WHITHER TECHNOLOGY AND WORK: THEORY, WAREHOUSE STUDY, JOB QUALITY AND DISCOURSES IN THE SOCIOLOGY OF AUTOMATION

Abstract

The objective of the dissertation is to examine the relationship between technology and work and automation of work. The first empirical study (chapter 1) describes the socio-technical experience impacting present workers. I examine how technology and automation affected warehouse workers at Amazon, a powerful platform monopoly that has used technology to surveil, deskill and precarize warehouse work using published secondary sources, qualitative thematic analysis and topic models for Youtube testimonies and Reddit feeds. Amazon uses both labor-displacing as well as labor-complementing technologies. The second empirical study (chapter 2) explores the relationship between the automatability of occupations and job quality using Frey/Osborne, Webb, Jorgenson, O*Net and General Social Survey data. The overall finding is mixed, in that among the eight different automation measures none of them imply the potential elimination of high- or low-quality jobs along all dimensions. Highly automatable occupations are associated with less stress, less likelihood of requiring a second job, but also less job satisfaction and health. The third empirical study (chapter 3) is a social discourse of elite social actors involving the future of work imaginary using topic models and qualitative thematic analysis applied to NBER working papers, presidential archives, New York Times articles, business organization and trade union websites. The dissertation is a contribution to economic sociology, sociology of work, political sociology, political economy and technology studies.