that’s the case, I don’t see why you can’t design a model to value machines, robots, computers, software programs, etc.

Instead of taxing only labour, you might as well tax (some of) the profit generated by automation. This will eventually be necessary to keep our social model intact or to flesh it out more where it doesn’t exist (yet).

Legislation, transparency and ethical frameworks

One of the problems experienced by platform workers, for example, is the lack of transparency about how the algorithms that control them are operated. Pricing is not at all clear, for instance. Uber drivers in turn lose their licence or are simply deleted from the application and can only guess why.

Moreover, with the integration of artificial intelligence and automation, ethical considerations also need to be taken into account. We have to stress the importance of transparency and accountability in the development and deployment of these technologies. There needs to be clarity for the use of AI algorithms so that we can guarantee fairness, prevent discrimination and protect the privacy of employees.

The management of platform companies will also have to learn to talk with the people who carry out work for them. It’s called social dialogue. And it can only be achieved with the involvement of the unions. Because if there is one thing we cannot do, it is to assume the good intentions of these platform companies. Monitoring is an absolute necessity.

Not so very long ago, I was sitting at the kitchen table at home, talking about travel. About whether we would ever go on a trip to Greece again, because remember last time… An ordinary weekday conversation at an ordinary weekday location. And as I grabbed my smartphone to check my messages for the umpteenth time – the umpteenth time too many – I happened to receive some advertisements about … travel to Crete. I am really not making this up! I couldn’t! When that happens, shouldn’t we urgently call for ethical frameworks that take into account the social impact of these technologies and ensure that they are consistent with workers’ and consumers’ rights, as well as in line with our societal values?

Daron Acemoglu is an economist affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He researches the economic implications and dangers of introducing artificial intelligence and he believes in technological progress, although not at any cost. He warns us that without a clear regulatory framework, technology will increase inequality. You don’t even have to be or become a technophobe to see that regulation is urgently required.

And that regulation, he says, should not be left to the industry itself, nor delayed for geopolitical reasons. He refers to the battle between economic superpowers hiding behind the fact that competition benefits from unilateral regulation: “We cannot do that, otherwise China will get ahead.” Meanwhile, China itself has also put plans to introduce regulations on hold for the same reason.

We must actively participate in discussions about the future of work and not leave it to techies or politicians. We must put pressure on policymakers, employers and other stakeholders to shape a future that promotes fair work, social justice and shared prosperity.

Leaving no one behind

In Belgium, 20 per cent of the population lives in poverty or social exclusion – or risks falling into it. 28 per cent of Belgians don’t have the required knowledge to use the Internet securely. This means that poverty and a lack of access to the Internet and social media, etc. go hand in hand. Disadvantaged people have less access to increasingly digitalised (public) services, whether it’s health services, banks or digital municipal services.

Older people, for example, often fall by the wayside. They may lack computer skills and often don’t even have a computer or a smartphone. Consequently, they cannot create an electronic identity and hence miss out on connecting to many digital services.

Architect-urbanist Thomas Ermacora has serious concerns about this. Concerns about countries lacking the capabilities and resources to use artificial intelligence, concerns about the concentration of power of AI development. 80 per cent of research, engineering and product development for artificial intelligence is in the hands of a dozen companies, he says.

He’s even concerned about the personality of the people who run the big tech companies (Amazon, Meta, Google, etc.). He believes that their personalities – some call them narcissistic, others talk about egoism – create a toxic dynamic in the technology landscape. This was illustrated clearly in August 2023, when Elon Musk supported a message from the Flemish far-right fascist party Vlaams Belang on his new forum X, formerly Twitter.

Checking the power of the tech giants

Meta does not agree with the new law and so simply took out all news reports from its platforms. There had already been talk about this in Australia in 2021, where the government voted for similar legislation. The law was subsequently adjusted… under pressure from several of the tech giants. It illustrates the power and attitude of these behemoths who bestride technology: anyone who votes for laws the media giants don’t like will take a pasting. That’s a big fat middle finger from the tech giants to the political world.

It becomes even more excessive when you come to realise that SpaceX, Elon Musk’s company, can decide the course of a war. Such as the war in Ukraine. With his company Starlink’s 4,500 satellites suspended high in the atmosphere, Musk acquired a dominant position in the field of Internet via satellite. At the touch of a button on his Starlink system, Elon Musk could complicate Ukrainian attacks on Crimea. That’s according to research from The New York Times. It’s very frightening to think that something so radical is possible. We are talking here about one filthy-rich person who can decide the course of a war. Whatever you think of the war in Ukraine, it’s a sobering thought. That businessmen – who are only out for profit – can have such an impact should be enough to shake every democrat awake. When you add to that the fickle and maverick nature of Musk’s character and psychology, we must urgently demand that governments intervene and establish more controls – or else develop their own initiatives that allow for democratic control over such systems. The only way to rein back the power of Musk and his consorts is to challenge his monopoly. Which is why the EU has developed the IRIS² satellite communication network.

I also advocate greater control and transparency over data management and processing by companies and governments. Personal data remains the property of the people themselves: that should be the starting point. The European Union took the first step in this direction with the introduction of the General Data Protection Regulation. But that’s just the beginning. There also needs to be greater visibility into the ways in which data is processed. Just think of the benefits affair in the Netherlands in which 25,000 people were wrongly suspected of fraud due to incorrect assumptions made by the data management program.

Thanks to increased productivity, we may have achieved a higher gross domestic product, which has brought greater prosperity, but this has not necessarily improved everyone’s wellbeing.

Artificial intelligence, as semi-autonomous software, can solve problems, but how can we prevent it from having a negative impact on the lives of many people? In short, will artificial intelligence be used for the benefit of a society with a high level of social capital and mutual trust, or will it be used solely to increase shareholder profits?

50 years ago, automation eliminated many jobs that were based mainly on a person’s physical strength or their ability to do manual work in manufacturing. This meant that the lower middle class and manual workers had to look for other jobs or else they ended up unemployed or taking early retirement. It also demonstrates that the application of more advanced technologies does not necessarily improve everyone’s standard of living.

AI, as a broad set of technological tools, gives managers the opportunity to work at a lower cost and above all to save on middle management labour costs. AI therefore solves the problem of managers. However, its social cost is high: higher unemployment and greater inequality are likely to emerge. The middle class – people with their trades and skills – is in danger of disappearing.

This will fundamentally change the socio- economic system.

There will be greater pressure to guarantee everyone, as a consumer, a basic income from general resources based on a tax system. But big business and its shareholders will make maximum use of artificial intelligence tools to avoid making a fair contribution to the “basic income” system.

The development of AI is currently in the hands of the ten richest companies worldwide, so that an increasingly exclusive de facto elite dominates global economic and related social dynamics.

An increasingly exclusive elite can decide on the purposes and applications of AI and will therefore influence the lives of a large group of people.

If the aim of AI is to increase productivity, and if only shareholders are going to reap the benefits, this means that technological advances are being misused.

Of course, no one is opposed to new, more advanced technologies, but at the end of the day, it’s about promoting economic justice and creating a better life for everyone. Technological development is closely linked to the capitalist economic system and is associated with “progress” and advancement. Public money, in the form of tax breaks or subsidies, even stimulates this process: the pharmaceutical sector in Belgium is a case in point. But what is progress in a globalised world facing enormous ecological challenges? Who has the capacity and power to make decisions in this area? How should we organise ourselves in terms of democratic participation processes?

IS AI ABOUT FOLLOWING THE INSTRUCTIONS OF AN ALGORITHM?
AI is not a neutral technology, because it is fuelled by certain knowledge, certain systems of thought and certain underlying values and emotions. In short, it is based on a particular vision of the world in which algorithms are created. These algorithms can perform creative tasks and propose potential decisions, but they will always be part of a predetermined worldview.

A company’s board of directors could, for example, ask the AI system the following interesting question: Should we prioritise short-term productivity gains or long-term job/ existence security? What are the advantages and disadvantages of the different scenarios for the players involved?

The challenge therefore remains to ask essential questions and to be aware of the worldview and interests that will dictate the answers.