This work addresses the role of global value chains (GVCs), workforce skills, ICT, innovation and industry structure in explaining employment levels of routine and non-routine occupations. The analysis encompasses 28 OECD countries over the period 2000-2011. It relies on a new country-specific measure of routine intensity built using individual-level information from the OECD Programme for the International Assessment of Adult Competencies (PIAAC) survey, as well as on new industry-level Trade in Value Added (TiVA) indicators of offshoring and domestic outsourcing. The results suggest that employment in all types of occupations positively relate to innovation. With respect to offshoring patterns, a positive correlation is observed between the offshoring of inputs and domestic outsourcing with more routine-intensive jobs. Taken together, the results point to the existence of complex interactions between the routine content of occupations, skills, technology and trade, which do not allow for a neat identification of “winners” and “losers” in a GVC context.