By Erica Pandey, Kaveh Waddell | Axios
The counties in the Midwest hit hardest by previous waves of job-market turbulence will again bear the brunt of the next round of automation-fueled disruptions.
Why it matters: As middle- and low-wage jobs in the American heartland disintegrate further, the national anger and polarization fueled by an urban–rural divide will only deepen.
“We often talk about automation in terms of which jobs will be lost. It’s just as important, if not more important, to think about which places will be hit.”
— Roy Bahat, head of the venture fund Bloomberg Beta
The backstory:The last wave of technological disruption — the IT revolution of the 1980s — created new jobs, but the bulk of the job and wage gains were on the high and low ends of the labor market. Scores of middle-wage, middle-skill jobs in manufacturing, largely in the middle of the country, were automated away or sent abroad.
