MOUNTAIN LAKES, NJ - July 24, 2003 /Send2Press Newswire/ -- Don't count on yesterday's jobs for tomorrow's income, warns Richard W. Samson, author of an employment-trend report issued by think tank EraNova Institute (www.eranova.com). Thanks to a "brain drain" of human skills into electronic systems, "even the most high-tech jobs are being downsized rapidly," he says. "They ll never resize and some will disappear." On the horizon, however, are new jobs based on a re-definition of human endeavor.

The basic problem is not, Samson says, that high-tech and service jobs are going overseas. That's only temporary. Third-world contractors, like Americans, will eventually lose out to all-electronic solutions. The report identifies a "global brain drain" as the key source of today's employment turbulence, and points to a coming restructuring of jobs based on "meta-mental" skills that are uniquely human.

"Our mental processes are rapidly being transferred into computers, microchips, networks, and mechanical devices of all types," he says. "If we want to stay useful, we need to leapfrog the technology that's displacing us."

A similar sea change happened when machines began taking over muscle work at the dawn of the industrial age. Back then, the report says, people adjusted by moving up to know-how work. "But know-how is the very thing now being automated," says Samson. Obvious examples of downsized, almost-gone occupations include switchboard operator (thanks to electronic phone switches), and typesetter (thanks to page-composition software). On the way out are most personal secretaries and middle managers (thanks to electronic systems that automate business activities). "Today information-technology and service jobs, in particular, are being squeezed," says Samson.

Innovation has always created new jobs to replace those lost, but what exactly are those new jobs this time? The report describes a paradigm shift to "meta-mental" or "hyper-human" work that will be tomorrow s norm. It's based on attributes and abilities that computers are not likely to co-opt -- at least for the next few decades.

The report, Surviving the Great Global Brain Drain, may be downloaded from the EraNova Institute at http://www.eranova.com/braindrain.pdf

More information: http://www.eranova.com

Source of news: EraNova Institute
Website: www.eranova.com