Employment and organization aspects of high technology: A case study of machine vision *

Abstract

A case study of machine vision has been conducted to help identify and analyze the global employment effects of high technology in general. Machine vision as a new industry has grown exponentially but erratically, and its major users are presently concentrated in the automotive and electronics industries. The total employment of this high-tech industry has been growing rapidly in proportion to its sales. However, very few blue-collar workers are employed, and its highly trained employees have come from other high-tech firms or directly from schools. The user firms have had a reduction of work force on the factory floor due to machine vision applications. On the other hand, machine vision may bring some of the offshore manufacturing activites back to the United States, or at least slow down the trend of manufacturing outmigration. The work looks closely at the risks and strategies of firms in a mercurial technological environment. These findings have policy implications in many areas, including human resource management.