Robots Will Take Over These 5 Jobs Soon — Is One of Them Yours?

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Machine laborers are on the rise with a record 14,135 robots ordered from North American robotics companies in the first half of 2014, an increase of 30% in units over the same period in 2013. Why hire robots instead of people? They don't get bored, they make fewer mistakes, and they are cheaper.

In fact, experts predict that several industries will be fully outsourced to robots by 2045. Here are five of the jobs that are likely to disappear in a near future due to robots.

1. Sewing Machine Operator

Take a look at your favorite dress shirt. Somebody had to sew it all together, insert the buttons, and apply all the tiny details. This industry is very close to disappearing in the United States. In fact, since 1997, the industry's employment outlook has been bleak.

In 2012, the numbers of sewing machine operators declined by 42,100 jobs, or 26%. Even a major company, such as American Apparel, was looking only for two sewing machine operators in August 2014. These jobs are less attractive to potential employees because a search on Indeed on August 2014 shows that about 57% of them pay about $20,000 per year.

Don't think a robot could do it better? Watch this robot fold a towel. Companies are enticed to buy robots in this and other industries due to applicable stimulus tax credits. Some recently outsourced jobs are coming back to America, but to done by American robots!

2. Mail Processor

Does your job consist of sorting DVDs and games for Netflix or GameFly? Hopefully not.

At its highest point, Netflix operated 58 distribution centers in the country. That number was down to 39 in 2013. During that same time period, the number of RedBox kiosks has increased to about 35,900 locations in the U.S. This means that close to 68% of the U.S. population is within a 5-minute drive of a Redbox kiosk, which is a tiny mail sorter robot.

But what is more alarming to manual mail processors is the fact that two of the biggest employers of mail processors are replacing humans with robots.

First, the Postal Service is constantly struggling to meet its mandatory annual prepayment of $5.5 billion in health care benefits for future retirees. Most suggested solutions involve either:

• Reducing the number of delivery days from six to five, which in turn reduces the number of people using USPS, so fewer clerks, mail sorters, and processors would be needed.
   
• Moving stand-alone post offices into smaller retail spaces, which builds a strong case for centralization and automation of the process.

And the third solution? Robots, such as Baxter, available for about $22,000. In the future it may make sense to replace human mail sorters and processors with robotic ones. After all, hiring new USPS employees also increases pension costs.

Already Amazon uses orange robots from Kiva to dramatically cut costs in its fulfillment and shipping centers. In 2014, the company announced that it has deployed 10,000 robots. A warehouse equipped with Kiva robots can handle up to four times as many orders as a similar one without the orange little helpers. Sorry human, you do not compute.

3. Mail Delivery Carrier

The postal carrier can't catch a break.

Even USPS's 7,559 letter carriers (known as "the Fleet of Feet") have no job security in the future. With Amazon testing its Amazon Prime Air delivery service (a.k.a. "delivery by drone"), we may be not too far away from a future in which we may not need a person to physically deliver a letter or package.

And Amazon is not alone in this. Google X, a division of Google that works on "moonshot" projects, is currently working on Project Wing, which is also aimed at unmanned drone delivery.

Imagine this: You order a product online, Baxter puts together your shipment, Kiva fetches the package, and Betty the Drone delivers your order to your doorstep.

4. Pharmacist Clerk

Since 2011, the UCSF Medical Center has operated a robotic pharmacy. This automated service has prepared and delivered over 350,000 doses of medication without a single error. The assistant director of pharmaceutical services for the UCSF Medical Center claims that the robotic pharmacists not only increase the safety of dispensing medications to patients, but also allow nurses to focus more on patient care.

As UCSF continues to push the envelope in autonomous prescription delivery, it is just a matter of time until private corporations test drive this service to cut down on costs.

5. Cab Driver

As of 2011, Google's fleet of self-driving cars had logged over 190,000 miles. There have been tests in closed courses with humans on board of Google's cars and even on open roads on Hollywood Boulevard and in Santa Monica.

While there are many obstacles to widespread acceptance of the self-driving vehicle, the main one is legal. There is no clear legal framework on how to handle events such as accidents and property damage involving robotic cars. Currently, driverless cars are allowed for public road testing in California, Michigan, Florida, and Nevada.

Still, demand for driverless cars may force things to speed up. Running errands with a robotic driver just looks too cool. Ford expects autonomous vehicles on the market by 2025. Daimler, BMW, General Motors, and Renault are much more bullish and forecast that year to be as early as 2020.

What other jobs do you think won't exist soon due to robots? Please welcome our robotic overlords in comments!