I personally would take up golfing or play chess by the park. What about you guys?
Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
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Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#2Are we assuming a magic source of income?
If yes: I'd take up writing, teaching and practicing yoga, and charcoal drawing.
If no: I'd probably have to be some kind of nanny or domestic help. :/
Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#3[deleted]
Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#4If the bots can pick up the phone, make a sale and get a client to pay me on a subscription basis, I won't need to do anything. I will sit on my couch, sip some wine and watch TV. Until then, I have a job.
Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#5Struggle to re-establish my economic viability before my marriage collapsed under a pile of unpaid bills. Worst case scenario I'd slam my car into a bridge piling at a hundred and twenty miles an hour knowing my life insurance policy would cover the mortgage and my son's college education. Edit: oh wait...is this a thought experiment where capitalism isn't a thing anymore?
Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#6Other than, attempt to retrain and look for another job?
Without quite knowing the scope or seriousness of question, it's tricky.
I'm in IT, started as a sysadmin in PeopleSoft/ERP world, currently a hands-on team-lead. A lot of stuff we do can, should, and will be automated. Which will remove my hands-on portion and reduce my team-lead portion.
I've been lucky/careful to retrain both up (relative direction) and laterally over the last decade, partially to avoid being off-shored (pretty much every time I moved a position, shortly thereafter previous one was no longer done in-house), partially to remain relevant to management and clients.
I enjoy learning, but one day I may burn-out, and/or no longer be capable of learning fast enough, and/or all the things I'd like to / can easily learn will be automated. At that point, I haven't a clue, we'll see in which way we get there...
Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#7I would go in the wild to do math and design algortihms and catch fish.
Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#8Are we assuming a magic source of income? If yes: I'd take up writing, teaching and practicing yoga, and charcoal drawing. If no: I'd probably have to be some kind of nanny or domestic help. :/
I think everyone "assumes" basic income grants, when the robots make say upwards of 50 percent of people redundant.
I myself remain sceptical. If you low-medium skilled you should be able to find work from the people made richer by the robots, as butlers, assistants, etc... Yes even with the best robot, some people will prefer human contact. Some people may even pay a premium for companionship.
Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#9We'll all be living in a VR utopia while the robots do all the work and feed us intravenously...
Re: Ask HN: If the bots take your job, what would you do?
#10Struggle to re-establish my economic viability before my marriage collapsed under a pile of unpaid bills. Worst case scenario I'd slam my car into a bridge piling at a hundred and twenty miles an hour knowing my life insurance policy would cover the mortgage and my son's college education. Edit: oh wait...is this a thought experiment where capitalism isn't a thing anymore?
I was thinking more along the lines of "Turn to a life of crime." But your solution also has merit.