AI are taking jobs
economist.com
AI are taking jobs
1–10 of 169 posts
Re: AI are taking jobs
#2The notion of weak artificial intelligence hurting the economy by taking away jobs is a complete misunderstanding of the situation. To understand why, you need to read and understand the parable of the broken window:
http://freedomkeys.com/window.htm
The key lies in seeing that when humans no longer have to do mundane repetitive tasks, then they are freed up to do far more powerful and interesting things. The last job to be completely automated is the programmer, engineer and designer. And that too will one day be automated. I like to believe that humans and AI will merge so that together, a human and the machine will always be more powerful/more in control than just the AI.
Re: AI are taking jobs
#3The notion of weak artificial intelligence hurting the economy by taking away jobs is a complete misunderstanding of the situation. To understand why, you need to read and understand the parable of the broken window: http://freedomkeys.com/window.htm The key lies in seeing that when humans no longer have to do mundane repetitive tasks, then they are freed up to do far more powerful and interesting things. The last jo…
The problem is that there are not a lot of people capable of doing engineering/programming jobs. It is one thing to make the transition from a farmer to a factory worker, but another entirely to move from a factory worker to an engineer.
The learning curve for the jobs that may be created might be too steep for those whose jobs were displaced.
Re: AI are taking jobs
#4Perhaps we can build a giant firewall to keep Illegal Intelligents out.
Re: AI are taking jobs
#5Imagine a world where all goods and services required for a decent life will be provided by AI and robots. Still, there will plenty of jobs for humans - those related to the humanity of humans. Life could become dedicated to enjoying art in various forms, and this art will be conceived mostly by humans. If people will have no work to do, they could hire entertainers. They could do jobs as a hobby - e.g., manually producing stuff that could as well be made by robots, but that other humans will buy just because it was hand made. They could enjoy experimenting with various lifestyles, effectively creating diverse subcultures, and these cultures will trade items that are uniquely developed within the culture.
Imagine a world where people could enjoy the variety of clothing that existed in the world 300 years ago and that has been now elliminated by the hustle of modern life and by a global trade in clothes. Even if they will be produced by robots, designing these clothes will remain mostly a human job. Virtually anyone could wear designer clothes, and many people could become such designers. The same could be applied to food, music, movies, and so on.
Education and corporal care would also become a large part of the economy that would hire humans and not robots. There will be plenty of niches, and people will have the time to invest in developing specialized skills, rediscovering skills long forgotten.
Eliberated by the stress of modern life, life will simply become more enjoyable.
Re: AI are taking jobs
#6The notion of weak artificial intelligence hurting the economy by taking away jobs is a complete misunderstanding of the situation. To understand why, you need to read and understand the parable of the broken window: http://freedomkeys.com/window.htm The key lies in seeing that when humans no longer have to do mundane repetitive tasks, then they are freed up to do far more powerful and interesting things. The last jo…
The books the article mentions do know about both that parable, and the Luddite episode, and analyze extensively whether they apply to the current situation; as The Economists notes, some of the books are more optimistic than others. There's a bit of a dynamic aspect to it as well in terms of how the change happens and how human work patterns adapt in response. When people are "freed up to do far more powerful and interesting things", does this result in paid work at the same rate as the freeing-up happens? Or will there be significant lags where, say, 20-30% of the population might be unable to earn income at any given time? And how long-lasting will that be? Also, to the extent that automation running on robots and computers is what produces advances that humans could perhaps symbiotically work with, will everyone have access to the same starting point (software/hardware/etc.) so they can do so, or will there be a rich-get-richer feedback loop where the tools of automation are mainly in the hands of the better-off part of the population?
I don't really have a guess myself. I think it depends pretty sensitively on some hard-to-predict parameters; change some rates 2% here and 3% there and technological transitions (and the distribution of labor/wealth that results from them) look much different.
Re: AI are taking jobs
#7I don't see this as a bad thing, except:
In the 1950's people wondered what the future generations would do with all their free time. They predicted, correctly, that worker productivity would rise immensely. They also assumed that people would be just as wealthy while working much less.
People are wealthier in some ways. In america, its pretty much standard issue to own at least one car (partially perhaps because a car is needed to simply get a job in most areas).
But in other ways it does not seem like the average worker is as well-off as the past had predicted.
I could say things about concentration of wealth and other reasons the productivity gains were not matched by gains in free time, but I'm not sure I know enough to make those arguments.
Re: AI are taking jobs
#8The notion of weak artificial intelligence hurting the economy by taking away jobs is a complete misunderstanding of the situation. To understand why, you need to read and understand the parable of the broken window: http://freedomkeys.com/window.htm The key lies in seeing that when humans no longer have to do mundane repetitive tasks, then they are freed up to do far more powerful and interesting things. The last jo…
Joe the forklift driver is never going to do powerful and interesting things when he loses his job. It's completely unrealistic.
Re: AI are taking jobs
#9I don't see this as a bad thing, except: In the 1950's people wondered what the future generations would do with all their free time. They predicted, correctly, that worker productivity would rise immensely. They also assumed that people would be just as wealthy while working much less. People are wealthier in some ways. In america, its pretty much standard issue to own at least one car (partially perhaps because a c…
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Re: AI are taking jobs
#10The notion of weak artificial intelligence hurting the economy by taking away jobs is a complete misunderstanding of the situation. To understand why, you need to read and understand the parable of the broken window: http://freedomkeys.com/window.htm The key lies in seeing that when humans no longer have to do mundane repetitive tasks, then they are freed up to do far more powerful and interesting things. The last jo…
The problem is that there are not a lot of people capable of doing engineering/programming jobs. It is one thing to make the transition from a farmer to a factory worker, but another entirely to move from a factory worker to an engineer. The learning curve for the jobs that may be created might be too steep for those whose jobs were displaced.
True, I think creating high quality, cheap/free reeducation programs are one of the most important challenges facing us today.