How Irish employees view their future in terms of skills, training, and job disruption due to AI - with a little help from John Maynard Keynes.

2. Gerard O’Neill - Amárach
Keynes’ Great-Great-Grandchildren
IITDConference2019
• Compound Interests
• End of the Workplace Romance
• Their Generation
• Soft Skills vs Skill Stacking

3. If capital increases, say, 2
per cent per annum, the
capital equipment of the
world will have increased
by a half in twenty years,
and seven and a half times
in a hundred years. Think
of this in terms of material
things - houses, transport,
and the like. J M Keynes
The work-life balance debate
keeps defaulting to work over
‘life’ despite the higher
standards of living we now enjoy.
While most of us are in work and
wish to remain in work,
continued growth in the
economy – combined with AI
and digital disruption - will give
us choices that previous
generations never had.
Compound Interests
http://www.econ.yale.edu/smith/econ116a/keynes1.pdf

4. 31%
support
Universal
Basic
Income
65%
support
Pension
Auto-
Enrolment
41%
of adults
are not
actively
employed
Source: Amárach Blog/CSO https://amarach.com/blog.html

5. Workplace Romance
Is the romance of work over?
The marginal return on effort
is falling and even turning
negative in terms of tax and
free time.
In a full-employment
economy, more money isn’t
motivating enough for most
people.

6. 67%
Would
support 4
new bank
holidays
each year
52%
Could do
their full-time,
5-day job
in just
4 days
58%
Would prefer
same pay/
fewer hours,
than more pay/
same hours
Source: Amárach Blog https://amarach.com/blog.html

7. Their Generation
5-generations workforces
are here.
Each generation brings
distinctive benefits but has
distinctive needs.
Navigating these distinctions
will challenge more and
more employers in the years
ahead.

8. 25%
of under 35s
say job is not
meaningful:
14% of
over 55s
27%
of under 35s
want staff to
be allowed to
bring pets to
work: 8% of
over 55s
53%
of under 35s
want pay
increases
linked to fitbit
data: 23% of
over 55s
Source: Amárach https://amarach.com/blog.html

9. Soft Skills vs Stacking
Robots don’t have feelings,
but customers do.
Soft skills are harder to
‘substitute’ with AI and
technology.
But skill stacking creates a
unique combination that can
attract higher rewards.

10. 51%
will need to
learn new skills
or get new
qualifications
to remain
employed in
five years’ time
38%
would switch
job for same
pay if offered
training
guaranteeing
employed in
five years’ time
64%
receive
sufficient
training in their
current job to
remain
employed in
five years’ time
Source: Amárach https://amarach.com/

11. We shall once more value
ends above means and
prefer the good to the useful.
We shall honour those who
can teach us how to pluck
the hour and the day
virtuously and well, the
delightful people who are
capable of taking direct
enjoyment in things, the lilies
of the field who toil not,
neither do they spin.
But beware! The time for all
this is not yet. For at least
another hundred years we
must pretend to ourselves
and to everyone that fair is
foul and foul is fair; for foul is
useful and fair is not. Avarice
and usury and precaution
must be our gods for a little
longer still. For only they can
lead us out of the tunnel of
economic necessity into
daylight. J M Keynes
http://www.econ.yale.edu/smith/econ116a/keynes1.pdf

12. Gerard O’Neill - Amárach
Gerard O’Neill is Chairman of Amárach Research.
He is a graduate of the London School of Economics and was previously Business Planning Manager in An Post. He leads the strategic
consulting practice in Amárach, working with senior management teams to create resilient strategies for the future.
Gerard is a Fellow of the Marketing Institute of Ireland as well as a board member of the Institute. He is a director of AIMRO - the
Association of Irish Market Research Organisations. He is a member of the National Statistics Board, a statutory body overseeing the
development of official statistics in Ireland.
He was previously chairman of the Marketing Society and was a director of the Third Space community initiative in Smithfield, Dublin.
His book – 2016: A New Proclamation for A New Generation – is published by Mercier Press.
LinkedIn Profile: http://ie.linkedin.com/in/gerardoneill
Contact: gerard.oneill@amarach.com