Research

Information technology and the labour market With the help of a previous grant from BLR&DD, the Technical Change Centre carried out a detailed study of the impact of new technology on demands for information workers of various types. Data were collected to show employment trends over the past two decades but forward projections were also based on an assessment of the changes brought about by the new technologies. A full report on the project concluded that although ‘core’ information jobs will increase numerically they will decrease as a percentage of all jobs in information occupations. The present project, which runs through October and November 1985, will produce a summary of the full report, bringing out some of the qualitative data collected from the earlier questionnaire surveys. Issues discussed are likely to include the kinds of people, other than librarians, entering ‘core’ information jobs and the extent to which librarians and information scientists are beginning to enter peripheral or emerging employment sectors.