A new study measures the actual impact of robots on jobs. It's significant.

Machines replacing humans in the workplace has been a perpetual concern since the Industrial Revolution, and an increasing topic of discussion with the rise of automation in the last few decades. But so far hype has outweighed information about how automation -- particularly robots, which do not need humans to operate -- actually affects employment and wages. The recently-published paper "Robots and Jobs: Evidence from U.S. Labor Markets" by MIT professorDaron Acemoglu and Boston University professor Pascual Restrepo, PhD '16, finds that industrial robots do have a negative impact on workers. The researchers found that for every robot added per 1,000 workers in the U.S., wages decline by .42% and the employment-to-population ratio goes down by .2 The impact is more sizable within the areas where robots are deployed: adding one more robot in a commuting zone (geographic areas used for economic analysis) reduces employment by six workers in that area.