Are jobs obsolete? • Hacker News Board

Re: Are jobs obsolete?

#141

Post by paulhauggis » Mon, Mar 19, 2012, 11:32 PM UTC

thebooktocome wrote: post #77

icandoitbetter wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The real problem is that we keep reproducing uncontrolably. The religiously crazed keep pushing having tons of kids with NO WAY TO SUPPORT THEM. That's only the main issue if you're wearing Reddit atheist goggles. Population growth is steadily decreasing in developed countries. On the other hand, automation is becoming increasingly a problem and is partly responsible for the increasing economic inequality we are faci…

Perhaps I also have Reddit atheist goggles on, but if the religiously crazed have more children on average than the secular, at some point the number of the former will outnumber the number of the latter. And then, presumably, every near-democracy travels back in time one hundred years.

Not really because many atheists grew up in religious families.

Re: Are jobs obsolete?

#142

Post by mcantelon » Mon, Mar 19, 2012, 11:34 PM UTC

zeroonetwothree wrote: post #79

mcantelon wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Largely due to globalization, nearly half of Americans are poor or low income. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/census-shows-1-2-people-103940... There is, of course, no shortage of productive work, but getting paid for that productive work is another matter.

This is just based on changing definitions of "poor" and "low-income". Wages are still around all-time highs for every quintile.

I'm talking about real wages: the ability to buy food, transportation, and shelter. A few decades ago a lot more people could do this without requiring both spouses work and take on significant debt.

Re: Are jobs obsolete?

#143

Post by david927 » Tue, Mar 20, 2012, 8:55 AM UTC

speleding wrote: post #116

david927 wrote: post #94

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's exactly right. Recently Foxconn in China has started to replace some of its workers with automation. Think about that: when even low paid work in China can't beat automation, you have a problem. There used to be a place for unskilled/semi-skilled labor: factory work, travel agents, insurance sales people. It's what created the middle class. And it's gone. Now you have the owners of the travel web site making a…

If unskilled labor is no longer needed for factory work it becomes available again for other low cost service work. A century ago lots of families employed a nanny, a cook, a cleaning lady and a gardener. Perhaps we will return to that time.

Roomba, self-cleaning ovens, ... do I need to go on?

Yes, people can move to service work but there's not much demand for it. I live near Monaco and the people I know who could easily afford such domestic help tend to get by with less than you would expect.

Besides, do we want it to be 10% has the other 90% working for them doing cleaning and cooking?

Re: Are jobs obsolete?

#144

Post by loup-vaillant » Tue, Mar 20, 2012, 9:59 AM UTC

hpvic03 wrote: post #66

jerrya wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree. In the Star Trek economy (afaik), the inwention of the replicator was key to the end of money and the end of a scarcity based economy. Well, we already have a replicator for much of the economy $ cp And it looks as though soon we'll have some very advanced robots that will be able to automate most mundane jobs. So maybe this is good and we can all become Platos, relaxing, philosophizing, self-actualizing at…

You make a good point about the transition period. I'm a fan of Kurzweil and am convinced that many of his predictions will come true. However, he paints a rosy picture of the future and glosses over any potential conflict in the transition between between now and when he predicts that humans will merge with machines, which he pegs at 2099. There is definitely going to be conflict as we move to a post-scarcity world.

Oh, but there already is conflict. While information basically got out of scarcity, the copyright overlords are still clinging to their old ways.

Re: Are jobs obsolete?

#145

Post by loup-vaillant » Tue, Mar 20, 2012, 10:13 AM UTC

jonnathanson wrote: post #117

hpvic03 wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not so impossible to believe. The objection I often hear (and I recall that this is PG's stance as well) is that as old jobs disappear new ones will take their place. For example, as the article mentioned, the former toll booth operator could now repair the automated toll booth system. So far this general idea has been true. Before computers existed as we know them, "computers" were people who did lengthy comput…

In theory, gains in productivity from computerized resources would replace the need for human work. (Voicemail and word processors made secretaries obsolete in many organizations, for instance). But in practice, work has simply grown more complex and more voluminous to accommodate the productivity gains. Consider the humble spreadsheet, arguably the most powerful business innovation of the last 50 years. Now that peo…

Consider 2 variables: Productivity is the "quantity" of "stuff" produced by man-hour (on average). Wealth is the "quantity" of stuff consumed by man-day (on average). So, on average,

  hours-of-work-per-day = wealth ÷ productivity

The question is, can wealth absorb all the productivity gains? If so, no problem. If not, then mechanically, there will be less and less hours worked per day, on average. In a world where we all want a "full time" job, that means unemployment.

Looking at the current trends, I'd say wealth absorbs only a (big) fraction of the productivity gains. Which means unemployment.