Hedging vs. Boosting: Optimal hard–soft skill portfolios under AI adoption

This project formalizes training choice as a portfolio problem where hard-skill modules hedge unemployment risk in high-automation-exposure jobs, and soft/non-cognitive and management modules boost bargaining power and wage growth. Empirically, it combines job-posting skill taxonomies with local AI exposure measures to estimate the risk–return frontier of training bundles by occupation. Then it runs a modular RCT offering workers randomized portfolios (hard-only, soft-only, mixed), personalized by baseline AI exposure, personality profile, and prior skills. Outcomes include employment risk, wage growth, and mobility over 24–36 months. The novelty lies in the explicit risk–return framing and testing cross-skill complementarities against heterogeneous AI exposure. If successful, this approach would shift policy away from one-size-fits-all training toward individualized “skill portfolios” that stabilize employment and raise pay, providing a practical recipe for public training agencies and firms to allocate scarce training budgets for maximum return.

References:

1. Labor Market Returns to Personality: A Job Search Approach to Understanding Gender Gaps. C. Flinn, Petra E. Todd, Weilong Zhang (2024). Journal of Political Economy.
2. Conscientiousness and Labor Market Returns: Evidence from a Field Experiment in West Africa. Mathias Allemand, M. Kirchberger, S. Milusheva, C. Newman, Brent L. Roberts, Vincent Thorne (2023).
3. Different Degrees of Skill Obsolescence Across Hard and Soft Skills and the Role of Lifelong Learning for Labor Market Outcomes. Tobias Schultheiss, U. Backes-Gellner (2023). Social Science Research Network.
4. Digital twin-based cyber-physical manufacturing systems, extended reality metaverse enterprise and production management algorithms, and Internet of Things financial and labor market technologies in generative artificial intelligence economics. George Lăzăroiu, Tom Gedeon, Elżbieta Rogalska, Katarina Valaskova, Marek Nagy, Hussam Musa, Katarína Zvaríková, Miloš Poliak, Jakub Horák, R. Crețoiu, T. Krulický, Luminița Ionescu, C. Popa, L. Hurloiu, F. Nistor, L. Avram, Viorica Braga (2024). Oeconomia Copernicana.