Season 3, Ep. 8: Skills shortages, AI and the future of work
Show notes
Below, you will find links to all of the research referenced by our guests, as well as other resources you may find useful.
More about the Projects
Harvard Labor and Worklife Program (external link)
Global Strategy for Skills, Migration, and Development ( (external link) GS4S)
Media
(8 May 2024). Migration, skills shortages and AI: Rethinking the way we work (external link) . Deutsche Bank.
Labor and skills shortages in Europe - statistics & facts (external link) . Statista.
A.I. and the Future of Employment (external link) . (2023). Directed by Aldo Montesanto.
Notes from Poland. (16 August 2024). Polish business groups urge government to “support legal, sustainable labour immigration” (external link) .
Stewart, H. (22 January 2025). UK to review visas to entice more AI and science workers, says Reeves. (external link) The Guardian.
Wrobel, A. (8 September 2024). The last word: Poland’s need for foreign workers creates policy challenges (external link) . Emerging Europe.
Working Papers & Policy
Alffram, H., Denney, L., Domingo, P., & Jesperson, S. (2023). (PDF file) Rethinking labour recruitment to reduce exploitation and trafficking of migrants (external link) . ODI Thematic brief. London: ODI.
Brekelmans, S. and G. Petropoulos. (2020). (PDF file) ‘Occupational change, artificial intelligence and the geography of EU labour markets’ (external link) . Working Paper 03/2020, Bruegel.
Damian-Smith, C. (10 March 2025). Holistic labour market matching: Boosting immigrant retention, EU competitiveness, and growth (external link) . ICMPD.
EURES (external link) (EURopean Employment Services).
Hooper, K. (2021). (PDF file) How can Europe deliver on the potential of Talent Partnerships (external link) . Migration Policy Institute (MPI).
Labour Migration (external link) . IOM UN Migration.
MPF Labour Mobility Oarner Country Dashboard (external link) . (16 novmeber 2022). MPF.
Poeschel, F., Boland, C., de Lange, T., Ruhs, M., & Saka-Helmhout, A. (2025). Engaging the private sector in Global Skills Partnerships: exploring the potential of international Business-to-Business approaches (external link) . Global Strategy for Skills, Migration and Development (GS4S).
Ghodsi, M., Ivanović, K., Leitner, S.M., Beckers, P. & Tesseltje de Lange. (December 2024). (PDF file) The impact of migration to the EU on labour shortages in the Western Balkans: Policy implications (external link) . Policy Notes and Reports 87. WIIW.
Beckers, P., Ghodsi, M., Ivanović, K., Leitner, S.M., Poeschel, F. & Sabouniha, A. (October 2024). (PDF file) Skills-oriented migration in the Western Balkans: Linking workers’ migration aspirations to skill shortages in destination and origin countries (external link) . Working Paper 252. WIIW.
Books & Book Chapters
De La Torre, E. M., Perez-Encinas, A., & Gomez-Mediavilla, G. (2022). Fostering sustainability through mobility knowledge, skills, and attitudes (external link) . Sustainability, 14(3), 1349.
de Lange, T. (2019). (excel file) Intersecting policies of innovation and entrepreneurship migration in the EU and the Netherlands (external link) . In, Carrera, S., den Hertog, A. P. L., Panizzon, M., & Kostakopoulou, D. (Eds.),. EU external migration policies in an era of global mobilities: intersecting policy universes (Vol. 44). Brill.
de Lange, T., Maas, W., & Schrauwen, A. (Eds.). (2021). Money matters in migration: Policy, participation, and citizenship (external link) . Cambridge University Press.
Fink, A., & Elisabetta, E. (2019). (excel file) Skill flows and the Fourth Industrial Revolution: future questions and directions for the ASEAN Economic Community (external link) . In Skilled Labor Mobility and Migration (pp. 267-292). Edward Elgar Publishing.
Jemielniak, D., & Przegalinska, A. (2020). Collaborative society (external link) . MIT Press.
Przegalinska, A., & Triantoro, T. (2024). Converging minds: The creative potential of collaborative AI (external link) . CRC Press.
Rijken, C., & de Lange, T. (2018). Towards a decent labour market for low-waged migrant workers (external link) (p. 282). Amsterdam University Press.
Scholarly Articles
Babar, Z. (2021). Purveyors of dreams: labour recruiters in the Pakistan to Saudi Arabia migration corridor. (external link) Migration and Development, 10(1), 68-85.
Barnard, H., Deeds, D., Mudambi, R., & Vaaler, P. M. (2019). Migrants, migration policies, and international business research: Current trends and new directions (external link) . Journal of International Business Policy, 2(4), 275-288.
Berntsen, L., de Lange, T., Kalaš, I., & Hanoeman, R. (2022). Migrant entrepreneurship enablers: from chance encounters to community development. (external link) Work, Employment and Society, 36(2), 271-289.
De Lange, T. (2018). Welcoming talent? A comparative study of immigrant entrepreneurs’ entry policies in France, Germany and the Netherlands (external link) . Comparative Migration Studies, 6, 1-18.
de Lange, T., Berntsen, L., Hanoeman, R., & Haidar, O. (2021). Highly skilled entrepreneurial refugees: legal and practical barriers and enablers to start up in the Netherlands (external link) . International Migration, 59(4), 74-87.
De Lange, T., & Vankova, Z. (2022). (excel file) The recast EU blue card directive: towards a level playing field to attract highly qualified migrant talent to work in the EU? (external link) . European Journal of Migration and Law, 24(4), 489-515.
Jones, K., Ksaifi, L., & Clark, C. (2023). ‘The biggest problem we are facing is the running away problem’: recruitment and the paradox of facilitating the mobility of immobile workers. (external link) Work, Employment and Society, 37(4), 841-857.
Kerwin, D. (2020). International migration and work: charting an ethical approach to the future. (external link) Journal on Migration and Human Security, 8(2), 111-133.
Reslow, N. (2012). (excel file) The role of third countries in EU migration policy: The mobility partnerships (external link) . European Journal of Migration and Law, 14(4), 393-415.
Transcript
Maggie Perzyna
Welcome to Borders & Belonging, a podcast that explores innovative migration research and connects the dots to real world impact. This series is produced by CERC Migration in collaboration with Lead Podcasting. I'm Maggie Perzyna, a researcher with the Canada Excellence Research Chair in Migration and Integration program at Toronto Metropolitan University. Today, we're diving into how emerging technologies like AI, a push for energy transition and an aging population are reshaping the workforce and the skills needed to fill the gaps. We'll look at how these changes affect global mobility and migrant labour typically used to fill shortages. Europe is a great example. There's a massive shortage of workers in sectors like healthcare, construction and digital tech. At the same time, AI is transforming the job market, reshaping industries, automating tasks and even influencing who gets hired and who doesn't. But as automation changes entire industries, what does that mean for migrant workers? Are we opening up new opportunities or just making it harder for them to find decent jobs? Joining us to take a closer look at the topic are two esteemed researchers studying the intersection of an aging population, migrant labour and artificial intelligence. But first, we're heading to Poland, a country with one of the lowest unemployment rates in the EU. But despite its strong labour market, Poland is facing a growing skills gap, one that's being shaped by demographic shifts, technological advancements and evolving migration patterns.
Mateusz Żydek
I really remember some cases of people that I was directly contacting, especially in the case of the stories of migrants are very special for me. Because for years it was quite closed country. We started to be very open. And I would say that we should be very thankful for immigrants who are also supporting Polish economy.
Maggie Perzyna Meet Mateusz Żydek. He leads communication and research projects for the Randstad recruitment agency in Poland.
Mateusz Żydek
This is a perspective that allows me to tell you that the times for the job market are really fascinating, especially for the perspective of a guy like me. I graduated social social studies, and that is why it is so fascinating, but also challenging, not only for agencies, but for employees, employers, and I would say government, and also NGOs part.
Maggie Perzyna
Part of Mateusz's job is to examine the big picture when it comes to skills recruitment into Poland, incorporating employers needs and the government's mandates,
Mateusz Żydek
The role of job agencies, the role of connecting the side of employees and the side of employers. And also it is essential to track all the processes also on the government level, and to look really deeply on the also perspective, not only country perspective, but the global processes affecting the different countries and the different processes between the global workforce
Maggie Perzyna
Today, Poland's unemployment rate is impressive, sitting around 3% in 2024, the second-lowest rate in the EU. But like several other countries in the world, Poland is facing the challenge of an aging population.
Mateusz Żydek
The number of births in 2024 in Poland was the lowest in the entire post war period. So, imagine from 1945 we have the lowest entries, or lowest data, and the population of people aged 80 and over, numbered over 1.6 million people, and it means that it is 5% of population. And 10 years ago, it was only 3% and 25 years ago, in 2000 it was 2%, so the change is so dramatically visible now.
Maggie Perzyna
To prevent Poland's future unemployment rate from skyrocketing, Mateusz says that certain changes need to happen now, and a group effort among agencies and government is needed.
Mateusz Żydek
I would say that we are trying to maybe even be a kind of driver for the wider way of or, a wider approach for not only for my agency or other agencies or HR industry, but also for the Polish economy and Polish government to find these ways. And of course, we are testing different approaches.
Maggie Perzyna
Some of these approaches include extending the age of retirement, encouraging learning in young people, and working with employers to expand their understanding of who qualifies as a potential employee.
Mateusz Żydek
About a million of people in Poland with disabilities are able to work, not always every position, but they are able to be active in the job market. And we are helping employers adjusting the workplaces to their needs.
Maggie Perzyna
In Poland, a state rehabilitation Fund helps prepare and finance employers to support workers with disabilities.
Mateusz Żydek
And I would say that this is not the case of money, of economy, but this is the case of approach and mindset, to be more open, or to just imagine that those people can be fully able to boost the business, even in the time of talent scarcity. So, I think that this is the moment, the right moment to try to change this mindset. It is going slowly, but I really hope that employers will notice the potential that is among the people with disabilities.
Maggie Perzyna
But according to Mateusz, the most important approach in working to end the growing skills shortage is in working with migrants.
Mateusz Żydek
Immigration means a huge perspective for the Polish economy and I would say also Polish society. This is one of most complicated tasks. How to do it right? And I would say that also we've got some political discussion around this topics, not only in Poland, in many different countries around Europe and around globe. So, it means - but, but - we must admit that migration is one of the most important solutions for the talent scarcity and the skills demand in the job markets of emerging markets such as Poland, but many other countries.
Maggie Perzyna
Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 migration to Poland has surged, with more than 1.5 million Ukrainians entering the country in search of refuge.
Mateusz Żydek
This war has the kind of really unpredictable way of a situation, and the people do not know, in fact, still do not know, what will be the future? If they will remain in Poland? If they have a change to get back to Ukraine, if Ukraine will be able to give them right workplaces that will be matched with their skills.
Maggie Perzyna
Mateusz's agency and others across the country, sent consultants to help ease the transition for Ukrainian migrants. Not just the transition to their new career, but to their new lives. The consultants helped with grocery shopping, with child care.
Mateusz Żydek
Even attractions suggestions, where they can go to the cinema or to the theater or some other places. Why? To help them to maybe forget or a little bit calm down after all this hard emotions, because the stories were totally dramatic. I even live in the house, and my neighbors are people from Ukraine, which were describing the way from the Donbas, this part, which is annexed by Russia, to Poland and they even still have bullet signs in the car. So, the way was so dramatic. But another side, it was also the explosion of good human emotions, and showing that in tough times, we can be together and we can get good relations and help each other in this case. The most important in the case of employers, NGOs, agencies, it was a matter of business, of doing business. It was a human side or human face of the companies. We usually do not think that corporation, for example, has a human face, but in fact, sometimes it has.
Magdalena Perzyna
And this wasn't Poland's first experience with integrating newcomers into their workforce.
Mateusz Żydek
There is a law that allows to have very short procedure of legalization of work in Poland for certain countries. This is the case of, for example, Georgia, but also Ukraine, I guess, Moldova and some some other countries. Most of them were part of USSR in the past, and people of this country have a shorter procedure for legalization of work.
Maggie Perzyna
Poland doesn't have a history of being particularly open to foreigners and Mateusz thinks that these new initiatives are essential to keeping Poland's unemployment rate low.
Mateusz Żydek
We noticed some balance characteristics or skills demand in even five or maybe more years ago. So, the diagnosis was right, and there was a solution to open a little bit, let's say a little bit, but to help, in fact, in procedures and open the stock market for people from the certain countries. Now we see that it was only a small step, and maybe too small a step, because the demand is really huge. But of course, it helped a little bit in the case of Polish job market, it's shown openness of the job market is a kind of marketing and promotion way of showing the job market for people abroad.
Maggie Perzyna
And while new migration policies are essential, so are the ways that they're delivered to the population, especially as attitudes towards immigration are growing more polarized around the world. In many countries, including Poland, public perception of migration shaped by political discourse, media narratives and economic conditions. Mateusz emphasizes that how migration policies are communicated to the public makes a significant difference in their effectiveness. But that doesn't mean we shouldn't try.
Mateusz Żydek
A few months ago, there was a new migration strategy in Poland presented, and we saw that the issue with safety, or national safety, started to be, I would say, maybe more important than the talent demands. So, something is changing on the side of government. We are discussing with government that we should still remain open, because migration is a very important, very important solution for the talent and skills demand. But we see, of course, the reason is, for example, the experience of Western countries with some issues with integration of the people from different countries. It affects the integrity of society the most, in fact, and I totally understand that. So if you do not make it carefully or steer of a process of immigration or help or in integration and do all these efforts to organize the process of migration, it may be challenging, and after the first time of enthusiasm of the people in Poland, for example, you can lately get the result that people won't be enthusiastic for migrants anymore. So we should do it carefully. However, we shouldn't tell that the migration is not the solution for demand on the job market in Poland.
Maggie Perzyna
Significant efforts have been made to address skill shortages by opening pathways for migrants to enter the workforce. But what if the countries that migrants are coming from work together with Poland and with each other to create a system that not only meets labor demands but also ensures fair skill utilization of cross borders? Mateusz Żydek is the community team leader at Randstad Poland. Many thanks to him for sharing his insights on Poland's labour market and how migration can help address skill shortages. Joining me today to unpack the politics of labor migration and the role of AI in the workplace are Professor Tesseltje De Lange and Professor Alexandra Przegalińska. Tesseltje is a professor of European migration law at Radboud University in the Netherlands, specializing in labour migration policies and how they shape workforce mobility. She's the principal investigator of the Horizon funded project, Global Strategy for Skills Migration and Development, or GS4S. Alexandra is a professor of AI and digital society at Kozminski University in Warsaw. Her focus is on artificial intelligence, automation and its impact on work and society. Alexandra is part of the Horizon funded project, Link4skills, which explores the global challenge of skills shortages and mismatches through innovation, sustainable solutions that Foster fair skill utilization, and exchange across continents. It's great to have you both with me today.
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Thanks for having me.
Tesseltje De Lange
Thank you for the invitation. Yeah.
Maggie Perzyna
So, let's dive in here. How do skill shortages driven by an aging workforce and rapid technological changes shape global migration patterns? Tesseltje, let's start with you.
Tesseltje De Lange
Okay, well, that's quite a question [laughs]. Coming at it, I'm going to start as a lawyer and investigating this I look at what policies are there to assist, to shape this global migration pattern that we see definitely because of skill shortages. And there's a variety of tools out there, of methods to regulate mobility. There's mobility partnerships, which come in all sorts of shapes and sizes. There's business to business partnerships, where businesses agree on helping each other out, simply put, with skill shortages. But there's, of course, also a whole recruitment industry at play here who have all sorts of instruments again. And approaching it even more legal, there is a framework under the International Labor Organization. It's a specific convention that has annexes that set out how you can shape a global migration scheme. So, to say how to make policy on this field. I think I mentioned four, and I thought of a fifth, which are actually trade agreements. So, there's a whole world out there in of trade, in services, which is actually also a form of labour mobility, addressing skill shortages. Each of these different methods or schemes or policies address skills in different ways. They define skills in different ways, be it through formal qualifications or practical experience, or training on the job. So, if I go back to your question, how do skill shortages shape global migration patterns? From my perspective, I would say that all of these different policies and schemes shape the opportunities for mobility. And not to add, per se, exactly the shortages. Some shortages are just not addressed through global migration patterns.
Maggie Perzyna
Interesting, Alexandra, anything to add?
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Well, I would just add, perhaps that as far as artificial intelligence and the emerging technologies are concerned, what we are seeing in terms of, well, say, skill based migration, is that AI, for instance, does create demand for high skilled roles in the tech sector. Particularly in Those regions of the world where you do have already a robust AI industry and AI ecosystem, right? So, we see a lot of that in Europe. I think we see a lot of that in the United States, and that can attract skilled migrants. While some areas that are not perhaps excelling at artificial intelligence and the emerging technologies may experience out migration, I think that is something that we will be observing. Probably already in the in the in the coming years, as this technology accelerates so much. So that perhaps could be added, and I think also it's very much related to different sectoral shifts, because artificial intelligence's adoption can reduce the demand for labour in various sectors, like, for instance, manufacturing that were traditionally employing both native and also migrant workers. And I think this displacement may somehow prompt those individuals that are affected to migrate in search for, say, new employment, maybe some new opportunities.
Tesseltje De Lange
I totally agree, and I think it's very good to add indeed that it differs very much in what sector we're looking at when you address that question. So, whether it is high wage very technical work or more low wage practical work that also very much defines the patterns.
Maggie Perzyna
Europe is facing massive skills shortages, but many countries still resist labour migration. Why do you think there's such a disconnect between economic needs and political decisions? Tess?
Tesseltje De Lange
Well, I think there's huge differences on this across Europe. So I'm always a little hesitant to talk about Europe as a whole. Studying European Union law, there is, I think, a disconnect between what the European Commission is trying to achieve with creating a common labour market to address these shortages, and indeed, what some of the Members States political story is. And maybe there's a third element, and that is what's happening on the ground. Because what politicians say they do is not necessarily the same as what happens on the ground, and especially when it comes to economic migration, you see policies are in place and in case of labour shortages, and in case employers can prove that they've tried to recruit in all of their country of the European Union, migrants already present, refugees and they still can't find anyone, then usually, work permits will be granted, whatever the rhetoric. And especially, I guess there's when you talk about that disconnect, it might be good to just highlight the word "needs", because it's sometimes contested how much this is needed, especially when it comes to low wage work. And of course, this already came up with automation and the use of AI, you might need less low wage workers. But of course, the transition is costly. It's also about wanting to invest in a more automated economy as such. And some economies or some types of jobs might not be easy to to automate, like in care or construction. Yeah, so there, indeed, there's, there is a disconnect. Indeed, you're absolutely right, but I I'm not sure how long that will hold.
Aleksandra Przegalińska
I just wanted to add something to that, actually, because I think it's quite an interesting thing, although it's a piece of anecdotal evidence, what I have recently heard from one of the prominent politicians here in Poland was that now we have the possibility to choose between migration and automation. So, actually, what we are hearing, and perhaps this is something that other people hear also in other countries, is that currently we don't have to attract more migrants, because technologies will replace their work. And I think it's a very false claim, and we have plenty of evidence for that, because artificial intelligence can replace some tasks, but certainly not a job, not a profession. And I think the more you use this technology, the more you see how limited it is at its current stage. But we are hearing that, since migration is politically sensitive, we are hearing from politicians, from those stakeholders that are making decisions that actually they don't have to worry so much about it and about the skill shortage, because they can easily, or they soon will be able to, easily replace those workers that are missing with robots, AI agents, AI assistants, etc.
Tesseltje De Lange
We actually have work ongoing in our GS4S project, which shows that when automation increases, the workers that remain in place are actually low wage migrant workers. So, there is a replacement, maybe, of mid level professions, but there's still somebody who needs to clean up at the end of the day or operate simple machineries. So that it's not a guarantee that automation takes away the demand for low wage labour and often migrant labor.
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Yeah, and I really agree with that. And I think you know, one thing is to look very carefully at various sectors, but the other is to also take a look at the polarization in the labour market that happens in terms of skills specifically. So, it's a different story for high skilled jobs, it's a different story for low skilled jobs and yet for mid skill jobs. And I think you know, high skilled jobs are probably growing, mid skill jobs may be shrinking, at least some of them because of artificial intelligence. But for sure, when it comes to low skilled work here, we often see that they are actually stable, in the sense that it's very hard to replace some of that work with, say, artificial intelligence or a robot that would be much more expensive than a worker. So, and also for many other reasons, robots are not such a developed part of AI and technologies currently, and a lot of manual labour cannot be performed by them in any, you know, sufficient way. So, in that sense, I think it's very important to look at the skills, not only at the sectors, but like you said, exactly at the skills. And the patterns will vary here.
Maggie Perzyna
So Tess, your research highlights the labour migration policies that often fail both workers and employers, whether through weak enforcement, bureaucratic barriers or political resistance. If you could change one key aspect of the system to make it work better for everyone, where would you start?
Tesseltje De Lange
Well, I would definitely start with a rights-based approach. Let me. An example, indeed, weak enforcement is one of the key topics that I keep looking at, and interestingly, currently in the Dutch setting, enforcement is high on the agenda of the government. So they start using the authority to close businesses in case of illegal employment of migrant workers or non-compliance with other labour laws. They've had this power for decades, but had not used it very frequently, but now they are. So they close what a restaurant and the workers? Yeah, the workers are out on the streets. So it's, it's the type of enforcement that only addresses one side of the coin. It sort of is supposed to scare employers, but even if there's more enforcement, what the risk of being caught goes up from one to 3% maybe 5% but employers still calculate this kind of risk and might not be too scared for this kind of enforcement, but if there is enforcement, I think it is key to think of what, what does the migrant workers stand to gain of such enforcement? And we've actually seen that private sector jumps in a positive way, to say, okay, we can try to find a new job for these people. And actually one of one of these cases I heard about recently, new jobs were found, residence permit, work permits, everything was settled and everybody's happy, including that the employer, who made a mess out of everything, faces enforcement. So, I think that's a good example of a rights-based approach, where the migrant worker is centered to the issue. And not only this, this economic needs or enforcement action.
Maggie Perzyna
Some say AI will create more jobs, while others argue it's replacing workers, especially in sectors like construction and care what's really happening?
Aleksandra Przegalińska
A lot is happening, and I think it really varies by sector, as we were saying before, by region, also by skill level. But I think, you know, we do see this tension between job creation and also job displacement. I think it's a big question mark. We do know already that AI can create new jobs. It is creating, maybe not jobs, but specializations or certain extensions of professions that we already know in the fields that are specifically related to AI itself. And in data science and cyber security, there are plenty of new things to do, and there are also new roles that are related, say to AI ethics, AI governance. There's AI road mapping in various organizations, and I see that there is a need for experts who could facilitate that. There will be some jobs I'm assuming that are going to emerge because of human AI collaboration. So we do have plenty of things that we do with artificial intelligence. It's still our work. It's just performed in a different way, and some new interesting things may emerge out of that as well. But I also think that job displacement is real, although I do remember that I have participated in a seminar recently at Harvard University, where actually the scholars claim that they don't see that much data that would confirm it. So it's more of you know a hypothesis that we have. We don't know how big this displacement will be, but we certainly can see some professions that are going to die out. For instance, a person who was, say, a lector of audiobooks. Well, this is not going to be done using human voices, probably the future. It's just going to be done using clones of voices of humans, and it can be fully automated this particular set of tasks. And I think also, you know, manufacturing is a different story here. We've been seeing various technologies stepping in and replacing some of the human work. And also, I would say that when it comes to customer service or customer care, we can have many chat bots that can do that type of job quite well. Administrative support to some extent. So there are some segments where there will be at least reduction when it comes to the demand for these sorts of jobs. So that is happening, but as we were saying prior, it's definitely very much sector specific. It's different for care work or healthcare, and it's very different for, say, construction. And also what is important is what we were saying prior and here really again, we don't have that much evidence quite yet, and we've noticed, also with our Horizon project Link4skills, that there is data missing recent data, because AI, in particular, generative AI, has been developing very rapidly for the past two years. So, it's little time, but a lot has changed during that time, and we don't have enough evidence to say. But certainly we can already see right now that this technology will tackle in a different way people with different skill sets. And for high skilled labour, it may be an augmentation. It will not affect so greatly low skilled labour, but in terms of mid skilled labour, here we might see actually, perhaps not displacement, but less of a demand, for sure.
Tesseltje De Lange
I'm curious, and I've heard from HR managers in care, for instance, that their workforce is hesitant to work with migrant workers, but just as well, hesitant for any novel automation, robotization, etc, on the workforce. So, they're really keen to keeping things the way they are. Is that something you've looked into, or any research on how this automation is accepted on the workfloor by the present workforce?
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Well, I did look at it mostly in managerial professions, where actually you do have enthusiasts. You have people who accept this technology but are not excited about it. And there is also a kind of a consistent group that we've seen because we were doing sort of generative readiness reports in various organizations like banks and also in the pharmaceutical sector. And what we saw there, that was usually a group of, let's say, 15% 10 or 15% of the whole workforce that was resistant to this technology, and they were scared of it, and they were, they had definitely a very negative attitude towards this technology. So, we do see that, and it's different from, you know, just being a late comer. It's not so that people are disinterested, and because of that, they don't want change. They actually are very interested in artificial intelligence, but they are sort of hostile towards it. They're afraid of it. They express fear. So that is, I think, a big difference. Prior technologies have not been so controversial, I think, as AI is today. So that is one thing that we are seeing. And I do remember also that the group at Harvard Labour and Work Life program, where I'm also employed, where I'm working, they've been doing research with with nurses, particularly traveling nurses, and those nurses were indeed insisting on keeping things as they were, even though, for them, their job is very often very cumbersome, and perhaps some degree of automation would be welcome and it could facilitate what they do today. They were not happy to deploy this technology. They were afraid of this technology. They had issues, and I think, very legitimate questions about responsibility for this technology. So, you can see that the attitude towards artificial intelligence is definitely very polarized in different professions. So, that's something I've observed. Regarding migrants less because these were not the questions we were asking.
Tesseltje De Lange
But indeed, we are in our research project, so it's interesting to bring these two together. Yeah. Thanks.
Maggie Perzyna
How does the EU's approach to skill based migration compared to other major global economies facing similar workforce challenges. Tess?
Tesseltje De Lange
Well, the EU is trying very much to compete. So, there's all sorts of legislative action as well as policy actions engaged to try to compete with, say, the more traditional countries, the US, Canada, Australia, with like Expression of Interest kind of programs. There is, right now, for instance, a proposal on the table, which is the EU talent pool, which is actually also, from an AI perspective, a very interesting one, because it's it's to be a EU-wide database where where applicants from outside the EU can apply for jobs inside the EU. So, it's a matching platform, really, which hopefully also ties into the legislation and the policy and so that people are properly informed of the opportunities prior to applying for a job. That's really one of the ways they try to address the skills shortages and compete in the in the global economy. I have to say it's still a proposal, and that's where the weakness comes of the EU. It's optional for the member states, so the EU talent pool regulation, it's actually an initiative from the European Parliament and the European Commission took the idea on board and is currently drafting a regulation to set the parameters of a matching tool and the parameters at EU level. It's, of course, about the governance of the instrument. Who has to say what. It's about? Who has access? What workers. Do all employers have access. Or is it through countries that can have access? It's supposed to look a little bit like EUR-S, which is also a European platform for matching jobs to people. And it's interesting, because, of course it's opening up the European. No, I should not say it's not opening up the European labor market at all, because that decision remains the prerogative of the EU member states. So, the problem is, the European Commission can think of this wonderful platform and it can be very promising and very IT savvy, etc, but if the member states don't want it, then we just spend a lot of money on making a beautiful platform that nobody will use. And that's one of the issues, of course at the EU, at how it's organized, is that in Brussels, the Commission can develop this, but if the member states don't want it. I do think some member states will be interested, because what is, what it tries to do, very much, is also open up the international labor market for small and medium enterprises. Because the multinationals, they have an international network, they know where to find people through subsidiaries or other relations that they have. But for SMEs, who are not operating internationally, it's very difficult to recruit internationally. So, the idea is that this platform opens the door to the world and job applicants can apply to vacancies in Europe instead of, and that's a little bit of the rhetoric, instead of taking a risky route into Europe through illegal channels. Of course, it's not necessarily the same people, but that is part of this bigger plan of having more legal pathways into Europe instead of irregular migration.
Maggie Perzyna
Aleksandra, anything to add.
Aleksandra Przegalińska
What I can certainly say is that in order to build sound policies, we need more data and this is something that we've discovered also with Link4skills. So this, you know, Horizon project, research project that I'm also involved in. And the project itself is looking at global skill shortages, mismatches, etc. It's using artificial intelligence to build a Skills Navigator, and I think it can have very interesting policy implications. But part of our analysis, and I'm happy to share a bit more about that as well, has been to try and understand what's happening on the labour market, and what is the, you know, need for migration in Europe, and how does the factor of automation impact it all. And it turned out that, simply, we don't have enough evidence. It was quite shocking for us, how little of that exercise is being done in Europe in particular.
Tesseltje De Lange
Yeah, it's actually, I mean, you're absolutely right. That's the same, one of the same findings in our project. I think this talent pool could be an interesting source for data in the future. And we're talking future couple of years, if it comes into play and the just an anecdote this proposal had, as is more common with with legal documents, a reporting duty of every five years [laughs]. So, yeah, if you talk about data shortages...
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Yeah, that's funny.
Tesseltje De Lange
So, one of the recommendations I did, I gave to the European Parliament, is guys ask for, like, continuous reporting. This has to be, you know, this has to be real time data available on who applies for what kind of jobs, and what kind of jobs do we have available? And then we would have this data that we as researchers are also craving for.
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Yeah, particularly when you think about AI and newest developments in artificial intelligence, what's been happening two years ago for us as prehistory? I mean it. I really mean it, the newest agents, this new generation of AI tools, is definitely changing our work in a dramatic way, as opposed to those early tools for me, early is two years ago, that were just, you know, little attempts to do something, generate a bit of text, and that was a big wow effect for many of us at that time. But currently, we just, you know, when we look back at this technology, it was mostly about limitations, not so much about really doing something with this technology, doing anything meaningful. So, yeah, I think, you know, five years is definitely a scary interval.
Maggie Perzyna
One of the goals of Link4skills is to better predict skill shortages and optimize migration pathways. How reliable are AI driven labour market forecasts, and how can we be sure they remain adaptable to real world economic and political disruptions that affect the migrant workforce? Alexandra?
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Well, as we started discussing already, I think it is very important that we do try and run these forecasts using artificial intelligence. That we look at artificial intelligence as a factor that changes the landscape, but it's also, interestingly enough, a technology that can be helpful in understanding what's happening better. We actually did perform an AI-based meta analysis. I think it's one of the first attempts to actually use AI agents, a set of agents and assistants to run a meta analysis, and we were quite happy with how the agents performed for us in, kind of curating, selecting some of the studies that could be most valid and interesting for us to look at. It was very, very helpful. On the other hand, it had to be coordinated and supervised by humans. That is for sure the case, but I will also say that in general, even apart from Link4skills, I think that these sorts of forecasts have a very strong potential, but they do have limitations, and their reliability depends a lot on data quality and also data volume. That's something we addressed already, prior that we don't have enough data, but a lot of that is also obviously related to the meta model design and to what extent what we will build the study, meta analysis, or any type of analysis forecast exercise that we will perform, to what extent it's kind of adapting to the real world disruptions. I think that's an important thing, because we do see a lot of unpredictability. We see events like the pandemics. We see various geopolitical crises. Let's have a look at what's happening in geopolitics right now as we speak, sudden policy changes that's happening as well. And I think it is important that very often, the technologies that we are using to run these sorts of forecasts are not particularly accustomed, or they're not catering to economic and political shocks of any kind. Obviously, that is a very big limitation, at least for me. And then there's plenty to say about data quality, the bias that is inherently there with data, certain incompleteness, that is something that we've observed with our meta analysis as well, that you have outdated data, you have biased data, right, and then your forecast may actually reinforce existing inequality or something like that, instead of shedding some light on a phenomenon that we should carefully examine, so that I think is is a problem. And then when I also think about migrant policies, specifically, not being an expert, but just an observer, but also based on the experiences I've had with Link4skills, I would say that migration policies often do change based on, you know, political decisions. And obviously this is something that AI cannot fully predict or influence. So, these are, let's say, regulatory or policy constraints that are also, that have to be taken into consideration. You cannot fully rely on this technology. And just, I think it's very important to try and factor that in.
Maggie Perzyna
If we get AI and migration policy right, what does a fair and inclusive future of work actually look like? Tesseltje?
Tesseltje De Lange
Well, I'm not sure if the first bit of the question should make difference in that sense. I think one of the big challenges of the future is, indeed, how we get fair and inclusive future of work right, and migration policies and AI likely as well have an influence. I would think that we see actually a division, and we mentioned this before, actually, where there's the division of skill levels and different sectors and jobs, and to talk of a fair and inclusive future of work, it's important to not discriminate between these different categories of skills, or sectors, or people, depending on their origin, which we still see. And as long as that is a practice, we're not talking about a fair and inclusive labour market. And I think one of the things practically in migration policy, what we can get right is that fair recruitment and decent employment practices need to be part of of migration policies, and more so also, when you look at the skills and the skills need, that is something to look at that is done in a decent and fair way, instead of what you see, at least in European context. Right now all the focus is on security and border control and keeping people out, which is, I think, the total wrong direction if you're trying to strive for inclusive future of work. Maybe just an example from another project I'm working on, DignityFIRM, also an Horizon Europe project. We were in Agadir in Morocco, and we agreed with our Moroccan partners there, very much, that the security of food for Europe and the neighbors is something we need to work on together in an inclusive way, and that means Morocco is a partner of Europe and not a country that is only called to the table for security issues or irregular migration issues, border control, et cetera. So that was, I think, a very interesting example where we see options to cooperate instead of be less cooperative.
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Well, I would add on my end, my team and I at Kosminski University, we work on human-AI collaboration, and I think collaborative AI is a very good pathway forward. I really believe that. And I think it's sort of a normative stance, that you are developing a tool that is supposed to empower humans, and not, you know, a tool that you delegate tasks too, which actually can increase efficiency, but it's not going to be really supporting humans at excelling at their work, at getting better. And I think we want the type of AI that would augment human work somehow, not simply replace it. And I think what we've been seeing so far is a lot of focus on productivity, and I'm not sure if that productivity is understood well, in the sense that when we talk about productivity in terms of time only, I am not so sure if that is really, if that is really a very good pathway forward. Because then you probably would want people to work even more, right? Because you see that they can perform certain tasks quite fast thanks to AI. Is that really increasing or improving the quality of their work? And is that helping them in developing what they do, in, you know, making sure that their work is is done even better and striving for more? Well, I think it's not the case. So, this focus on efficiency, productivity and AI, I think, is very limited, and we would want workers to have meaningful roles right in AI driven workplaces. And I wouldn't want the type of AI that exacerbates inequalities even more, and the type of AI that is only focused on enhancing productivity. That I think is very important. And another thing is obviously something we do talk about, but perhaps not enough, which is re-skilling. And I think a future proof workforce would include some sort of robust AI literacy, and I see that happening also in Europe. I'm happy to see more initiatives, but I really think that we have to add AI to our Lifelong Learning programs and try and ensure that workers, whether they are native born or migrants, have access to those re skilling opportunities that are easily accessible for them, that are for free, etc. And perhaps also the things that we are doing with this, AI Skills Navigator, an extension of that, some sort of AI driven job matching platform, could be very interesting. Could be helpful, also for migrants, right, also for displaced workers, and it would help them in transitioning to some sort of new career. So, that, I think is very important these two things, right? AI is a tool for empowerment and re-skilling as well. These are very necessary steps to kind of make sure that this is not a scary future, that we don't have a growing group of those who resist this technology, very often for legitimate reasons, like I said, but actually that we have people who are eager to learn about it, eager to find their own methods and patterns of collaboration with AI that are good for them, that are helping them out, that are allowing them to thrive at what they do. And this is, yeah, what I would wish for, I guess, in that fair and inclusive future of work.
Tesseltje De Lange
And actually, while you were talking, it's fascinating, whenever you say AI, I think we can also replace it with migrant workers. I think migration policies should be just as collaborative and empowering and focusing on re-skilling, so combined, indeed, I think it can deliver strong for the inclusive future of work.
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Yeah, interesting,yeah. I agree. I think this AI driven economy that seems to be emerging. We have to value both the technological innovation and human agency very much. And I think it's important to try and create an ecosystem. Maybe that's, you know, a good pathway for Europe as well. Maybe Europe could excel at something like that, this kind of healthy implementation of this technology, where people, regardless of their nationality or skill level, do have opportunities to thrive, right? And I think it's a very positive message on AI. In Europe, we've been talking quite a lot about trustworthy artificial intelligence, and now that artificial intelligence is so popular and so many people know about this technology, I think it's particularly important to send a message not only about trustworthy AI that is protecting your privacy and dignity, but really collaborative technology that helps you out, augments your work, does not replace it. It's very important.
Maggie Perzyna
Well. Thank you so much for finishing that off on such a hopeful and positive note. This has been such an amazing conversation. Thank you both. I learned so much today.
Tesseltje De Lange
Thanks for having me. Thank you.
Aleksandra Przegalińska
Thank you for having me.
Maggie Perzyna
Thanks to Tesseltje De Lange and Alexandra Przegalińska for joining me today, and thank you for listening. This is a CERC Migration podcast produced in collaboration with Lead Podcasting. If you enjoyed the episode, subscribe to Borders & Belonging on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. For more information on the intersection of AI, skills shortages, and migration, please visit the show notes. Before we wrap up, do you have an idea for an episode? Something we haven't covered yet, but should. Season Four is all about your requests. DM us on LinkedIn or email bordersandbelonging@gmail.com. We'll feature the most compelling ideas in our next season. I'm Maggie Perzyna. Thanks for listening.
