Work Trends for 2021 and Beyond

Rarely are predictions of dramatic change accurate. Prospects are better although less impressive when predicting continuation of existing trends. Here are my best shots.

AI-Assisted Work. The robots aren’t coming so fast but artificial-intelligence-assisted jobs are. Progress in AI and its subset, machine-learning (self-teaching computers), will improve our lives and create jobs. Examples: AI-assisted telemedicine, gene editing to cure diseases, matching paradigms for jobs, dating, friends, and mentors.

Greening. If as predicted, the Democrats win in the fall, we’ll likely see a major increase in Green New Deal spending. That will include the obvious such as solar energy but also, jobs in creating more mass transit and in regulation and inspection. There may also be an increase in spending on nuclear energy as even many environmentalists have come to believe that nuclear need be part of the clean-energy mix.

Secular spiritualism. According to the Pew Center for the Study of Religion, except for Islam, the fastest growing religion is no-religion. Might Eastern spirituality as manifested heavily in meditation and yoga, join the ranks of faded fads, like cigars, go up in smoke? It's certainly a good bet that humankind will continue to seek something beyond the quotidian. Increasing numbers of such people will find that through charity: time and money, for example, increase in “socially responsible” and “impact” investing. Relatedly, more people will start business aimed at the poor, for example, making microloans. I write more on secular spirituality here.

Basics. The economy’s COVID collapse will likely be with us for a good while. So consider working for a company that provides basic food, housing, transportation, etc. A less obvious example: home-office services. Ever more people will, by choice or mandate, be working from home. So there may be opportunities in home-office creation, ergonomics, and videoconferencing coaching.

Jobs move from the private to the federal government sector. Likely wins for Dems in November suggest that companies will be additionally taxed and regulated, which, atop the COVID economic shutdown, will reduce hiring. Conversely, the federal government, which can print money and take on more debt through "quantitative easing" and the like, will likely grow. A plus for government jobs is that they tend to be full-time, fully-benefited, and with maximum job security.

Work serving the poor. Today’s racial roiling atop acceleratingly powerful messages from society’s mind molders (schools, colleges, and media) suggest that ever more resources will be allocated to the poor. That’s another argument for government jobs, which disproportionately provides programs for the poor, as well as for work in well-funded nonprofits. Entrepreneurial types who want to serve the poor might walk their talk by starting a business that hires low-income people or gives a percentage of profits to nonprofit organizations.

Jobs to gigs. It’s hard to resist: Option A: Keep paying workers 52 weeks a year with full benefits, and the full complement of employee rights, whether or not that person’s skill set is ideal for all 52 weeks. Option B: Hire on a just-in-time basis. So, ever more work will likely be converted from full-time, relatively permanent positions to short-term temp gigs. The takeaway: Keep growing your marketable skills and the depth and extent of your network.

Automating of white-collar jobs that are fact- rather than judgment-centric. It’s old news that repetitive jobs are very subject to automation (and offshoring.) But advances in artificial intelligence will eliminate increasing numbers of white-collar jobs, for example low-to mid-level accounting and legal research work. So, consider pursuing jobs in which subjective judgment is important: for example, managing people, or providing physical or mental health services.

Security: Whether in preparing or responding to a naturally occurring or bioweapon pathogen, the COVID pandemic will likely cause continued hiring, not just of researchers and public health advisors but across the spectrum of employees: from clerks to CEOs.

While society tends to respond to the terrorism du jour, we can’t ignore terrorism's other forms. There’s the traditional bombing and shooting terrorism on trains, for example, the London Underground bombings and planes, e.g., 9-11, and on the streets—Almost 200 Israelis have been killed by lone wolves in just the past year. Particularly sad to me, despite my being an atheist, is terrorism against worshipers, for example, the burning of Paris’s Notre Dame Cathedral and massacring 11 people in prayer at Pittsburgh’s Tree of Life synagogue. Finally, there are threats that, to date, have been largely thwarted, for example, those targeting our food and water supply. In toto, the job market for people in terrorism prevention and response is likely to be robust, alas.

Online education developer. Education has long been ripe for reinvention. One of COVID’s silver linings is that it has revealed that the so-convenient and COVID-friendly online education hasn't yet lived up to its potential. COVID or not, there is great need for a next-generation of online education, what I dub ultracourses. These would be taught by world-class instructors, using rich interactivity, video-centric simulations, and gamification. In the 1968 movie The Graduate, the young man seeking career advice was advised, “Plastics!” If I were to offer such a person a soundbite of advice today, it would be “online education developer.”

The takeaway

S/he who lives by the crystal ball eats broken glass, but perhaps these not-radical predictions might help you eat a little better.

I expand on these on YouTube.

You can reach career counselor and author of Careers for Dummies Dr. Marty Nemko at [email protected]