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India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

engadget.com

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Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#61

Post by malchow »

poke111 wrote: post #21
anoother wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question -- why not? What makes this a bad idea?

Because you create wealth by producing goods and services. Jobs are a cost, not the end goal. Sacrificing production for jobs gets it exactly backwards and makes us, in the aggregate, poorer, even though it makes a few people richer.

Nicely put.

I'd add that your response makes a tidy argument against the abusive public employee unions that hold public fisc hostage in the U.S. Right now, U.S. teachers' unions have crafted a public education industry that is a lot like what this technocrat in India might have conceived .

Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#63

Post by danenania »

ceejayoz wrote: post #34
danenania wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Once self-driving cars hit, the switch will be immediate and massive. I would predict 10% to 90% penetration in probably less than 12 months--the limitation will simply be building the cars fast enough. That's a lot of people suddenly with no income." It will probably take 12 months just to form the exploratory committee that will form the actual committee that will even begin to consider legalizing fully driverless…

The "once self-driving cars hit" point would be their legalization in your scenario, with the same rapid uptake described unless government implements some sort of quota system allowing only a small number to be added at once.

I'll buy that. My point is that it's not something that will happen all of a sudden. First, the tech needs to be ready. Then we'll have a years-long period of political wrangling. And once we finally get through that, sure, adoption could be swift. But people in tech who think this is just going to sail through aren't in touch with how the majority of people look at the world... they're sort of like the folks who thought Google Glass would be a smashing success.

Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#64

Post by Pxtl »

praving5 wrote: post #62

I live in India. Irrespective of whether the Government bans driverless cars or not, Indian roads and traffic conditions are not suitable for driverless cars. Period.

I visited Kerala for a week for work. The roads in Thiruvananthapuram make me think the traffic conditions aren't really suitable for cars with drivers either.

Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#65

Post by deepGem »

Ah, another ban. Welcome to the new age governance in India. Some government official in Karnataka wanted to ban ride sharing as well. I hear the government's sentiment about creating jobs, but hey have these guys ever sat in that shitty truck and driven all night ? Fucking armchair politicians.

Anyways, I used to think why hasn't any company invested in self driving tech in India - and now the answer becomes pretty clear. One can possibly take the government head on and challenge the ban in the Supreme court.

Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#66

Post by nashashmi »

jlebar wrote: post #15
anoother wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question -- why not? What makes this a bad idea?

Because automated weaving makes clothes a lot cheaper. Put another way, when workers become more efficient -- one factory worker able to control many weaving machines, or a relatively small group of programmers able to control many cars -- people's standard of living increases. Maybe you're willing to pay more for clothes, or transportation, or any one thing. But paying more for all of the things that have gotten che…

What's the point of making things cheaper when it centers the wealth on just a few owners? When there are lots of workers working low income jobs versus just a few workers working high income jobs, it creates a healthier more distributed economy.

Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#67

Post by hackinthebochs »

poke111 wrote: post #21
anoother wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Serious question -- why not? What makes this a bad idea?

Because you create wealth by producing goods and services. Jobs are a cost, not the end goal. Sacrificing production for jobs gets it exactly backwards and makes us, in the aggregate, poorer, even though it makes a few people richer.

But jobs are how those goods and services are distributed. A country like India is not in a state to transition to basic income yet.

Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#68

Post by Pxtl »

bellBivDinesh wrote: post #54

What a shame. The mortality rate for car accidents in India is staggering.

I'm honestly surprised it's not a bigger deal, particularly since it's easy to draw vehicular safety along class lines - rich people have big safe cars and drivers and poor people don't. I'd think India's class-conscious politicians would make some noise.

Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#69

Post by deepGem »

praving5 wrote: post #62

I live in India. Irrespective of whether the Government bans driverless cars or not, Indian roads and traffic conditions are not suitable for driverless cars. Period.

I bet if we start testing self driving cars in India, we'll get there in perhaps another 10-20 years. What's needed is an extremely good path planning algorithm. Rest of the self driving tech SLAM et al is already solved.

However, the bigger problem on Indian roads is congestion. I think you need smaller autonomous vehicles that can navigate through the crevices and cracks ( gallis ). Something smaller than the Tata Nano.

Re: India will ban driverless cars in order to protect jobs

#70

Post by malchow »

denzil_correa wrote: post #18

Reminds me of this story > The story goes that Milton Friedman was once taken to see a massive government project somewhere in Asia. Thousands of workers using shovels were building a canal. Friedman was puzzled. Why weren't there any excavators or any mechanized earth-moving equipment? A government official explained that using shovels created more jobs. Friedman's response: "Then why not use spoons instead of shove…

The brilliance of the Friedman anecdote is that it reveals something Higher-Life-Form types like Nitin Gadkari, who propose to save you with the wonderful power of regulation, miss. What they miss is that in their world there's no logically sound riposte to Friedman's question. It should be spoons. Teaspoons, even. Creates more jobs.

But actually what works is, perhaps, shovels. And then, if you can afford it, earth-moving equipment.

Who says shovels are best?

Prices say shovels are best. And then, later, prices say earth-moving equipment is best. You don't have to be a Randian absolutist to conclude that governments inevitably distort outcomes and impoverish people, even at the margin, when they control prices.

I think what is implicit in a move like Gadkari's is a belief that the idea of a "market-clearing price" is an economic textbook proposal that one is free to adopt or not adopt. In fact these concepts are not theories but reality-reflecting lenses. Prices are actual facts. The ban on driverless cars will create grey markets, criminals, cartelize commercial driving, artificially enhance transport costs, and, perhaps most insidiously, marginally nudge a young man or woman on the edge of deciding between (say) driving and doing a Masters degree, to drive.

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