机器人兴起对制造业就业的影响——基于中国上市公司的经验研究

The Impact of the Rise of Robots on Manufacturing Employment--An Empirical Study Based on Listed Companies in China

文章基于2011—2018年中国上市公司数据,采用巴蒂克工具变量因果识别策略,考察了工业机器人对制造业就业的影响。实证结果表明,整体而言,机器人应用能够促进制造业就业,工业机器人渗透度每增加1%,制造业就业将增加0.02%。从影响机制看,机器人的就业促进效应源于其对企业生产率的提高和对劳动力就业技能结构的优化。但并非所有行业的劳动力都能从机器人应用中获益,电子信息等技术密集型行业的劳动力就业“双向极化”特征明显,部分中等技能劳动力就业受到抑制,并且机器人应用对非技术密集型的制造业就业影响不显著。研究表明,工业机器人应用对就业的替代效应受到边际递减规律约束,由“机器换人”引发的对制造业工人失业的担忧是不必要的。异质性分析表明,工业机器人应用对制造业就业的促进作用在资金充沛的成熟企业和非国有企业中更为显著。

Based on data from listed companies data from 2011 to 2018 in China,this paper applies a causal identification strategy of"Bartik Instrumental Variables"to examine the impact of industrial robots on the employment in the manufacturing industry.Empirical results indicate that the application of robots can promote manufacturing employment on the whole.For every 1%increase in the penetration rate of industrial robots,manufacturing employment increases by 0.02%.Mechanism studies reveal that the employment promotion effect of robots benefits from the improvement in enterprise productivity and the optimization of the skill structure of labor employment.However,not all industries can benefit from the application of robots;there are"bipolarization"features of labor employment in technology-intensive industries such as electronics and information,where the employment of some medium-skilled labor is suppressed.Meanwhile,the impact of robots on manufacturing employment in non-technology-intensive enterprises is not significant.Further research shows that the employment promotion effect of robots will lead to a diminishing marginal substitution effect,thereby weakening their substitutive role.The concern about the unemployment of manufacturing labor caused by"robots replacing humans"is unnecessary.Heterogeneity analysis shows that the promotion effect of robot application on manufacturing employment is more significant in well-funded mature enterprises and non-state-owned enterprises.