Relax: Automation isn't coming for your job

For the past few years, the drumbeat of think pieces about automation taking your job–yes,your job–has gotten both louder and more incessant. Smart people like the folks at Oxford Martin and Gartner forecast more and more jobs being gobbled up by our mechanical overlords and President Obama made a passing reference in his otherwise upbeat final State of the Union address. But technological unemployment has been around forever; you can actually go back to the ancient Greeks here or the famous example of English luddites throwing their shoes into weaving machines they felt were destroying the textile industry (fun fact: those shoes were called "sabots" and yes, that's where the word "sabotage" comes from). The point is, societies have forever dealt with technological unemployment. But even as automation continues–and make no mistake, it absolutely will–don't buy into the Chicken Littles who say your job–yes, your job–is next. Automation isn't coming to take your job.