A recent McKinsey & Company report on workplace automation came to a similar conclusion. The report has a clever angle: Instead of looking at “occupations” (like “electrician” or “psychiatrist”), it breaks down each job into a number of “activities” (for a retail salesperson, “demonstrate product features” and “process sales and transactions”) and looks at which of those activities are likely to be automated.

The report finds that while many activities will be automated, few occupations will be. In other words, robots won’t make most of the jobs disappear, but they will make those jobs very different, and in many cases, easier. What’s more, the impact will be felt across the board…