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Amy Bix, a professor of history, traveled to Capitol Hill on November 13 to deliver a Congressional Briefing on Automation and the Workforce, organized by the National History Center in Washington D.C. Bix joined Jonathan Coopersmith, a professor of history at Texas A&M University, and Louis Hyman, an associate professor of history at Cornell University, in exploring past, present, and future questions about technological unemployment. The audience included Congressman Bill Foster (Illinois), the only Ph.D. physicist in Congress and a member of the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology. This panel discussion will be broadcast on CSPAN3, American History TV, some time in the next few weeks.

The event summary read: “Congressional Briefing on Automation and the Workforce: Robots and other rapidly developing technologies have raised new fears about the future of work. Yet this is not the first time that technological innovations have transformed how we make a living. What can the past tell us about the impact of automation on employment?”