From October 20 to 22, along the banks of Shanghai's Huangpu River, the 2026 Sustainable Global Leaders Conference returns. Nobel Prize and Turing Award winners will take the stage to discuss the future and trends of technology, and the internet-famous professors who "rescue" people from anxiety and involution — Macfarlane and Xiang Biao — will engage in a live dialogue!
Limited seats available, first come first served. Let us journey together toward sustainability! [Click to Register] Not long ago, the Ministry of Human Resources and Social Security and other departments released 11 new professions and 23 new job types, including embodied intelligent robot application technicians and digital twin engineering technicians. Since 2019, China has cumulatively released 8 batches of 121 new professions, among which digital professions number 113. The impact of technological transformation, represented by artificial intelligence, on employment is a new challenge facing China as it moves toward modernization. Structural employment contradictions have become prominent due to technological change, and must also be resolved through technological change — the continuous "launching" of new professions is a footnote to this resolution.
The crux of structural employment contradictions lies in the mismatch between supply and demand — namely, "jobs without workers" coexisting with "workers without jobs." Technological transformation, while altering old positions, is also nurturing new ones. On one hand, emerging industries directly create jobs. Of the 11 new professions released this time, 5 are digital professions. The number of people employed in core digital economy industries has reached over 36 million, there are more than 6,200 artificial intelligence enterprises, and the core industry scale has exceeded 1.2 trillion yuan. On the other hand, traditional industries have "grown" new positions through digital transformation — under logistics service providers, low-altitude logistics workers have been added; under furniture makers, intelligent furniture installation and adjustment workers have been added. It is evident that new technologies do not simply squeeze people out of old industries, but rather give labor in old industries new content.
From the results, from January to August this year, the national urban surveyed unemployment rate averaged 5.2%, flat compared with the same period last year. Employment in information transmission, software, and information technology services increased notably, and the overall employment situation remained stable amid structural adjustment. From an international perspective, the impact of artificial intelligence on employment is not unique to China. A monthly report recently released by the U.S. employment consulting firm Challenger shows that in the first half of this year, the U.S. technology industry cumulatively laid off nearly 140,000 people. In June alone, approximately 15,000 tech sector layoffs accounted for about one-third of total U.S. corporate layoffs that month. The main reason for layoffs is corporate organizational restructuring, automation upgrades, and capital reallocation around artificial intelligence. The Tony Blair Institute for Global Change estimates that artificial intelligence could ultimately replace 1 million to 3 million jobs in the UK.
China's development practice lies in linking new profession releases, occupational standard development, skills training, and skills assessment into a single chain, with government, enterprises, and institutions working together, so that the cultivation of new positions and the transition of workers can be synchronized as much as possible. China has abundant data resources, a complete industrial system, broad application scenarios, and enormous market space — these are the realistic conditions for converting employment pressure into transformational momentum.
Of course, conditions will not automatically translate into results. On the demand side, the job vacancy-to-applicant ratio for skilled talent has long remained above 1.5, reaching above 2 for highly skilled talent, and the talent gap in the top ten key manufacturing sectors is approximately 30 million. On the supply side, the 2026 graduating class of college students will reach 12.7 million. On one hand, skilled workers are hard to find in workshops; on the other hand, some graduates struggle to find jobs — the pain of mismatch hurts on both ends.
It should be pointed out that from the release of a new profession to it truly becoming a position in workers' hands, there are still many links that have not been connected. National occupational standards for some new professions have not yet been issued, and training and assessment cannot keep up. Social security for flexible employment and workers in new business forms remains incomplete, and concerns about job transitions have not been resolved. Converting the momentum of technological transformation into reality of high-quality full employment does not rely on sitting and waiting for technology dividends to naturally spill over, but on proactive policy guarantees and institutional arrangements.
Strengthening the employment-first orientation. The "15th Five-Year Plan" outline proposes "building an employment-friendly development model," which means employment is no longer just a result of development but a front-loaded consideration when planning development. It is necessary to implement assessments of the employment impact of major policies, major projects, and major productive forces layout. Assessment is not about setting gates for innovation, but about matching the pace of technology application with society's capacity for absorption, and guiding innovation resources toward directions with greater job creation potential.
Making new professions take root as soon as possible. Some say that now it is technological progress and education training racing against each other. To make education and training catch up with the pace of technological iteration, it is necessary to accelerate the development of national standards for new professions, implement special training actions such as artificial intelligence skills improvement, promote effective linkage between skill levels and compensation, and career advancement, so that the skills workers learn translate into tangible returns.
Weaving a dense safety net for employment transition. It is necessary to improve the social insurance system for flexible workers and workers in new business forms, refine labor benchmarks for new employment forms, expand coverage of occupational injury protection, and ensure that workers can transition out, be received, and stay stable. The wave of technological transformation will not stop, nor will the pace of improving people's livelihoods pause. Only by fully, quickly, and solidly completing the process of nurturing new positions and raising workers' adaptability can structural employment contradictions be gradually resolved amid change, and the path toward high-quality full employment become ever broader.
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