Historical patterns from the telephone switch and personal computer eras suggest women are likely to be among the most affected by artificial intelligence. The International Labour Organization concluded in March that nearly one in 10 women in high-income countries work in occupations at the highest risk from AI.
Ariane Hegewisch, a senior research fellow at the Institute for Women's Policy Research, notes that AI targets routine tasks and pattern recognition. These functions dominate clerical and administrative roles, where women still comprise 90% of secretaries and clerical workers.
The history of telephone operators offers a direct parallel. In the 1940s, nearly 95% of America's telephone operators were female. The job required months of training to handle hundreds of calls per hour. When AT&T introduced the automated telephone switch, it represented one of the largest automation investments in history. In the decades following the popularization of automatic switches, an estimated 75,000 operator jobs vanished.
Economists James Feigenbaum of Boston University and Daniel P. Gross of Duke University's Fuqua School of Business analyzed census and paycheck data to track these changes. They found that incumbent operators were frequently displaced into lower-paying jobs or dropped out of the workforce entirely. Economist David Autor explains that many workers are already in their highest-paying occupation, so when that job becomes technologically obsolete, the next available step is often down.
However, Feigenbaum and Gross observed that younger generations fared better. Future workers were more adaptive to an evolving labor market and often found similar-quality jobs in other fields. This suggests that while specific roles disappear, other work emerges over time.
The introduction of the washing machine in the mid-20th century also reshaped women's labor participation. Dubbed "engines of liberation" by University of Pennsylvania economist Jeremy Greenwood and colleagues, appliances reduced unpaid housework time. From 1950 to 1980, the number of employed women in the U.S. grew by more than 25 million. The female labor force participation rate rose from 34% to 52%. This shift was driven by new demand for services like childcare, growth in the service economy, and increased need for office workers as businesses expanded.
The personal computer revolution followed a similar pattern. According to the 1980 U.S. census, nearly 4.7 million Americans worked as secretaries, stenographers, and typists, with more than 98% being women. When IBM introduced the personal computer in 1981 and Microsoft Word arrived two years later, many clerical middlemen became obsolete. Executives began typing reports and booking travel themselves.
Yet the PC was not entirely negative for women. Studies indicate women were already more likely than men to use computers at work during this era. The technology provided new tools like spreadsheets and databases, allowing many women to adapt and become indispensable through new skills.
A 2022 paper by Marcus Dillender and Eliza Forsythe found that when companies adopted software for office work, employment in the sector declined by 1%, but wages for college graduates increased by 3%. Many women hold more college degrees and managerial positions than in previous technological shifts, which may offer some protection. However, Hegewisch warns that AI promises to move up the value chain of human jobs. The long-term outlook remains unclear because AI can learn.