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Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

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Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#41

Post by gloverkcn »

nickgrosvenor wrote: post #36

Generally, the way it works is like this, a new technology comes around and every one in that generation that had that career is out of a job in that industry. So a whole generation loses a job. Most of them don't get new jobs. Their kids learn new vocations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power-loom_riots Happened in the textile industry. In New England, Portuguese immigrants lost their jobs building cloths to more e…

If industry displacement starts occurring more than once a generation?

Our rate of advancement is increasing. We will get to the point where new job opportunities will be automated before there's even a real workforce.

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#42

Post by afastow »

jfaucett wrote: post #35

When will people realize that increased productivity is what makes society better to live in and not jobs. If all you needed were jobs then every country in the world would have no excuse for low living standards - they'd just need to get people a job doing anything, picking crops, whatever. [1] 1. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Productivity#National_producti...

Increased productivity isn't making society better to live in for people who don't have jobs.

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#43

Post by cm2187 »

cm2187 wrote: post #30
codecamper wrote: post #5

More like it destroys more white collar jobs & that is scary for economists that actually are part of white collar America. (technology has been destroying blue collar jobs for a while now)

Industrialisation has been destroying blue collar jobs. Computerization has been destroying white collar jobs for a while. You don't need an army of accountants to manage your books. All you need is an SAP-like system and a small team of experts. You don't need hundreds of engineers doing industrial design all day, you just need a few good guys and a CATIA-like system.

In fact a few years ago I read the memoir of a former officer in the french secret services (DGSE). He explained at length how a large part of the job of the DGSE was to accumulate mundane information about everyone, what article who published where, who is close to who, who thinks what, what rumor X says he heard from Y on Z. Over many years of painful accumulation of data through various sources, and with a critical understanding of the reliability of each source, the DGSE built this massive file on all potential persons of interest, which is crucial for the day they need it.

Now 90% of that is available in free access on linkedin, facebook and gmail...

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#44

Post by dbcurtis »

AnimalMuppet wrote: post #20
kmkemp wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At what point should society decide that robots have provided sufficient work that people should have the choice to work or not? This is why Universal Basic Income needs to become a mainstream concept ASAP.

At the point where the people can all stop working and nobody starves.

Well, if that is your criteria, and if you are working on robots you are working on the wrong problem. (Disclaimer: Robots are by day job).

Starvation is a distribution problem. We grow enough food to feed the world. Poor distribution systems cause some people to starve and some food to be wasted. Robot farmers won't fix that.

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#45

Post by gloverkcn »

cm2187 wrote: post #30
codecamper wrote: post #5

More like it destroys more white collar jobs & that is scary for economists that actually are part of white collar America. (technology has been destroying blue collar jobs for a while now)

Industrialisation has been destroying blue collar jobs. Computerization has been destroying white collar jobs for a while. You don't need an army of accountants to manage your books. All you need is an SAP-like system and a small team of experts. You don't need hundreds of engineers doing industrial design all day, you just need a few good guys and a CATIA-like system.

My favorite example is you don't need a graphics department for presentations. Just that one guy with a graphics design background.

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#46

Post by flukus »

nickgrosvenor wrote: post #36

Generally, the way it works is like this, a new technology comes around and every one in that generation that had that career is out of a job in that industry. So a whole generation loses a job. Most of them don't get new jobs. Their kids learn new vocations. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power-loom_riots Happened in the textile industry. In New England, Portuguese immigrants lost their jobs building cloths to more e…

New jobs will only be created if people can consume (and afford to consume) more. We're getting pretty close to consumption limits.

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#47

Post by shenanigoat »

SomeStupidPoint wrote: post #25
AnimalMuppet wrote: post #7

Of course it does. That's kind of the point of technology. Take farm equipment, for example. One combine replaces hundreds of people with sickles. All those people can't find jobs in the combine factory, either. So what happened? Mass unemployment? No, those people got jobs making automobiles and refrigerators and washing machines and ten thousand other things. The only reason society could do that is because they we…

There's a basic, and I think unfounded, assumption we'll find new jobs for people. Look at horses: thousands of years of utility, now essentially decorations and luxury items. Their population virtually gone in 100 years. No one has explained to me why that won't happen to humans except "it hasn't happened yet" and "humans aren't horses (duh!)", neither of which really addresses the issue.

Capitalism is supposed to serve humanity, not the other way around. When this stops happening, if we don't have an alternative system...well, I shudder to think.

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#48

Post by oli5679 »

guelo wrote: post #32
bmay wrote: post #6

> When the University of Chicago asked a panel of leading economists about automation, 76 percent agreed that it had not historically decreased employment. > But when asked about the more recent past, they were less sanguine. About 33 percent said technology was a central reason that median wages had been stagnant over the past decade, 20 percent said it was not and 29 percent were unsure. These two statements are di…

Econ 101 says lower price means either not enough demand or too much supply. Lower wages imply lower demand for employees, i.e. fewer jobs. Or maybe too much supply of employees.

Suppression of median wages is possible if the tech is particularly complimentary to workers at the top of the earning distribution.

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#49

Post by harry8 »

guelo wrote: post #32
bmay wrote: post #6

> When the University of Chicago asked a panel of leading economists about automation, 76 percent agreed that it had not historically decreased employment. > But when asked about the more recent past, they were less sanguine. About 33 percent said technology was a central reason that median wages had been stagnant over the past decade, 20 percent said it was not and 29 percent were unsure. These two statements are di…

Econ 101 says lower price means either not enough demand or too much supply. Lower wages imply lower demand for employees, i.e. fewer jobs. Or maybe too much supply of employees.

Econ 101 says you're assuming zero friction in the labor marketplace and exactly equal negotiating strength between employers and labor with zero collusion between employers, zero collusion between workers.

Now look at the S&P500 level over that time. Could that frankly stunning increase, GFC and all, have been less if there was a bidding war to get the best talent in labor hiring? Is all labor completely fungible?

Then we compare the salaries of senior management of S&P500 companies, who are also labor. No shortage of labor supply there at those salary levels - you, me everyone would have a go for a year at a salary of $X million. CEO salaries have not stagnated. Compare to demand for really awesome programmers which has outstripped supply by massive amounts and all the big companies desperately want to import people to meet some of that supply from overseas. But we don't see the bidding war with salaries going up to even $500k there.

Econ 101 is notice what your assumptions are in your model and think through all of them when applying that model. The assumptions of perfect competition in the labor market are obviously bogus and we need to think harder about what is going on, why and what a good outcome is (about which I'm saying nothing at all here) and how to get to that good outcome than: "The model says X so by definition there's no problem."

Re: Economists Say Newest AI Technology Destroys More Jobs Than It Creates (2014)

#50

Post by nickjarboe »

VLM wrote: post #21

People confuse "the economy" with certain popular commodities, such as physical paper cash or the concept of the dollar. In practice extreme inequality of commodities remove those commodities from the general purpose commodity market. Do you buy food with baseball cards? Do you pay the rent with beanie babies? Is your 401K in collectible Elvis plates? Or lets look at it from top down, instead. Currently the marketpla…

The key is debt. If your debt is in US dollars and you are forced to pay in US dollars, then you need to have US dollars. If you don't have them, you have to trade what you have (labor, land, beanie babies) with someone who has US dollars and want what you have. Hyperconcentrate the dollars, get most people in debt, and maintain the power to collect debts. This will make the economy not work well for most people.

Student loans, house loans, car loans, credit cards. Here we are.

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