Can Manufacturing Add Robots and People Simultaneously? Insights on Automation's Impact

Beyond measurable gains in productivity and quality, automation consistently raises a less tangible metric: employee anxiety. Robotics, amplified by advances in artificial intelligence, has become a frequent headline in mainstream media, sparking questions about which jobs are at risk.

• Robots: Is your job at risk?
• Robots to destroy jobs and lower wages, says new study
• How robots will even affect the jobs of people we thought were immune

Against this backdrop, a recent press release from the International Federation of Robotics (IFR) caught my eye: Robots Create Jobs—New Research. While the IFR has a vested interest in promoting robotics, the underlying report comes from the Centre for European Economic Research (ZEW), commissioned by Germany’s Federal Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF). The study aims to provide an unbiased assessment of robotics’ impact on the German economy.

In 2017, Germany boasted a robot density of 309 units per 10 000 employees—ranked third worldwide—while its workforce reached 44 million, the highest level since reunification.

Junji Tsuda, IFR president, noted that automation “modernizes production by shifting hazardous, unhealthy, and monotonous work to machines. In the vast majority of cases, only certain activities of a job are automated, not the entire spectrum of an employee’s work.”

The ZEW report also found that when automation displaced 5 % of workers within five years, new roles were created to offset the losses. Forecasts project that further automation and digitalisation in manufacturing will lift employment by 1.8 % by 2021.

Supporting this view, the IFR highlighted a London School of Economics study, Robots at Work, which analysed industrial robot adoption across 17 developed economies from 1993 to 2007. The study reported a 15 % productivity gain, a decline in low‑skilled labour, and a modest rise in wages.

Global Automation Adoption is Accelerating

In February, IFR released a worldwide survey of automation levels. Global robot density reached 74 units per 10 000 employees, up from 66 in 2015. Regional averages are 99 in Europe, 84 in the Americas, and 63 in Asia.

Between 2010 and 2016, annual growth rates in robot density were 9 % in Asia, 7 % in the Americas, and 5 % in Europe. China’s adoption surged from 25 units per 10 000 employees in 2013 to 68 in 2016, placing the country 23rd globally. Beijing aims to enter the world’s top 10 most automated nations by 2020.

In the United States, robot density rose to 189 units per 10 000 employees in 2016, ranking seventh worldwide. Forecasts predict at least a 15 % annual increase in robot sales through 2020.

While automation headlines often highlight job displacement, the evidence suggests a more nuanced picture: robots can complement human labour, enhance safety, and create new employment opportunities.