工业机器人应用与就业再配置

The Application of Industrial Robots and Employment Reallocation

近年来,集成了人工智能的新一代机器人正在我国快速普及应用。长期来看,机器人在国民经济各领域广泛应用对于提高企业生产效率,促进企业人力资本提升,推动企业数字化绿色低碳转型,缓解老龄化加速和劳动力成本快速上升的不利影响等方面会产生诸多积极作用。与此同时,机器人广泛普及应用同样会引起劳动力在地区和产业层面重新配置,对就业增长和再配置产生多方面影响。本文基于企业税收调查数据(2010~2016)、城市层面数据(1999~2019)、中国劳动力动态调查(2012~2018)微观数据,通过构建城市层面机器人渗透率工具变量,多角度探讨了机器人应用在地区层面的就业影响作用。研究发现:(1)机器人广泛应用显著增强了在位企业的市场优势,促进了市场在位企业总体就业增长,促进了劳动力在不同部门之间的转移,劳动力会倾向于转移到企业平均规模较大的行业。(2)企业加总层面和微观个体层面的经验结论表明:机器人应用显著地提升了企业生产效率,导致就业创造效应放缓的同时也显著降低了就业损失效应,劳动力在地区层面的就业稳定性呈现上升趋势。(3)机器人应用会产生显著的市场外溢效应,促进在位企业就业增长的同时,也会一定程度上放缓新企业进入速度,这也是地区层面总体就业增长率放缓的主要原因和机制。(4)微观数据异质性分析表明:机器人应用对高学历和中间年龄群体的工作转换产生更显著影响,会提升高学历和中间年龄群体追求工作稳定的倾向。这也意味着长期来看机器人应用会促进企业人力资本积累,能够有效缓解老龄化加速和劳动力成本快速上升给企业带来的经营压力。机器人对不同职业类型和性别群体的工作转换影响没有显著性差异。

In recent years,a new generation of robots integrated with artificial intelligence has been rapidly applied in China.In the long run,the widespread application of robots in various sectors of the national economy will have numerous positive impacts,such as improving productivity of enterprises,promoting human capital accumulation,driving the digital,green,and low-carbon transformation of enterprises,and mitigating the adverse effects of accelerated aging and rapidly rising labor costs.At the same time,the widespread application of robots will also lead to the reallocation of labor at the regional and industrial levels,and have a multi-faceted impact on job market.Based on enterprise tax survey data(2010-2016),city-level data(1999-2019),and micro-individual data from the China Labor Dynamics Survey(2012-2018),this paper constructs Bartik instruments for robots at the prefectural level to explore the impact of robot application on employment reallocation from multiple perspectives.The findings are as follows.First,the widespread application of robots has significantly enhanced the market advantages of incumbent enterprises,promoted the growth of employment in incumbent enterprises,and to some extent led to the transfer of labor between different sectors.Workers tend to shift to industries with larger average enterprise size.Second,the application of robots has significantly improved enterprise production efficiency,slowed down the growth of job creation and job destruction simultaneously,therefore,the stability of employment has shown an upward trend.Third,the application of robots also has significant market spllover effects.While promoting the growth of employment in incumbent enterprises,it also slows down the speed of entry of new enterprises,which is the main reason and mechanism for the slowdown of overall employment growth at the prefectural level caused by robots.Fourth,the application of robots has a more significant impact on the job transitions of highly educated and middle-aged groups,and significantly enhances the tendency of highly educated and middle-aged groups to pursue job stability.This also means that in the long run,the application of robots will promote the human capital of enterprises and can effectively alleviate the operating pressure on enterprises caused by accelerated aging and rapid increases in labor costs.No significant differences have been found in the impacts of robots on job transitions for different occupational types and gender groups.