Help Wanted: Four Forces Transforming Labor Markets

The invention of the spinning jenny in 1764 upended the textile industry—and the women who earned a living weaving cotton and preparing fabrics in their homes. Suddenly, these jobs became obsolete. Just as the industrial revolution had a profound impact on how people worked and lived, structural forces are transforming global labor markets today, from slowing globalization to the advent of generative AI. The evolution of labor markets is poised to reshape the macro landscape in the years to come, posing broad implications across the investment portfolio. In this episode of PGIM's The OUTThinking Investor, we talk to three experts about the transformation of labor markets, the economic impact, and how investors can identify leaders and laggards as the world embarks on a new era of work. Our guests are Greg Wright, an associate professor of economics at the University of California at Merced and a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution; Zeynep Ton, a professor at MIT Sloan and author of the book The Case for Good Jobs: How Great Companies Bring Dignity, Pay and Meaning to Everyone's Work; and Jakob Wilhelmus, Director of Thematic Research at PGIM. For more on this topic, visit PGIM.com to explore our Megatrends report, The Transformation of Labor Markets: Winners and Losers in a New Era.