Creating unemployment models

Until recently, economists and politicians assumed that displaced factory workers would find new job opportunities in the service sector. Now, however, the service sector is also beginning to automate, eliminating vast numbers of white collar workers in the process. In banking, insurance and the wholesale and retails sectors, companies are deconstructing. They are eliminating layer after layer of management and infrastructure, replacing the traditional corporate pyramid and mass white collar workforces with small, highly skilled professional work teams, using state of the art software and telecommunication technologies. Even those companies that continue to use large numbers of white collar workers have changed the conditions of employment, transferring workers from permanent jobs to "just-in-time" employment, including leased, temporary and contingent work, in an effort to reduce wage and benefit packages, cut labour costs and increase profit margins.