Economic and historical studies warn that artificial intelligence risks are concentrated in administrative and clerical jobs, which women occupy 90% of, mirroring the shock of telephone switchboard automation in the last century.
Concentration of women in administrative roles and ILO warnings
History’s lesson from telephone switchboard automation and the disappearance of 75,000 jobs
Liberation engines of the 1950s and the expansion of the service and office economy
The personal computer revolution and the future of women’s jobs in the age of AI
Frequently asked questions
Concentration of women in administrative roles and ILO warnings
Decades long before the emergence of smart voice assistants like Siri, Alexa, or ChatGPT, there was a real human being—almost always a woman—standing at the heart of the information and communications world, without whom most long-distance phone calls could not be completed. She was the telephone switchboard operator, who at one time constituted the single largest occupation for native-born white women in the United States under the age of 20—a job that no longer exists today.
As the world struggles to understand the fallout of the dawn of artificial intelligence on society and the economy, the history of technological progress—from automated switchboards to electric washing machines and the personal computer—provides clear signals that women will likely be among the groups most affected by AI, according to an analysis prepared by CNBC economic journalist Steve Liesman.
Ariane Hegisch, a senior researcher at the Institute for Women’s Policy Research, says: “AI focuses on routine tasks, numbers, and pattern recognition, and those types of jobs are the clerical and administrative work held by many women, as women still account for 90% of workers in secretarial and clerical jobs.” Recent research supports this argument; the International Labour Organization concluded in March that nearly 1 in 10 women in high-income countries work in professions facing the highest degree of risk from artificial intelligence.
History’s lesson from telephone switchboard automation and the disappearance of 75,000 jobs
In the 1940s, females made up nearly 95% of all telephone switchboard operators in America. It was a relatively well-paying job for women at the time and complex, requiring months of training to handle hundreds of calls an hour during peak times with speed, accuracy, and politeness. These operators suffered a heavy blow when AT&T introduced the automated telephone switchboard, in one of the largest and most AI-resembling automation investments in history, leading in subsequent decades to the disappearance of an estimated 75,000 switchboard operator jobs.
Economists James Ficenbaum of Boston University and Daniel Gross of Duke University’s Fuqua School of Business studied census and salary data from that era, writing in 2020 that the impact of that shock on current female workers at the time was depriving many of their jobs and career paths, with many ending up in lower-paying jobs or leaving the workforce entirely.
Economist David Autor explains this finding by noting that most people do not change their career paths much and instead make decisions early, and when the value of their work becomes technologically obsolete, their next step is often toward a lower-quality job. However, Ficenbaum and Gross also discovered that the next generation of women fared better, as younger, more adaptable female workers found job opportunities in other fields of comparable quality.
Liberation engines of the 1950s and the expansion of the service and office economy
By the 1950s, another technological innovation emerged that left a profound impact on women: the electric washing machine and household appliances described by University of Pennsylvania economist Jeremy Greenwood and his colleagues as “liberation engines.” These devices sharply reduced the time women spent on unpaid domestic labor, allowing that time to be redirected toward paid jobs outside the home.
From 1950 to 1980, the number of working women in the United States increased by more than 25 million, and their labor force participation rate jumped from 34% to 52%, while 16 million additional men found work despite a 5-percentage-point drop in male participation rates.
The U.S. economy absorbed these numbers through three main factors: first, the transfer of domestic tasks such as childcare and food preparation to the paid economy; second, the growth of the nation’s wealth and the emergence of opportunities in the service economy such as retail, restaurants, and hospitality; and third, the expansion of American corporations and their need for more employees to manage paperwork and accounts, with Autor emphasizing that between 1940 and 1980, a massive number of clerical jobs available to high school graduates were created.
The personal computer revolution and the future of women’s jobs in the age of AI
The next major revolution was the advent of the personal computer. According to the 1980 U.S. Census, nearly 4.7 million Americans worked as secretaries, shorthand writers, and typists, with women making up more than 98% of them. When IBM introduced the personal computer in 1981, followed by Microsoft Word two years later, offices eliminated many clerical middlemen as managers became able to print their own reports and book their own travel.
However, the personal computer was not entirely bad news for women; studies showed that women were more eager than men to use computers at work, adapting to spreadsheets and databases—a scenario likely with artificial intelligence, which may eliminate certain tasks without completely eliminating the job. A 2022 study by researchers Marcus Dellinder and Eliza Forsyth found that corporate adoption of administrative work software led to only a 1% decline in sector employment against a 3% increase in wages for college graduates.
Although a larger number of women today hold university and graduate degrees and managerial positions, providing them with some protection compared to the past, this protection may not last long because AI promises to move up the value chain for human labor, and as Hegisch concludes with a striking warning: “Artificial intelligence can learn.”
Frequently asked questions
Question: Why are women more vulnerable to job losses due to artificial intelligence?
Answer: Because AI aims to automate routine tasks, data, and patterns—tasks concentrated in clerical, administrative, and secretarial jobs, which women occupy about 90% of.
Question: What happened to telephone switchboard operators when AT&T introduced automated switchboards?
Answer: Women made up 95% of switchboard operators in the 1940s, and automation led to the disappearance of about 75,000 jobs, forcing existing operators to accept lower-paying jobs or leave the labor market.
Question: How did household appliances in the 1950s contribute to changing women’s participation in the labor market?
Answer: Electric washing machines reduced unpaid domestic labor time, helping more than 25 million American women enter the labor market between 1950 and 1980 and raising their participation rate from 34% to 52%.
Question: How did the advent of the personal computer and administrative software affect women’s work and wages?
Answer: Despite reducing the need for typists—98% of whom were women in 1980—women adapted to using computers, and a 2022 study showed that office software reduced employment by 1% but raised college graduates’ wages by 3%.
