Technology and Work

  • Bluesky
  • Facebook
  • Instagram
  • YouTube
  • Subscribe

The UC Berkeley Labor Center’s Technology and Work Program provides worker organizations and policymakers with the research, policy analysis, and training they need in order to respond to rapid technological change in the workplace and ensure that AI and other digital technologies benefit rather than harm workers. We focus on low-wage industries and the workers of color, women, and immigrants who are often on the frontlines of experimentation with emerging technologies.

Research & Publications

Mishal Khan

Co-opting or Centering the Human Worker in the Digital Age? An Overview of Human-in-the-Loop Legislation in the United States

SSRC’s Just Tech program. What does it mean to have a “human-in-the-loop”? Including examples from the 2026 legislative session, in this piece published by SSRC’s Just Tech Platform, senior researcher Mishal Khan dives into the many different HITL provisions being proposed in legislatures across the country today, highlighting their impacts on workers.

Preliminary Comment on Notices & Disclosure and Employee Data as Regulated by the California Consumer Privacy Act

Written response to the California Privacy Protection Agency’s April 20, 2026 invitation for preliminary comment on Notices & Disclosure and Employee Data as regulated by the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). Comments submitted by the California Federation of Labor Unions, California Nurses Association, SEIU California, Tech Equity, and the UC Berkeley Labor Center.

Press Coverage

Quartz

How stores that pack online orders drain the life from a busy street

Researchers at the University of California, Berkeley’s Labor Center describe a broader move across the industry in which chains treat their locations as dispersed mini-warehouses, shifting labor away from the sales floor and toward back-room picking, packing, and processing returns.