Four Alabama counties are among the nation's highest risks for losing jobs to automation, according to a new report from Ball State University.

"How Vulnerable Are American Communities to Automation, Trade and Urbanization?" was prepared by the university's Center for Business and Economic Research and the Rural Policy Institute's Center for State Policy.

According to the study, Coosa, Conecuh, Greene and Pickens counties are all among the top 25 counties in the U.S. that run the highest risk of losing jobs to automation over the next generation.

Coosa County ranked eighth, Conecuh 16th, Greene 19th and Pickens 21st. The county with the highest risk in the country of heavy job losses to automation was Aleutians East Borough in Alaska.

Alabama was not the only southern state represented. Counties in Mississippi, Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina, Kentucky and Virginia also showed up on the list.

Michael Hicks, director of the Center for Business and Economic Research, said the list came from occupational data which charted the jobs in any given county against jobs that are currently be done by automation and might have a higher probability of replacement.

"This is based on current technology, not 'Star Wars' stuff in a laboratory somewhere," Hicks said.

What's not clear is how quickly jobs could be replaced. A number of factors are at play - the relative cost of machinery versus worker, the pace of the employing companies toward automation. What is clear is that automation, like outsourcing jobs, will have far-reaching implications for the economy, both at the national and the local level.

"You've got three factors, three challenges that rural areas are facing," Hicks said. "There's trade, there's automation and there's households moving from the rural to the urban."

Urban concentration, Hicks said, would follow a factor such as automation. If jobs are easier to find in urban areas, more workers will move from rural areas seeking employment.

What is more, the study confirms something other research is showing - higher wage jobs are often at low risk of automation, while low-wage and low-skilled jobs, requiring not as much education, are the most vulnerable.

According to the report, half of all low-skilled jobs are likely to be replaced by automation. In addition, one in four American jobs are at risk from foreign competition, across virtually all labor markets, earnings and educational attainment.

"Considerable labor market turbulence is likely in the next generation," Hicks said.

What jobs are most susceptible to automation? According to the study, jobs involving data entry, telemarketing, insurance underwriters and tax preparers are in jeopardy. On the opposite end, recreational therapists, mental health and substance abuse social workers, occupational therapists and health technicians face the least challenges.