Guaranteed Minimum What? • Hacker News Board

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#281

Post by cbanek » Sat, May 13, 2017, 12:22 AM UTC

ethbro wrote: post #265

cbanek wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Like I said in my original comment, even if the people are great, they are usually doing a very boring repetitive job. And even if they aren't a "bump on a log," many employers these days honestly want them to be. (liability, efficiency) They really want a robot that is cheaper, not a person. There are so many rules about what an employee can and should do now, especially for lower level jobs. What they can say, how…

I'd argue that those companies that have squeezed the humanity out of their workers are the first ones getting dislocated by the market. E.g. Blockbuster being bankrupt and our local independent video store doing just fine. Or McDonald's vs Waffle House. If you play was "we can provide a worse service for less" then yes, you're going to get steamrolled by automation. If your business is run around adding value (like…

I think you hit it on the head - it depends on the service being provided, and how the people relate to providing it.

Some people like talking to humans, some don't. It often changes as well. But for incredibly basic mundane transactions, I'd lean on the "I don't like talking to humans." But it's also slower to talk to humans, and generally there is a line, making it again slower. If I have to add travel time in there, that's a factor. So if the person at the end doesn't add at least some positive value (other than just doing what I need done), I'd rather go the faster way.

Also, if a company is squeezing the workers and not the market, that probably means that company is having trouble no matter what the workers are doing.

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#282

Post by dba7dba » Sat, May 13, 2017, 12:25 AM UTC

cbanek wrote: post #249

ryandrake wrote: post #224

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> On the other hand, the fancy waiter will make recommendations. Will tell you about other things, and is generally part of the ambiance and experience of eating out. I don't see the distinction. With all due respect to waitstaff (it's a tough job), the function is just begging for automation. An order-and-payment-taking tablet embedded into the table would be so much more efficient: 1. No need to wait for staff to c…

You're basically talking about the "fast casual" dining craze. Like a panera, where you can order and take payment online, or from a tablet there, and they drop the food off when it's ready. Drinks and everything else until you leave are self service. Pei-wei is another example. These are all the rage because of the efficiency (less wait staff) but still good food and a sit down environment. The distinction is in exp…

Excuse, did you just say Pei-wei has good food?

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#283

Post by mark_edward » Sat, May 13, 2017, 12:25 AM UTC

muninn_ wrote: post #77

jawns wrote: post #75

One thing that might cushion the displacement of workers by automation is if the workers themselves had an ownership interest in the automation technology. Yes, they would lose their jobs, but having an ownership interest would allow them to generate income. Maybe instead of UBI, we should consider a scheme where we grant an ownership interest in productive property. One naive way to implement that is to just grant s…

So this is a naive, honest question, but why not just index funds?

most people don't have enough wealth for investment income to matter much, and they probably will never have it. the average american has a negative net worth.

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#284

Post by jfoutz » Sat, May 13, 2017, 12:27 AM UTC

brownbat wrote: post #231

coldtea wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Things are always the same" fallacy. No, there are periods that are artistically more fruitful and interesting that others, and the history of art knows and documents several of them.

> there are periods that are artistically more fruitful and interesting that others, Sure, but the claim was just that there have always been bad movies. Here's a test: If there's some year you know of where bad movies were exceptionally rare, let us know. Then we'll see if we can provide counterexamples.

My pick for year is 1878. I'd love to see your examples.

But really, how do you quantify good? Taste is subjective. The original Transformers move is a great example. I didn't like it. but i believe 14 year old me would have absolutely loved it.

It's similar to the statistics about Word users only use 5% of the functionality of Word. But everybody uses a different 5%.

I guess if you want to go by money, i'm going to pick 1939. I'd guess about $18,000,000 in production expenses, and about $240,000,000 in box. [1] (arbitrarily assigning 1,000,000 to the unlisted numbers, but keeping the box at $0 for unlisted numbers) Seems like a pretty good ROI. (although i think of, Gone with the wind, Mr Smith goes to washington, and the Wizard of Oz as subjectively good. 25% is a pretty good percentage)

Kind of a fun exercise poking through the years. 1997 was a standout, but everything i looked at had memorable and fun movies. I don't think any year would hit that 25% mark though.

[1] http://www.the-numbers.com/movies/year/1939

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#285

Post by mnm2 » Sat, May 13, 2017, 12:39 AM UTC

BeetleB wrote: post #149

redleggedfrog wrote: post #63

I hate to say this, and this is in no way a troll, but I believe the solution for this will eventually be to kill the poor. Not directly, at least I don't think, but through lack of health care, lack of shelter, lack of education, poor diet, use in waging war, incarceration, and probably once they get desperate and try and get theirs, being labelled terrorists. People who have money, and therefore power, in the Unite…

>I hate to say this, and this is in no way a troll, but I believe the solution for this will eventually be to kill the poor. Only works if they die before reproducing...

kids without parents have certainly a reduced success-expectancy in life

It's interesting, that poor people have "so many children", normal people "just 2" and the rich again many... seems like everyone has their reasons/strategy:

Rich people can just have as many kids as they like. Normal people as they can sustain and poor people are just pounding them out with good hope that some/any will make it

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#286

Post by mnm1 » Sat, May 13, 2017, 12:41 AM UTC

ethbro wrote: post #261

dredmorbius wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are two distinct problems at play: 1. Workers whose contributions are undervalued. 2. Workers who cannot be trained or educated to provide high-value labour. These are both issues. (There are other categories: parents, caregivers, the disabled, sick, or handicapped, etc. But the two classifications above represent a major part of systemic failure of labour markets.)

3. Creating a hellish nightmare society where I am not afforded the opportunity to talk to a single random person in the going about of my average day. If you think the class gaps and problems of lack of cross-socioeconomic empathy are an issue now, wait until a middle class worker can go 24 hours without ever having to interact with anyone making less than them. "Raise taxes to fund foodstamps? Crazy! I hear the poo…

I'm middle class and I can go 24 hours or even many days without interacting with anyone. The future is already here. Can't say I'm all that impressed with it.

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#287

Post by AndrewKemendo » Sat, May 13, 2017, 12:45 AM UTC

dredmorbius wrote: post #279

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More accurate to say "Big companies have traditionally been blind sided by new tech..." I'm not aware of any major example of this since the introduction of the iPhone.

Look at what's happening to the desktop/laptop industry. Print and broadcaast media. Telcos, especially wired. Politics. News. Propaganda.

I'm talking specifically about AFGAM:

Apple owns consumer

Facebook owns Social

Google owns Search

Amazon owns E-commerce

Microsoft owns enterprise

Nobody is coming even close to taking them out in their categories and they are collectively dominant in pretty much everything else except hard infrastructure - even then they are gaining ground.

Snapchat could have had a close chance against FB before FB targeted them hard, so you can forget about that. But even then, google capital is an Investor and on top of that is getting $2BN in revenue from snapchat using google cloud!

Name any potential serious startup competitor to any of these. Doesn't exist.

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#288

Post by mnm2 » Sat, May 13, 2017, 1:00 AM UTC

marcosdumay wrote: post #121

redleggedfrog wrote: post #63

I hate to say this, and this is in no way a troll, but I believe the solution for this will eventually be to kill the poor. Not directly, at least I don't think, but through lack of health care, lack of shelter, lack of education, poor diet, use in waging war, incarceration, and probably once they get desperate and try and get theirs, being labelled terrorists. People who have money, and therefore power, in the Unite…

That was a big part of the deal that "solved" the Industrial Revolution. The other big part was training the ones that managed to survive.

The interesting part is that humans go through different phases (decades/centuries), where different skills are required: Native Indians in Middle America weren't strong enough to work on the plantations, so Africans were brought in. Today there are probably more Africans living in the Carrebian, since they once made the money to attract a female, make it a wife (marry here, very important for women) and then have a family (kids), which some/most Native Americans maybe didn't achive, since no job/money (and thus no true love ;)

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#289

Post by brownbat » Sat, May 13, 2017, 1:05 AM UTC

jfoutz wrote: post #284

brownbat wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> there are periods that are artistically more fruitful and interesting that others, Sure, but the claim was just that there have always been bad movies. Here's a test: If there's some year you know of where bad movies were exceptionally rare, let us know. Then we'll see if we can provide counterexamples.

My pick for year is 1878. I'd love to see your examples. But really, how do you quantify good? Taste is subjective. The original Transformers move is a great example. I didn't like it. but i believe 14 year old me would have absolutely loved it. It's similar to the statistics about Word users only use 5% of the functionality of Word. But everybody uses a different 5%. I guess if you want to go by money, i'm going to…

> My pick for year is 1878.

Very funny.

> I guess if you want to go by money, i'm going to pick 1939.

You listed several great films, but I'm not disputing there were years with several great films, that's a completely separate point.

> But really, how do you quantify good? Taste is subjective.

I will concede that if we adopt a radical skepticism towards all aesthetic values then the claim "every year has bad films" collapses.

However, if we agree to make that move... the original claim that "everything in the theater now is terrible" is also false. Or "there's something special (and bad) about the quality of film at this very moment" also collapses.

So I'm good with this move. I accept the gambit.

Re: Guaranteed Minimum What?

#290

Post by lovich » Sat, May 13, 2017, 1:06 AM UTC

gwright wrote: post #247

Taek wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe we should be working on better ways to get the poor educated and integrated with modern society as opposed to making them dependent on jobs which take all of their time, don't pay nearly enough, and block any and all opportunity for a way out because there's no free time or disposable income.

You seem to be assuming that low-wage workers are all poor and uneducated. That is misleading. From [1]: 50% of minimum wage workers are under the age of 24 25% of minimum wage workers are under the age of 19 Entry level jobs paying minimum wage teach important skills to teens and young adults: * being on time * attention to detail * how to work with others * how to follow instructions ... There is certainly room for…

I don't know what entry level jobs you worked at. Every single entry level job I worked at just taught you how to sign off paper work saying you did procedure A when you hadn't done it months, how palling around with the managers got you whatever shift you wanted, and how to turn a 2 minute trip into the back room into a 30 minutes break. There were some lessons in petty theft as well if you were interested in that. You had to go at least 3 levels of management up to actually find someone who cared about the results of the work, and who wasn't just pulling a paycheck.