Evolution of migrant workers’ roles and attitudes amidst robotic production: Evidence from China

Sustainable development requires more intelligent production and the effective allocation of labour. The impact of increasing robot penetration on migrants' employment has led to fluctuations in their attitudes toward urban settlements. However, the mechanism of influence remains dormant in a black box. Using the China Migrants Dynamic Survey data, we estimate the impact of industrial robot penetration on migrants' settlement intentions. The results show that the increased penetration of robots exerts complementary and substitution effects, leading to a nonlinear characteristic of rising and falling settlement intentions among migrants. Their skills and income drive migrants’ migration direction, and this process is moderated by technological progress. We also discuss the role of inequality factors in the city that prevent migrants from achieving citizenship. The key to improving urban sustainability is mitigating the income and institutional inequalities that disadvantaged migrants suffer in cities. Reducing the income and institutional inequalities suffered by disadvantaged migrants in cities is important to mitigate the human-technology conflict in the urbanisation process and thus promote sustainability.