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Drawing on the Acemoglu–Restrepo framework, this article investigates the influence of technological innovations on the wage bill of France, Germany, Italy and Spain We show that in these countries: (a) the wage‐bill deceleration since the 1990s has mainly been productivity driven; (b) but was also affected by a wage‐share compression; (c) contraction of labor‐intensive tasks played a relevant role in such compression; (d) this reflected an acceleration of technology‐induced labor displacement not sufficiently offset by the reinstatement of new labor‐intensive tasks; (e) labor displacement was higher in low‐end services. Econometric analysis of displacement confirms the influence of technology. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]