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More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

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Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#81

Post by jawns »

neuromantik8086 wrote: post #56
jawns wrote: post #15

I live in the Wilmington, Delaware, area which, according to this article, is the East Coast hotbed of robots-replacing-workers. Our liabilities, in terms of industries ripe for automation, include the chemicals sector (DuPont is headquartered here and is our largest for-profit employer) and the pharmaceuticals sector (AstraZeneca is our third largest for-profit employer). We also used to have several large auto manu…

My blue-collar cousin works for one of the companies that is responsible for at least some of the automation in the states that the article highlights. When asked about the workers at these factories at a family gathering, his response was to advocate that these workers pursue more education, which I think echoes your point- the more knowledge you have that you can recombine in new and creative ways, the less likely…

You bring up a good point, that education and retraining is often a part of the process.

And the more I think about it, there are probably a good number of workers affected by or at risk of being replaced by automation, and they are not necessarily resistant to change -- but they might not have the resources to pursue the retraining and education that would help them pick up the skills necessary to adapt.

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#82

Post by ThomPete »

flyingfences wrote: post #41
ThomPete wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The jobs are mostly temp jobs not full time jobs. Bush changed how jobs are defined obama continued that with the result that 95% of jobs created since the financial cricis are temp jobs. This is a big deal in the us as it cuts of access to ex healthcare. Its very grim whats going on.

Jobs are still jobs, though. If people are still employed then that means that there are still jobs for people to do.

Jobs are jobs there are just less and less of those who can pay a salary you can live from.

Not sure what you are trying to say.

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#83

Post by H1Supreme »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #63
paulpauper wrote: post #8

Detroit lost so many jobs, not because of robots, but due to the decline of the domestic auto manufacturing industry. The modern auto assembly line, which uses human-assisted robots, existed a couple decades before Detroit's precipitous decline. The Detroit riots during the 60's and 'capital flight' also didn't help. The argument of robots destroying jobs, imho, has a lot of holes ..the hysteria seems overblown http:…

>The printing press put scribes out of work, but then the entire publishing industry exploded. And now the publishing industry is dying because of the web. Its not remotely a 1 to 1 transition and automation certainly is to blame for that. Sounds like your example was just a couple hundred years too early. Back in the old days you literally had a factory running to print papers everyday, two usually, with an evening…

Lots of truth in this post. The majority of people I know (30's age bracket) are working jobs that are not in the field they have a degree in. Some of them went back to school, and still have shitty retail jobs or part-time work. That, or they travel hundreds of miles during the week to work on location somewhere.

I was lucky to get into programming (as a hobby at first), but as we all know, it's not for everyone. Especially, if you only get into it because you think it's lucrative.

My Dad fell ass backwards into a blue-collar factory job when he was 18, and supported a wife (who worked part time sometimes) and 2 kids. This was literally par for the course in the 60's-80's. That's upper middle class these days, at minimum.

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#84

Post by H1Supreme »

vkou wrote: post #73
TimPC wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is true only when the alternative is a living wage job. A job that needs a top-up of benefits from the government is economically better for the government than that person relying entirely on government benefits. Most companies that pay low wages would potentially not exist if they had to pay $15+ an hour today. At a minimum the price structure of goods would radically alter and the incentives to cut workforce…

> A job that needs a top-up of benefits from the government is economically better for the government than that person relying entirely on government benefits. Unless the government could instead be paying that person to do something useful for all of society, instead of something that benefits only me. This election has shown that millions of people want meaningful work. Like teaching and caring for children, fillin…

Great point. The amount of infrastructure that needs upgraded in the USA is massive. Subsidizing shitty retail jobs is such a waste.

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#85

Post by thesagan »

djschnei wrote: post #78
thesagan wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The goal is diffused and spread out among ~8 billion people. Theorizing goals is fun, but it doesn't make it a goal anymore than Darwin made "survival" a goal for nature (or life, more narrowly); which isn't always true. (Some species self-sacrifice for reasons outside of self/individual preservation.) There may be a prevailing ideology, I'll admit. In the west, and now most of the world, it seems to be material weal…

We're getting caught up in pretty meaningless semantics here... but maybe your conflating natural individual self interest with the goal of an economic system? They are different things. Capitalism (the economic system) looks to channel individual self interest towards it's most mutually beneficial ends. It looks to maximize productive output of the overall system by channeling natural individual tendencies.

Econ and politics is rife with semantics, and they're very important, and sometimes central to the conversation.

Either way, I think you're the one making the claims that need substantiation. Years of studying econ hasn't provided me clear evidence that upholds the idea that "economies have goals" other than "economies tend to grow in material wealth" – and even that has subtleties too many to thoroughly discuss on an internet forum.

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#86

Post by s73ver »

neuromantik8086 wrote: post #56
jawns wrote: post #15

I live in the Wilmington, Delaware, area which, according to this article, is the East Coast hotbed of robots-replacing-workers. Our liabilities, in terms of industries ripe for automation, include the chemicals sector (DuPont is headquartered here and is our largest for-profit employer) and the pharmaceuticals sector (AstraZeneca is our third largest for-profit employer). We also used to have several large auto manu…

My blue-collar cousin works for one of the companies that is responsible for at least some of the automation in the states that the article highlights. When asked about the workers at these factories at a family gathering, his response was to advocate that these workers pursue more education, which I think echoes your point- the more knowledge you have that you can recombine in new and creative ways, the less likely…

Where do you find the resources and time to take on this new education when you're trying to pay a mortgage and feed your family?

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#87

Post by s73ver »

bduerst wrote: post #46
lurker10000 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Many people (including me) believe the problem isn't overblown. A common counterargument to your point is that humans have always had the ability to do work at higher abstraction levels than the machines replacing them. Scribes become unemployed but can retrain as typographers, press operators, digital layout artists and so on. The problem comes when robots begin to perform these higher order tasks. What happens to i…

Jobs are not zero sum - the demand for labor is a function of supply. People will begin to fill more niche and variable-demand jobs where capital investments don't make sense, i.e. a shift towards a consultant economy. Keep in mind that the specifics of this is very hard to predict. A large number of the jobs we have today would have seemed absurd 20-40 years ago, but to us they feel like they were inevitable.

Except there are going to be far, far fewer of those positions than there are people displaced by automation.

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#88

Post by s73ver »

paulpauper wrote: post #8

Detroit lost so many jobs, not because of robots, but due to the decline of the domestic auto manufacturing industry. The modern auto assembly line, which uses human-assisted robots, existed a couple decades before Detroit's precipitous decline. The Detroit riots during the 60's and 'capital flight' also didn't help. The argument of robots destroying jobs, imho, has a lot of holes ..the hysteria seems overblown http:…

So what industry is going to explode when robotic manufacturing, or driverless vehicles become common? What industry is going to take in all the truck drivers and assembly workers?

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#89

Post by cr0sh »

petra wrote: post #60
bduerst wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jobs are not zero sum - the demand for labor is a function of supply. People will begin to fill more niche and variable-demand jobs where capital investments don't make sense, i.e. a shift towards a consultant economy. Keep in mind that the specifics of this is very hard to predict. A large number of the jobs we have today would have seemed absurd 20-40 years ago, but to us they feel like they were inevitable.

What popular jobs.that we have today would seem absurd 20-40 ago ,for someone.with an eye into.the future , say a science fiction writer?

While I am pretty certain there were analogues of it 40 years ago (1977), the idea of a "lifestyle coach" and similar professions would seem a bit out there back then.

Re: More Robots, Fewer Jobs: capital vs. labor in production

#90

Post by PeterisP »

drzaiusapelord wrote: post #79
tankenmate wrote: post #76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The Norwegian sovereign wealth fund (somewhat strangely called the Government Pension Fund Global; it used to be called the Petroleum Fund, and it funded fully by tax receipts / profits from it's oil industry) is the largest sovereign wealth fund in the world at nearly USD1T. The Norwegian government rarely touches the capital (even though it is allowed to to a limited extent). With a minor reduction in spending it c…

>at nearly USD1T. At today's prices. Do you really think oil demand will continue for the next 50-100 years at this level with all this investment in renewables? We're currently at a price slump close to pricing from two decades ago. Its a little presumptuous to think oil will continue to have this value.

What do you mean "at today's prices"?

The Norway sovereign fund isn't the valuation of their oil businesses, it consists of 1T investments in non-oil businesses, including renewables, that have been funded by oil that's already sold at yesterday's prices. If oil become worthless tonight, they'd still have the 1T fund and it's ongoing proceeds.

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