SavedAdd your journal

Journals / Social Review of Technology and Change / 2026 / Cilt: 4 Sayı: 2

Technological Unemployment in the Age of Artificial Intelligence: From Job Loss to the Recomposition of Work

Yapay Zekâ Çağında Teknolojik İşsizlik: İş Kaybından İşin Yeniden Bileşimine

Serkan Çelik(TEKİRDAĞ NAMIK KEMAL ÜNİVERSİTESİ)0000-0002-5835-1300
Pages
86–117
Publication Date
2026-10-30
DOI
—
🏛️Bibliographic metadata and full text access for this article are provided via DergiPark.
DergiPark Record ↗
✨

AI Summary & Key Takeaways

AI Insight
⚡ TL;DR(Too Long; Didn't Read)

Accordingly, the social effects of technology are institutionally mediated rather than technologically predetermined.[

📌 3 Key Takeaways

🎯
Objective & Hypothesis:This article examines technological unemployment through a conceptual, historical, and comparative framework, focusing on how automation and artificial intelligence transform labor markets.
📊
Key Findings & Data:The comparison shows that similar technological shocks generate different labor-market outcomes depending on education systems, social protection, industrial policy, and labor-market institutions.
💡
Conclusion & Impact:Accordingly, the social effects of technology are institutionally mediated rather than technologically predetermined.[
🔬Design:Modeling & Simulation
📍Scope:Comprehensive Sample
⚙️Variables:teknolojik işsizlik · otomasyon · yapay zeka

Abstract

This article examines technological unemployment through a conceptual, historical, and comparative framework, focusing on how automation and artificial intelligence transform labor markets. Its central research question is not simply whether technological change destroys jobs, but how substitution and compensation mechanisms reshape task composition, skill demand, and job quality. Technological unemployment is therefore treated as a process in which short-term frictional adjustment and longer-term structural mismatch may coexist, producing a broader recomposition of work. The United States, the European Union, and China are selected for comparison because they represent three distinct institutional configurations: a market-led innovation model, a social-state and regulatory adjustment model, and a state-directed industrial-technology model. The comparison shows that similar technological shocks generate different labor-market outcomes depending on education systems, social protection, industrial policy, and labor-market institutions. In Turkey, technological change is analyzed together with informality, skill mismatch, weak school-to-work transitions, low female labor-force participation, and debates on premature deindustrialization. The article concludes that technological unemployment in the age of AI is more likely to appear through the contraction of routine middle-skill tasks, the automation of selected cognitive tasks, the emergence of complementary tasks, and changes in job quality than through uniform mass job destruction. Accordingly, the social effects of technology are institutionally mediated rather than technologically predetermined.[

Özet

Bu makale, teknolojik işsizlik olgusunu kavramsal, tarihsel ve karşılaştırmalı bir çerçevede inceleyerek otomasyon ve yapay zekâ çağında emek piyasalarının dönüşümünü analiz etmektedir. Çalışmanın temel araştırma sorusu, teknolojik gelişmenin iş kaybı yaratıp yaratmadığından daha ileri bir düzeyde, yapay zekâ ve otomasyonun ikame ve telafi mekanizmaları aracılığıyla işlerin görev bileşimini, beceri talebini ve iş kalitesini nasıl yeniden biçimlendirdiğidir. Teknolojik işsizlik bu nedenle yalnızca iş kaybı olarak değil, friksiyonel geçiş sorunları ile kalıcı yapısal uyumsuzlukların iç içe geçtiği ve işin yeniden bileşimini doğuran bir süreç olarak ele alınmaktadır. Karşılaştırmalı bölümde ABD, Avrupa Birliği ve Çin; sırasıyla piyasa merkezli inovasyon modeli, sosyal devlet ve düzenleyici uyum modeli ile devlet yönlendirmeli sanayi-teknoloji modelini temsil ettikleri için seçilmiştir. Bu karşılaştırma, teknolojik şokların benzer olmasına rağmen istihdam sonuçlarının eğitim sistemi, sosyal koruma, sanayi politikası ve işgücü kurumlarına bağlı olarak farklılaştığını göstermektedir. Türkiye örneğinde teknolojik dönüşüm; kayıt dışılık, beceri uyumsuzluğu, eğitim-istihdam kopukluğu, kadınların düşük işgücüne katılımı ve erken sanayisizleşme tartışmalarıyla birlikte değerlendirilmektedir. Makalenin ulaştığı temel sonuç, yapay zekâ çağında teknolojik işsizliğin kitlesel iş yok oluşundan çok, orta beceri gerektiren rutin görevlerin daralması, bazı bilişsel görevlerin otomasyona açılması, yeni tamamlayıcı görevlerin ortaya çıkması ve iş kalitesinin yeniden düzenlenmesi biçiminde görünür olduğudur. Bu nedenle teknolojik dönüşümün toplumsal sonucu teknoloji tarafından tek başına belirlenmemekte; eğitim politikaları, işgücü kurumları, sosyal koruma sistemleri ve verimlilik kazançlarının bölüşüm biçimi tarafından şekillendirilmektedir.

🔖

Cite This Article

Çelik, S. (2026). Technological Unemployment in the Age of Artificial Intelligence: From Job Loss to the Recomposition of Work. Social Review of Technology and Change, Cilt: 4 Sayı: 2, 86–117. https://ajindex.com/articles/1668581

📄 Full Text PDF Viewer

📄

PDF görüntüleyici hazırlanıyor...

References (44)

  1. Acar, A., & Del Carpio, X. (2019). Turkey jobs diagnostic. World Bank. https://documents1.worldbank.org/curated/en/734661564064906614/pdf/Jobs-Diagnostic-Turkey.pdf
  2. Acemoglu, D., & Restrepo, P. (2020). Robots and jobs: Evidence from US labor markets. Journal of Political Economy, 128(6): 2188-2244 https://doi.org/10.1086/705716 Arntz, M., Gregory, T., & Zierahn, U. (2016). The risk of automation for jobs in OECD countries: A comparative analysis (OECD Social, Employment and Migration Working Papers No. 189). OECD Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1787/5jlz9h56dvq7-en
  3. Autor, D. H. (2015). Why are there still so many jobs? The history and future of workplace automation. Journal of Economic Perspectives, 29(3): 3-30. https://doi.org/10.1257/jep.29.3.3
  4. Autor, D. H., & Dorn, D. (2013). The growth of low-skill service jobs and the polarization of the US labor market. American Economic Review, 103(5): 1553-1597. https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.103.5.1553
  5. Autor, D. H., Levy, F., & Murnane, R. J. (2003). The skill content of recent technological change: An empirical exploration. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 118(4): 1279-1333. https://doi.org/10.1162/003355303322552801
  6. Blanchard, O. J. (2006). European unemployment: The evolution of facts and ideas. Economic Policy, 21(45): 6–59. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-0327.2006.00153.x
  7. Brynjolfsson, E., Li, D., & Raymond, L. R. (2023). Generative AI at work (NBER Working Paper No. 31161). National Bureau of Economic Research. https://doi.org/10.3386/w31161
  8. Brynjolfsson, E., & McAfee, A. (2014). The second machine age: Work, progress, and prosperity in a time of brilliant technologies. W. W. Norton.
  9. Busemeyer, M. R., & Trampusch, C. (Eds.). (2012). The political economy of collective skill formation. Oxford University Press.
  10. Cazzaniga, M., Jaumotte, F., Li, L., Melina, G., Panton, A. J., Pizzinelli, C., Rockall, E. J., & Tavares, M. M. (2024). Gen-AI: Artificial intelligence and the future of work (IMF Staff Discussion Note SDN/2024/001). International Monetary Fund.
  11. Chan, K. W. (2010). The household registration system and migrant labor in China: Notes on a debate. Population and Development Review, 36(2): 357–364. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1728-4457.2010.00333.x
  12. De Stefano, V. (2016). The rise of the “just-in-time workforce”: On-demand work, crowdwork and labour protection in the “gig-economy” (Conditions of Work and Employment Series No. 71). International Labour Office.
  13. Dlugosch, D. (2023). Labour market and education reforms are needed to create more and better jobs in Türkiye (OECD Economics Department Working Papers No. 1782). OECD Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1787/54657452-en
  14. Eloundou, T., Manning, S., Mishkin, P., & Rock, D. (2024). GPTs are GPTs: Labor market impact potential of LLMs. Science, 384(6702): 1306-1308. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.adj0998
  15. Esping-Andersen, G. (1990). The three worlds of welfare capitalism. Princeton University Press.
  16. European Commission. (2020). Employment and social developments in Europe 2020. Publications Office of the European Union.
  17. European Commission. (2021). Employment and social developments in Europe 2021. Publications Office of the European Union.
  18. Floridi, L., Cowls, J., Beltrametti, M., Chatila, R., Chazerand, P., Dignum, V., Luetge, C., Madelin, R., Pagallo, U., Rossi, F., Schafer, B., Valcke, P., & Vayena, E. (2018). AI4People—An ethical framework for a good AI society: Opportunities, risks, principles, and recommendations. Minds and Machines, 28(4): 689–707. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11023-018-9482-5
  19. Frey, C. B., & Osborne, M. A. (2017). The future of employment: How susceptible are jobs to computerisation?. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 114: 254-280. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2016.08.019
  20. Gmyrek, P., Berg, J., & Bescond, D. (2023). Generative AI and jobs: A global analysis of potential effects on job quantity and quality (ILO Working Paper No. 96). International Labour Organization. https://doi.org/10.54394/FHEM8239
  21. Goldin, C., & Katz, L. F. (2008). The race between education and technology. Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
  22. Hötte, K., Somers, M., & Theodorakopoulos, A. (2023). Technology and jobs: A systematic literature review. Technological Forecasting and Social Change, 194, Article 122750. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2023.122750
  23. International Federation of Robotics. (2022). World robotics 2022: Industrial robots. IFR.
  24. International Federation of Robotics. (2024). World Robotics 2024: Industrial Robots. Frankfurt: IFR.
  25. Katz, L. F., & Krueger, A. B. (2019). The rise and nature of alternative work arrangements in the United States, 1995–2015. ILR Review, 72(2): 382–416. https://doi.org/10.1177/0019793918820008
  26. Keynes, J. M. (1930/2010). Economic possibilities for our grandchildren. In Essays in persuasion (pp. 321–332). Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-349-59072-8_25
  27. Klimczuk-Kochańska, M., & Klimczuk, A. (2015). Technological unemployment. In M. Odekon (Ed.), The SAGE encyclopedia of world poverty (2nd ed., pp. 1510–1511). SAGE. https://doi.org/10.4135/9781483345727.n783
  28. McKinsey Global Institute. (2017, December). Jobs lost, jobs gained: Workforce transitions in a time of automation. McKinsey & Company.
  29. Moretti, E. (2012). The new geography of jobs. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
  30. Naughton, B. (2018). The Chinese economy: Adaptation and growth (2nd ed.). MIT Press.
  31. Naz, G., & Altay, B. (2023). Türkiye’de teknolojik ilerlemenin işsizliğe etkisi ve endüstri 4.0’a yolculuk. Dumlupınar Üniversitesi İİBF Dergisi, (11): 93-106. https://doi.org/10.58627/dpuiibf.1306673
  32. OECD. (2016). OECD Employment Outlook 2016. OECD Publishing.
  33. OECD. (2019). OECD Employment Outlook 2019: The future of work. OECD Publishing.
  34. OECD. (2021). What happened to jobs at high risk of automation? OECD Publishing.
  35. OECD. (2023). OECD Employment Outlook 2023: Artificial intelligence and the labour market. OECD Publishing. https://doi.org/10.1787/08785bba-en
  36. Piketty, T. (2014). Capital in the twenty-first century (A. Goldhammer, Trans.). Belknap Press of Harvard University Press.
  37. Rodrik, D. (2016). Premature deindustrialization. Journal of Economic Growth, 21(1),: 1–33. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10887-015-9122-3
  38. Saraç, H. (2022). Otomasyonun yükselişi: Kitlesel işsizlik mi? Yeni istihdam mı? İş Gücü piyasasına etkisine dair bir değerlendirme. Çalışma İlişkileri Dergisi, 13(2):55-76.
  39. Srnicek, N. (2017). Platform capitalism. Polity Press.
  40. Susskind, D. (2020). A world without work: Technology, automation, and how we should respond. Allen Lane.
  41. Susskind, R., & Susskind, D. (2015). The future of the professions: How technology will transform the work of human experts. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198713395.001.0001
  42. Türkiye Bankalar Birliği. (2025). Banka, çalışan ve şube bilgileri - Aralık 2024. Türkiye Bankalar Birliği.
  43. Türkiye Bankalar Birliği. (2026a). Banka, çalışan ve şube bilgileri - Aralık 2025. Türkiye Bankalar Birliği.
  44. Türkiye İstatistik Kurumu. (2026a, 2 Haziran). Ulusal eğitim istatistikleri, 2025 [Haber Bülteni No. 58002]. TÜİK.