No Recent Automation Revolution • Hacker News Board

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#201

Post by lm28469 » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:02 PM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #195

omginternets wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the parent poster does not have Vietnam, nor North Korea, nor even communism in mind. You know this, and we know you know this.

Fair enough, so not capitalism, not communism. What political system might be capable of meeting these requirements? Is it the political equivalent of unobtanium or vaporware? Im not trying to be a smartass; I want to know what the answer might look like. It doesn’t have to be a treatise. Just something consistent with a chance at succeeding with non-ideal people.

We have that thing in Europe called socialism, it brought us paid vacations, public health care, paid parental leaves, paid sick leaves, less working hours, &c. In a way all these things are wealth redistribution.

It's actually funny to listen to political debates of the 60s and 70s because people were planning that if automation were properly handled we'd be working like 2 days a week while keeping our standards of life and retiring at 40. What happened is that the rich got richer and the poor have to work shittier and shittier jobs, work longer, retire later, &c.

By the way, you might want to reassess your way of starting conversations, you're definitely trying to be a smartass. There are answers all over the place if you're willing to search/read a bit, it's not like these societal issues are new, there are literally hundreds of books about this very topic.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#202

Post by RivieraKid » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:03 PM UTC

barrkel wrote: post #177

kaybe wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really makes me sad that jobs are seen as inherently valuable. The way you phrase it, 'provide jobs', feels like jobs are something needed. Of course, in the current setup, this is true, but there are so many boring and hard jobs (worked by people who are yet poor) that we shouldn't mourn once we manage to get rid of them. I want an economy where we can celebrate automation and distribute the profits evenly.

Unearned income is unfulfilling and the people who think they earned it resent it being taken from them, even if it's only particularly large because there's a big market to sell into and a big winner effect in the market structure. I don't know the answers here but they don't look like free market capitalism or redistributive socialist utopia, and actually I think this axis or spectrum is an actively harmful frame f…

Tangential note - I've always found the idiom "job creation" weird and illogical. It seems to be US specific AFAIK. You don't create anything when you decide to exchange money for labor.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#203

Post by ajuc » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:03 PM UTC

kaybe wrote: post #169

Zaskoda wrote: post #10

Due to the Covid-19 lock down, my company was forced to accelerate our automation program. We did in months what we had originally planned to do in years. As we are able to open our operations center further, it's clear that we'll be providing fewer jobs than we did before. At least some part of that is the result of automation. I can't help but think this same pattern is playing out at other companies right now.

It really makes me sad that jobs are seen as inherently valuable. The way you phrase it, 'provide jobs', feels like jobs are something needed. Of course, in the current setup, this is true, but there are so many boring and hard jobs (worked by people who are yet poor) that we shouldn't mourn once we manage to get rid of them. I want an economy where we can celebrate automation and distribute the profits evenly.

> I want an economy where we can celebrate automation and distribute the profits evenly.

In such an economy there's no incentive to work on further automation. In particular if there's a part of world where profits aren't distributed evenly - the innovation and manufacturing will move there.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#204

Post by shadowfox » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:04 PM UTC

mc32 wrote: post #195

omginternets wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the parent poster does not have Vietnam, nor North Korea, nor even communism in mind. You know this, and we know you know this.

Fair enough, so not capitalism, not communism. What political system might be capable of meeting these requirements? Is it the political equivalent of unobtanium or vaporware? Im not trying to be a smartass; I want to know what the answer might look like. It doesn’t have to be a treatise. Just something consistent with a chance at succeeding with non-ideal people.

> Fair enough, so not capitalism, not communism.

> What political system might be capable of meeting these requirements?

Capitalism isn't really a political system, even though people seem to elevate it to one.

Different political systems/policies combined with capitalism can produce very different societies and structures. For example, see social democratic systems in many parts of Europe.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#205

Post by TimJRobinson » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:14 PM UTC

How does this square with the type of automation Amazon is doing? The type that people rarely think is automation.

Retail jobs are being decimated across the USA not because robots are directly replacing them, but because as more people shop online these companies collapse and Amazon is able to perform the same service without the staff.

Maybe warehouse worker, delivery jobs and coders are increasing at the same place? That doesn't pass the sniff test to me as they seem to have much higher efficiency than your average salesperson at a retail store.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#206

Post by areyousure » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:16 PM UTC

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #197

Yet automation equipment has boomed in the last 20 years. Factory floors are largely devoid of human beings. The US factory employment figures are down by more than half in that time, and that with a population that's doubled (so per-capita, factory occupations down to 25% or less or what it was). Companies move to India or China, then some move back but with none of the assembly jobs, because they don't move back un…

> in the last 20 years > in that time > a population that's doubled

Are you sure the US population has doubled in 20 years?

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#207

Post by goatlover » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:19 PM UTC

taneq wrote: post #162

tuatoru wrote: post #69

An independent line of evidence looks at the formation of new occupations over time. If automation were taking over jobs, or jobs were being refactored because some tasks are automated, then we'd expect to see new job titles appearing in employment advertising and classifications such as the Bureau of Labor Statistics's. This does happen, as it has happened since the start of the Industrial Revolution. "Social Media…

> "Social Media Manager" is a new job that has arisen in the last several years, for instance. How many people worked on assembly lines in, say, 1910 vs. 2010? How about as a percentage of an average manufacturer's staff? How many people worked as social media managers in 2010? I'd bet that (adjusted for population growth) for every 100 assembly line workers in 1910 you now have 2-3 stressed out engineers plus a bunc…

Sure, but somehow the total number of jobs has still managed to increase from 1910 to 2010. Automation shifts the work humans do. So far, it hasn't replaced the need for humans to do work, or we'd have a shrinking job market, which we didn't have prior to Covid (a temporary situation).

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#208

Post by mumblemumble » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:21 PM UTC

ludamad wrote: post #194

mumblemumble wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's also not something that would be taken away by diverting excess productivity to covering people's basic needs. I can at least imagine a world where doing so spurs a renaissance of creativity and entrepreneurship, because, just like you said, people seem to have an innate need to try and do something productive with their time. If there's a real social fear that I hold, it's that we'd suddenly have supply problem…

"I'd have spent that time working on some of the ideas I had for software projects instead." Then this takes off, makes you money, and you are higher class than those who keep their skills "for fun" EDIT: Not sure if this was understood, this was meant on a commentary on how capitalism and class can find its why back into such a system

Given the idea I had at the time, probably not. But I'd like to think it would have enriched the lives of myself and others, all the same.

In broad strokes, I'm more capitalist than communist, so I don't really disagree with the whole "greed is good" thing. Where I part ways is the unstated - often, I suspect, un-recognized - premise that it's the only good. Money's only useful for what it can buy, and its value has been artificially inflated by a social structure that makes it something that you just can't live without.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#209

Post by JoeAltmaier » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:26 PM UTC

areyousure wrote: post #206

JoeAltmaier wrote: post #197

Yet automation equipment has boomed in the last 20 years. Factory floors are largely devoid of human beings. The US factory employment figures are down by more than half in that time, and that with a population that's doubled (so per-capita, factory occupations down to 25% or less or what it was). Companies move to India or China, then some move back but with none of the assembly jobs, because they don't move back un…

> in the last 20 years > in that time > a population that's doubled Are you sure the US population has doubled in 20 years?

Right took longer than 20 years. How the time flies! Used to be 1990, I swear. More like 50 or 60 years ago.

But in contrast, US manufacturing jobs have disappears much faster than that - by 1/3 in the 2000's alone. So the conclusion (few jobs remain, per-capita) is still a good one.

Re: No Recent Automation Revolution

#210

Post by Retric » Wed, Jun 10, 2020, 1:27 PM UTC

ajuc wrote: post #203

kaybe wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It really makes me sad that jobs are seen as inherently valuable. The way you phrase it, 'provide jobs', feels like jobs are something needed. Of course, in the current setup, this is true, but there are so many boring and hard jobs (worked by people who are yet poor) that we shouldn't mourn once we manage to get rid of them. I want an economy where we can celebrate automation and distribute the profits evenly.

> I want an economy where we can celebrate automation and distribute the profits evenly. In such an economy there's no incentive to work on further automation. In particular if there's a part of world where profits aren't distributed evenly - the innovation and manufacturing will move there.

It’s a question of implementation. Consider say a 10% dividend on the economy, in the US that’s 6,300$ per year per person. Which does not sound like much to live on, but historically represents a significant income. Not that the US would adopt such a system, but it could by cutting back other spending like social programs.

A tiny group might try to live in it, but more would see seasonal jobs as enough. As automation improves in general people would work less over their lifetime. Critically this would likely slow down the economy in the short term, but the constant minor labor shortage would presumably push for ever more automation to offset this.

Unfortunately, it needs to be a pay go system based on a fixed economic percentage to really work. But, assuming it was the general population would suddenly have a huge incentive to promote automation and economic growth.