RSSE: Julian Vedeler Johnsen (University of Bergen) The Combined Impacts of Automation and Immigration

It is our pleasure that Julian Vedeler Johnsen (University of Bergen) will present on Thursday, October 22, 2026, at 12:45 in room RB437 about the topic “The Combined Impacts of Automation and Immigration”.

Registration is not required and anyone who would like to attend is warmly invited.

It is also possible to participate online via MS Teams at this link. In case of any connection issues, please contact lubomir.cingl@vse.cz.

ABSTRACT: We study how automation and immigration jointly shape workers‘ long-run outcomes. We combine local robot exposure—predicted from international adoption patterns and pre-period industry composition—with immigration exposure from the EU‘s 2004 enlargement. Robots concentrate in manufacturing, but we find sizable spillovers: greater exposure reduces earnings among workers with manufacturing-related tasks. Exploiting licensing that limits immigrant entry, we show automation’s earnings penalty is significantly larger for immigration-exposed construction workers. Losses stem from workers moving down the job ladder, while transfers only offset a small share of losses. Our results highlight that shocks‘ distributional consequences depend on local labor market conditions.

BIO: I am a Professor and head of department at the Department of Economics, University of Bergen. I mainly work on the economics of labour markets, public policies, and health. You can find my research projects here.