Economic inequality is one of the biggest challenges facing society today. Inequality has been recently exacerbated by growth in high- and low-wage occupations at the expense of middle-wage occupations, leading to a "hollowing" of the middle class. Yet, our understanding of how workplace skills drive this process is limited. Specifically, how do skill requirements distinguish high- and low-wage occupations, and does this distinction constrain the mobility of individuals and urban labor markets? Using unsupervised clustering techniques from network science, we show that skills exhibit a striking polarization into two clusters that highlight the specific social-cognitive skills and sensory-physical skills of high- and low-wage occupations, respectively. The connections between skills explain various dynamics: how workers transition between occupations, how cities acquire comparative advantage in new skills, and how individual occupations change their skill requirements. We also show that the polarized skill topology constrains the career mobility of individual workers, with low-skill workers "stuck" relying on the low-wage skill set. Together, these results provide a new explanation for the persistence of occupational polarization and inform strategies to mitigate the negative effects of automation and offshoring of employment. In addition to our analysis, we provide an online tool for the public and policy makers to explore the skill network: skillscape.mit.edu.

中文翻译：

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消除工作场所技能的两极分化。

经济不平等是当今社会面临的最大挑战之一。最近，高薪和低薪职业的增长加剧了不平等现象，而中产阶级的职业却受到了损害，导致了中产阶级的“空洞化”。但是，我们对工作场所技能如何推动这一过程的理解是有限的。具体来说，技能要求如何区分高薪和低薪职业，这种区分是否会限制个人和城市劳动力市场的流动性？使用网络科学中的无监督聚类技术，我们发现技能表现出惊人的两极分化，分别突出了高薪和低薪职业的特定社会认知技能和感官身体技能。技能之间的联系解释了各种动态：工人如何在职业之间过渡，城市如何在新技能上获得相对优势，以及个人职业如何改变他们的技能要求。我们还表明，两极分化的技术拓扑限制了单个工人的职业流动性，低技能工人“卡住”了低工资技能。总之，这些结果为职业两极分化的持续存在提供了新的解释，并为减轻自动化和离岸就业的负面影响提供了战略依据。除了我们的分析之外，我们还为公众和政策制定者提供了一个在线工具，以探索技能网络：skillscape.mit.edu。我们还表明，两极分化的技术拓扑限制了单个工人的职业流动性，低技能工人“卡住”了低工资技能。总之，这些结果为职业两极分化的持续存在提供了新的解释，并为减轻自动化和离岸就业的负面影响提供了战略依据。除了我们的分析之外，我们还为公众和政策制定者提供了一个在线工具，以探索技能网络：skillscape.mit.edu。我们还表明，两极化的技术拓扑限制了单个工人的职业流动性，低技能工人“卡住”了低工资技能。总之，这些结果为职业两极分化的持续存在提供了新的解释，并为减轻自动化和离岸就业的负面影响提供了战略依据。除了我们的分析之外，我们还为公众和决策者提供了一个在线工具，以探索技能网络：skillscape.mit.edu。