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American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

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Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#51

Post by Pinckney »

merpnderp wrote: post #23
tuna-piano wrote: post #6

The other question you need to ask in order to understand this future scenerio:. Shipping costs will significantly decrease, what will consumers and shareholders spend the extra money on? Who knows what they will spend the extra money on, could be healthcare, boats, TVs, whatever. But new jobs will be created in these expanded industries. It really, really bothers me the constant "x technology will drive x people out…

Shockingly enough, a UBI has been a libertarian concept for nearly half a century. If UBI had some reasonable limitations, like say 10% of the GDP divided evenly amoungst those who apply, it would provide a hard bottom to poverty while leaving huge incentives to find gainful employment. I'm not saying it wouldn't quickly turn into 51% of the people voting themselves 100% of the money (which would quickly become worth…

>Shockingly enough, a UBI has been a libertarian concept for nearly half a century.

Can you recommend any reading on this?

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#52

Post by internaut »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #29
beyondcompute wrote: post #16

Yeah, I've been thinking lately as well, why are we doing that? I mean as a society? (I recall a phrase said by someone, that we are consciously building a future nobody wants to live in.) What exactly are we getting from that? Ultra-rich, namely car companies owners and shareholders, will become even more rich. (Why are they doing it, by the way, don't they have enough super-cars, mansions, yachts already?) What am…

7% cheaper, repeated over and over is meaningful. 1n 1900, people had to spend 43% of their income on food, now it is 13%. They spent 12% of their income on clothing, now it is 4%. Basic goods getting cheaper particularly helps poorer people. http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/04/how-amer...

Food has become more expensive recently.

Basic materials e.g. timber, nails, screws, stuff you use to build houses, have all become more expensive recently, despite a dramatic decline in house production (in my country at least).

Seems like few people are talking about this and it really annoys me.

No, things are not getting better and better. Many trends are going into reverse but are not being talked about.

They were getting better and better. Most of those trends stop in the early 70s or after 2008, especially basic needs like medicine and shelter.

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#53

Post by beyondcompute »

WillPostForFood wrote: post #36
beyondcompute wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, I still believe that world became better than it was: https://www.ted.com/talks/larry_brilliant_makes_the_case_for... And, of course, it all is just a food for thought, doesn't necessarily mean we need to prohibit sales of self-driving vehicles (except for special technical applications). But still we have to understand that it's our conscious effort, not just the "natural force of Progress". As a society we sh…

Would you rather have Donald Trump intervening to steer economic trends in harmonious ways, or would you rather trust the natural force of progress?

First of all, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/False_dilemma

Second of all government intervention already does lots of cool things for us: https://www.bloomberg.com/view/articles/2013-06-19/who-creat...

But we don't appreciate it because we're being fooled into "libertarian dream" by rich who want to get rid of our control: https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-...

One more time, it's not in reality a "natural force". It's company owners and their severely overworked cliques consciously plan to put hundreds of millions people out of jobs to become personally more prosperous and they tell you that it's a "natural force".

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#54

Post by galacticpony »

Simple solution: Ban self-driving trucks.

I'm surprised that in the land of (apparently ) limitless legal liabilities, so many people are bullish on self-driving cars, let alone self-driving trucks.

You should be highly concerned that the push towards this by big players is going to lead to laws where ultimately nobody will have to take up personal responsibility for accidents anymore.

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#55

Post by technofiend »

seanalltogether wrote: post #45
steve19 wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans have a tendency to always think "it's different this time". Trucking won't disappear overnight.

Exactly, plus there's no way driverless trucks will be allowed onto city streets. Maneuvering trucks in urban and suburban corridors requires the drivers to break the rules of the road constantly. Automation makes sense for long haul highways, so truck drivers will shift to being last mile drivers.

I disagree that it'll never happen but driverless 18 wheelers are the trolley problem writ large. The momentum from these vehicles is far more than a passenger vehicle so they have that much more capacity to cause damage and death. I think driverless taxis will happen first and then probably smaller delivery vehicles. I'd love for USPS to have automated delivery into standardized neighborhood boxes.

Once there's enough driverless vehicles large trucks can signal smaller vehicles things like "I need to turn right so please leave me room in the left turn lane to my right". Frankly the tow truck industry needs some disrupting. At least here in Houston they are the most dangerous lawless drivers on the road and need to go.

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#56

Post by pdkl95 »

tuna-piano wrote: post #6

The other question you need to ask in order to understand this future scenerio:. Shipping costs will significantly decrease, what will consumers and shareholders spend the extra money on? Who knows what they will spend the extra money on, could be healthcare, boats, TVs, whatever. But new jobs will be created in these expanded industries. It really, really bothers me the constant "x technology will drive x people out…

Farming and other types of automation that put people out of work in the past used technology to amplify and/or replace physical labor. Now we are learning how to use the general purpose computer to replace mental labor. These are different types of automation that will have fundamentally different effects on society. While we have many examples of new technology replacing physical labor, automation of mental labor is new. I suggest watching CGP Grey's explanation[1] of why "this time is different."

> went into other endeavors

We are automating away entire classes of jobs, so this will require retraining. How, exactly, do you propose to send half[2] of the workforce to college for retraining in a highly technical field? Assuming this was even possible and assuming there will be jobs for all of these new programmers/etc, is this retraining cheaper than UBI or other plans? It is relatively easy for a farmer to learn another trade that requires primarily physical work. Retraining drivers for unautomatable technical work is a lot harder and more expensive.

[1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

[2] Driving is the largest category of jobs. The next handful of job types (e.g. retail sales, various clerical work, customer service/support) are also being automated away. Together is very roughly half of all jobs.

TL;DR - just watch [1]

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#57

Post by jordwest »

tuna-piano wrote: post #6

The other question you need to ask in order to understand this future scenerio:. Shipping costs will significantly decrease, what will consumers and shareholders spend the extra money on? Who knows what they will spend the extra money on, could be healthcare, boats, TVs, whatever. But new jobs will be created in these expanded industries. It really, really bothers me the constant "x technology will drive x people out…

> If we had established UBI then, and people could get paid to sit around, imagine the state we'd be in today.

Perhaps we'd be in a better place today. We can't know for sure, without first experimenting.

Wealth inequality is a real and growing problem, and I believe is a much bigger impediment to human progress than a basic income would be.

What about the millions of incredibly intelligent minds who could be earning the big bucks on Wall Street, but instead are toiling away 7 days a week in research labs at universities, surviving only off the small budget they're allocated? Are they working to survive, or are they surviving just to work?

What about the millions who would love to further their education, but instead have to work two jobs to support a family?

Personally, I come from a lower income background and would never have had the opportunity to go to university if it wasn't for the generous social support my country has.

Humans are inherently enterprising creatures. Yes, a basic income will enable some to sit around and do nothing. But those people have already found ways to do that, and why should we stop them? The people who truly want to change the world are not going to be impeded by some cash handed to them.

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#58

Post by karma_vaccum123 »

tuna-piano wrote: post #6

The other question you need to ask in order to understand this future scenerio:. Shipping costs will significantly decrease, what will consumers and shareholders spend the extra money on? Who knows what they will spend the extra money on, could be healthcare, boats, TVs, whatever. But new jobs will be created in these expanded industries. It really, really bothers me the constant "x technology will drive x people out…

Drivers are cheap. Eliminating them won't yield much. Improved safety will be the biggest gain

The article cites $40k average pay per driver. That's fast-food wages

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#59

Post by 3adawi »

internaut wrote: post #52
WillPostForFood wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

7% cheaper, repeated over and over is meaningful. 1n 1900, people had to spend 43% of their income on food, now it is 13%. They spent 12% of their income on clothing, now it is 4%. Basic goods getting cheaper particularly helps poorer people. http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/04/how-amer...

Food has become more expensive recently. Basic materials e.g. timber, nails, screws, stuff you use to build houses, have all become more expensive recently, despite a dramatic decline in house production (in my country at least). Seems like few people are talking about this and it really annoys me. No, things are not getting better and better. Many trends are going into reverse but are not being talked about. They we…

usually people took about trends that is seen in decades, not 'recently' where recently here means a couple of years. If you look at food expenditure as a percentage in the 90s and now, there has been progress.

Re: American truck drivers could lose their jobs to robots

#60

Post by jmadsen »

tuna-piano wrote: post #6

The other question you need to ask in order to understand this future scenerio:. Shipping costs will significantly decrease, what will consumers and shareholders spend the extra money on? Who knows what they will spend the extra money on, could be healthcare, boats, TVs, whatever. But new jobs will be created in these expanded industries. It really, really bothers me the constant "x technology will drive x people out…

or...

decreased shipping costs will go into the pockets of the business owners as additional profits.

Since I'm already used to paying $X for that, why would you necessarily cut that out when you can keep it?

Just another possibility.

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