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UNI Global Union General Secretary Philip Jennings painted an alarming picture of the world labour market during a round of interviews with global media outlets at the World Economic Forum.

Jennings is an in-demand speaker in Davos for his forthright views on a lack of vision from businesses and policy makers to address the jobs challenge facing the planet as the fourth industrial revolution takes hold.

In an interview with Swiss news network RTS, Jennings said:

“Our role here is to push the debate towards the social consequences. We have started and we have the proof. Academics and thought leaders confirm that there will be a huge effect on jobs. Far more than the financial crash.”

Speaking to Euronews, he said:

“Let’s look at the scale of the problem that’s in front of us. We already have 200 million people unemployed. Half the world’s workforce is surviving on just a couple of dollars per day and they are classified in the informal sector. Now you put on top of that this digital revolution that’s taking place and all of the statistics that we see are alarmist.”

The UK’s Daily Mail said the looming financial meltdown had cast a shadow over the annual meeting, quoting Jennings who said, “We are heading for a crash. Cataclysm would be the right word to use.”

Germany’s Deutsche Welle asked whether inequality could be the next global crisis.

“It already is.” Jennings said. “Inequality has been festering and becoming more and more prominent as time goes by. There has been a kind of reckoning here at Davos and at other institutions that we have reached a stage in economic development where the economic benefits are not being felt by all the people.  It’s essentially the top one per cent. It’s one thing when a union leader says it but when institutions like the OECD and IMF begin to say that this is bad for our economies, this is bad for growth and bad for business we need to rethink where we went wrong.”