Digitalization, routineness and employment: An exploration on Italian task-based data

This work measures the digital and routine content of professions directly from occupational surveys. It then empirically analyses the relation between the digitalization of professions and changes in employment levels, and whether routine and non-routine occupations are equally affected. We define the digitalization of occupations in 796 5-digit ISCO professional groups, using data from a unique profession-level survey on skill, task and work contents – the INAPP-ISTAT Survey on Italian Occupations (ICP), an O*NET-type dataset. We develop three novel digitalization indices, measured for each profession: a digital use index measuring the use of digital devices and technologies in the workplace, a digital skills index assessing the familiarity and skill in using digital technologies, and a digital tasks index capturing the frequency and importance of selected digital tasks in defining the profession’s activities. Additionally, from the same data we independently replicate the Autor and Dorn routine task intensity index defined in the context of the Italian economy. This allows us to explore the extent of “routine-biased technological change” specifically associated to the use of digital technologies, and potentially to identify occupations at risk of automation. Results show the multifaceted nature of both digitalization and routineness, phenomena characterized by strong sectoral specificities and by being strongly associated with the skill content of labour professions. Professions characterized by higher digital skills are those growing faster compared to the others (although this holds only in manufacturing sector). Both the descriptive and econometric evidences show a negative employment dynamics among professions combining high level of digitalization and routineness.

Digitalization, routineness and employment: An exploration on Italian task-based data

Valeria Cirillo
Rinaldo Evangelista
Dario Guarascio
Matteo Sostero
working paper 05/2019 april