Gov. Gavin Newsom, whose interest in technology has been clear since his 2013 book, Citizenville: How to Take the Town Square Digital and Reinvent Government, on Friday announced two co-chairs and 19 members of the new state Future of Work Commission. Per its charter, the commission should contain 14 to 22 members. Among the takeaways:
• Executive Order N-17-19, which established the commission Aug. 14, acknowledges that “rapid advancements in technology, specifically automation of jobs and expanded artificial intelligence capability,” have and will continue to impact the type, quality and number of positions available in the 21st century. However, the EO emphasizes, wage stagnation, unemployment and other workforce problems are reversible by sound policy decisions and investment in the future — and not “inevitable consequences of economic growth and technological advancement.”
The commission’s primary mission is to “study, understand, analyze and make recommendations” about the types of jobs residents could have in the future. That includes looking at “the impact of technology on work, workers, employers, jobs and society”; and methods of promoting better job quality, wages and working conditions through technology. … ”
• The EO specifically directs the commission to “identify and assess the new and emerging technologies” that have the potential to significantly affect work, its organization, and wages and skill requirements. It also directs the group to develop tools to assess the impact of proposed technologies and evaluate them; and to identify policies and practices that could help businesses, workers and communities, while responding to rapid changes in technology.
The commission will work with the Institute for the Future in public-private partnership, to convene “diverse stakeholders” to support and guide its work, and create a public agenda. An interim report on its progress is due May 1.
“California leads the nation in both technological innovation and workplace standards, and the Commission will, in part, address the impact of these two forces on one another — including exploring ways technology can improve and expand economic equity, workplace justice, and pathways for Californians to connect to good jobs," explained Julie Su, secretary of the Labor and Workforce Development Agency, in an email to Techwire. "Ultimately, the goal is to develop a new social compact based on shared prosperity for working Californians.” She will join Newsom’s chief economic and business adviser, Lenny Mendonca, in helping guide the commission.
“We must do the planning required to ensure that we educate and train workers for the jobs of the future, and that these jobs create pathways for economic mobility and the reduction of economic inequality in our state,” Newsom said in a statement.
• Commission co-chairs will be Mary Kay Henry, nine-year president of the Service Employees International Union; and James Manyika, 10-year chairman and director at McKinsey Global Institute and member of the U.S. Commerce Department’s Digital Economy Board of Advisors from 2016 to 2017.
• Commission members include Roy Bahat, head of Bloomberg Beta since 2013 and a member of the Shift Commission on Work, Workers and Technology; Jennifer Granholm, Michigan governor from 2002 to 2011, and a member of the Berkeley workgroup on Work in the Age of Intelligent Tools; Tom Kalil, chief innovation officer at Schmidt Futures and special assistant to the chancellor for science and technology at the University of California, Berkeley, from 2001-2008; and Fei-Fei Li, co-director of Stanford University’s new Human Centered AI Institute since 2018, and director of the university’s AI Lab from 2013-2018. None of the positions requires Senate confirmation; each earns $100 per diem.
