Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

semianalysis.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

131–140 of 448 posts

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#131

Post by llamaimperative »

gopher_space wrote: post #127
llamaimperative wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s not “arbitrary.” It’s raising rents for the same reason rents are ever raised: people’s willingness/ability to pay has gone up. That can happen because of a new subway station, a hot new employer nearby, or simply because money appeared in their pockets. If money were no object, more people would live in high COL areas, not fewer. You know this is true because you see it in the prices. To prevent rent increases…

> It’s not “arbitrary.” It’s raising rents for the same reason rents are ever raised: people’s willingness/ability to pay has gone up. The only landlords who can afford to operate this way own many, many units. A long term tenant who pays in a predictable manner and isn't actively damaging property is worth their weight in gold, and you can't afford to roll the dice on the next tenant unless you're able to spread the…

All rents are set by the market's willingness and ability to pay.

No matter whether you're the 40th percentile (a vacancy-sensitive landlord) on price or the 90th (a vacancy-insensitive landlord), the dollar value of the underlying distribution is defined by the market's willingness and ability to pay. If that goes up, the entire distribution moves to the right.

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#132

Post by llamaimperative »

Libcat99 wrote: post #126
llamaimperative wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are we talking about one person’s income going up, or knowably every single person’s income going up by a known amount? When minimum wage rises, yes rents rise. When high paying employers come to an area, yes rents rise. These are a lot more random/diffuse in the market than UBI is, but they still cause the same effect. Can you please explain why rents go up at all?

A broad UBI plan would likely not have every single person's income going up by a known amount, either. Most of the plans I've seen taper off and then become a tax at certain income levels.

Taking the U and the B out of UBI? They should pick a different name.

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#133

Post by rtp4me »

Aromasin wrote: post #128
rtp4me wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems Honda just decided to produce the next Civic in Indiana. See [1]. [1] https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/honda-...

"Just decided" =/= decided today. They decided months if not years ago, after months of negotiations with local authorities. Don't look at plants opening now to judge the current administration. Look at it 2 years from now.

I don't know - the article specifically said Honda will produce the cars "to avoid potential tariffs". I don't think the Trump tariffs were in place "years ago"...

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#134

Post by paganel »

Yes, China is winning, but at what cost?

Leaving the stupid The Economist-list memes aside, the West has put itself all by itself in this position, for too long it had thought that it could still rule the world based on the services industries and on the financialization of the world economy. It seems like they bet wrong.

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#135

Post by watwut »

blueyes wrote: post #18

Some authors of this piece are deeply involved themselves in building robots and other hardware technology. They should be taken seriously. The US is moving into a trade war, however unwise, with the country that supplies components for everything we make and need. That country has expansionist ambitions and a superior manufacturing base, which is typically what wins wars.

You could also ... try not to make war. Just an idea. Pretty offputting actually to see someone supporting expansion being upvoted.

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#136

Post by Loughla »

alabastervlog wrote: post #48
sharemywin wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. there are limits to natural resources. 2. UBI is basically keeping humans as pets. 3. what value do billionaires bring to the table if their insight and wisdom can be replicated by a machine.

> 2. UBI is basically keeping humans as pets. UBI is similar to confining an animal? Deciding what and when it eats, when it bathes, where it goes? Training it, whether it likes it or not? Deciding whether it gets medical care? Whether it gets to have companions of its own kind? I thought it was giving people money.

I mean, depending on the amount, yes it could be deciding all of the things you said. You would be limited in your choices depending on how much the ubi actually is.

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#137

Post by Joel_Mckay »

rtp4me wrote: post #123
Joel_Mckay wrote: post #98

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed, no one sane will invest in building factory systems on US soil under a Kakistocracy. Robot platforms are already a difficult business model in the private sector. With the exception of robot vacuums the market just isn't viable in the US yet. Best of luck =3

It seems Honda just decided to produce the next Civic in Indiana. See [1]. [1] https://www.reuters.com/business/autos-transportation/honda-...

Indeed, products for domestic markets may have some incentives to avoid international supply chains.

The policies likely will just lead to multiple heavily coupled regional factories producing identical products at higher COGS. Controlling supply and demand in theory also makes communism more efficient, but in practice eventually has unintended economic consequences.

We shall see how this evolves... May our popcorn be plentiful =3

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#138

Post by paganel »

megaman821 wrote: post #100
tartuffe78 wrote: post #2

Who will buy the phones when no one is paid to produce them? The cars? The food and the clothes? Wealth keeps concentrating upward, great leaps in efficiency and throughput, but I can't see how it's a sustainable model for continued consumption growth year after year.

Why are manufacturing jobs special? People will upgrade their tastes to consume more. Middle class houses with artistic stone work and well-manicured gardens. Skin treatments, massages, and health scans galore. More entertainment and more niche too. Banking apps that could win design awards. We are nowhere near the end of useful work.

> Why are manufacturing jobs special?

Because you need manufacturing to win wars, or to be seen by outside great powers that you're in a position of winning wars. You're not winning wars based on git commit messages, but based on the steel any one country is able to produce at a certain moment in time (and to transform it into tanks/armoured vehicles and artillery shells).

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#139

Post by tzs »

outside1234 wrote: post #61
ryandrake wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Most participants in mature markets know approximately what percentage of the public's wallet they can grab. Obviously it's not 100% for any of them, but they all know what they can get away with. My guess is that if UBI added $1,000/mo to everyone's income, landlords would respond by raising rent by about $400-$500 or so, grocery stores would raise their prices by a percentage of that new income, and so on for all b…

One market where we see this effect, I think, is university education. Access to cheap loans has lead to an explosion in costs.

I'm not so sure about that. A few years ago I looked for historical university cost data. I didn't find much, but when I graphed what I did find I did not see any noticeable change in the rate costs grew between before the availability of cheap loans and after their availability.

Re: America Is Missing The New Labor Economy – Robotics Part 1

#140

Post by ambicapter »

tartuffe78 wrote: post #2

Who will buy the phones when no one is paid to produce them? The cars? The food and the clothes? Wealth keeps concentrating upward, great leaps in efficiency and throughput, but I can't see how it's a sustainable model for continued consumption growth year after year.

The plight of the poor is not an economic problem it is purely a political one. Progress in technology isn't really a root cause of poverty, rather a proximate cause with the root cause being "because the fruits of technology are not adequately shared by government policy", a policy issue.

Tax the billionaires and do what government is supposed to do (use that money to protect the safety of their people), it won't matter if they make their wealth via robots or via people.

Post reply on HN