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The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

nytimes.com

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Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#191

Post by dcole2929 »

shostack wrote: post #164
otakucode wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have done a lot of thinking about this. There are 2 things that keep sticking out to me: First, history. History does not make our future look good. Humanity has gone through a few disruptive changes in the way society viewed work and societal contribution. The most recent was with the spread of factories and assembly-line production. The result of the adoption of those structures/technologies was not good. Society…

How was the New Deal sold in to owners of capital who presumably controlled the press and political system? Would a similar approach work today?

FDR passed that kind of sweeping legislation almost entirely through, desperation, force of personality, and titanic reinterpreting of the powers of a peace time president and of the federal government. It also helped that for the first few years of his presidency he enjoyed a super majority in congress. He also was able to choose 8 of the 9 supreme court justices over the course of his time in office, and even initially he tried to pack the court. FDR was down right devious. He was well known for never ever telling the complete truth even to his most loyal of supporters.

The truth is he didn't bother to try and sell it to the people in power because he didn't have to. It was readily apparent that if something wasn't done America might not make it. At the time unemployment rate was at almost 30%. Most american's didn't have access to their bank accounts as many were insolvent. Literally the country was on the brink. Congress was going to do whatever it took to drag us out of that hole even if it meant completely rewriting the rules of well everything.

I don't know that any of that is possible today. The regulations we have in place largely prevent us from being able to get back to that sort of dark economic time. And in my opinion it will take either that sort of global catastrophe, or one of our current major parties to fall apart to enable the sort of cooperation in congress New Deal level policy requires.

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#192

Post by croon »

randcraw wrote: post #181
1982734234 wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What are the things that need to be invented when robots do everything for you?

Cures for disease. Entertainment. Friendship.

Cures for diseases I expect AI to do much better than us very soon.

Entertainment will take longer, but I see no reason why it wouldn't be possible to algorithmically create. The lesser ones like Big Bang Theory is basically just a nerd reskin of every other sitcom Chuck Lorre has done. That could probably be churned out by a computer by the end of 2020. The more complicated entertainment will take longer to crack though.

Friendship is tough to define. So I'll give you that.

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#193

Post by VladimirGolovin »

dfabulich wrote: post #65

(I posted this on another thread this week where it was less relevant, so I'll just repost it here and see if anybody notices.) Mass automation is undermining our democracy in a very specific way: it's acting as the ultimate "resource curse." https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Resource_curse "Countries with an abundance of natural resources, specifically non-renewable resources like minerals and fuels, tend to have less e…

> Mass automation is undermining our democracy in a very specific way: it's acting as the ultimate "resource curse."

This. This exact thought occurred to me about a week ago -- to my shame, a full year after I read The Dictator's Handbook.

The natural concentration of robot ownership in the hands of a few creates the same autocracy dynamic as described in the book for oil and other natural resources. Also, robotic factories can be seized and controlled by an autocracy, just like oil wells. What's really scary about this is that threatens stable democracies, like the USA.

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#194

Post by diego_moita »

jganetsk wrote: post #161

This is exactly wrong. Automation happened already, 200 years ago. It upended society. It was called the Industrial Revolution. Things changed dramatically, and nothing remotely of that scale is occurring now. We are suffering today not because of technological progress, but rather the contrary: the rapid technological progress of the 20th century that brought tremendous economic prosperity to humanity has finally co…

> the rapid technological progress of the 20th century that brought tremendous economic prosperity to humanity has finally come to a grinding halt

Fine, I can buy that. But stagnant productivity alone doesn't generate low employment. How do you explain low employment then?

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#195

Post by roryisok »

mdorazio wrote: post #188
jganetsk wrote: post #161

This is exactly wrong. Automation happened already, 200 years ago. It upended society. It was called the Industrial Revolution. Things changed dramatically, and nothing remotely of that scale is occurring now. We are suffering today not because of technological progress, but rather the contrary: the rapid technological progress of the 20th century that brought tremendous economic prosperity to humanity has finally co…

I disagree that it's "exactly wrong", though I at the same time agree with the secular stagnation concept. It's important to remember that past revolutions in automation have destroyed one field of labor while creating another. For example, the industrial revolution destroyed hand and muscle-driven labor and replaced it with factory labor. In the US we then went from an industrial economy driven by factory jobs to a…

Even jobs in the tech sector are likely under threat. Remember that guy a few weeks ago showing an AI platform be built to design logos for customers? We're not far from having AI build our web pages, and then simple web apps, and then probably native apps, and before long, finding and patching bugs in software, and eventually writing the software itself

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#196

Post by mcv »

jganetsk wrote: post #161

This is exactly wrong. Automation happened already, 200 years ago. It upended society. It was called the Industrial Revolution. Things changed dramatically, and nothing remotely of that scale is occurring now. We are suffering today not because of technological progress, but rather the contrary: the rapid technological progress of the 20th century that brought tremendous economic prosperity to humanity has finally co…

Not sure if I agree with your analysis, but I certainly agree with your solution.

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#197

Post by icefox »

croon wrote: post #192
randcraw wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cures for disease. Entertainment. Friendship.

Cures for diseases I expect AI to do much better than us very soon. Entertainment will take longer, but I see no reason why it wouldn't be possible to algorithmically create. The lesser ones like Big Bang Theory is basically just a nerd reskin of every other sitcom Chuck Lorre has done. That could probably be churned out by a computer by the end of 2020. The more complicated entertainment will take longer to crack th…

> Friendship is tough to define

The first version could take the form of a pen pal over email.

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#198

Post by nradov »

roryisok wrote: post #195
mdorazio wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree that it's "exactly wrong", though I at the same time agree with the secular stagnation concept. It's important to remember that past revolutions in automation have destroyed one field of labor while creating another. For example, the industrial revolution destroyed hand and muscle-driven labor and replaced it with factory labor. In the US we then went from an industrial economy driven by factory jobs to a…

Even jobs in the tech sector are likely under threat. Remember that guy a few weeks ago showing an AI platform be built to design logos for customers? We're not far from having AI build our web pages, and then simple web apps, and then probably native apps, and before long, finding and patching bugs in software, and eventually writing the software itself

You don't need much in the way of AI to design and build simple web pages. Existing templates and wizards already do that; those jobs were automated away years ago.

Patching all but the simplest software bugs will require real AGI. Understanding a bug and the side effects of a patch goes way beyond current AI technology, and there is still no defined R&D path which is likely to produce an AGI.

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#199

Post by jganetsk »

erikpukinskis wrote: post #182
jganetsk wrote: post #161

This is exactly wrong. Automation happened already, 200 years ago. It upended society. It was called the Industrial Revolution. Things changed dramatically, and nothing remotely of that scale is occurring now. We are suffering today not because of technological progress, but rather the contrary: the rapid technological progress of the 20th century that brought tremendous economic prosperity to humanity has finally co…

> The stream of lifechanging breakthrough inventions of the 20th century, from A (antibiotics) to Z (zippers), have ended I agree, but this only leads to more questions: why? And is it permanent? I think we are in a temporary lull. Finance people, in the vain of JP Morgan, have gotten very good at controlling the social processes around both physical resources and human output. They keep most people tired and scared…

> I agree, but this only leads to more questions: why? And is it permanent?

Our rapid technological progress in the last 2 centuries was an anomaly. We have 200,000 years of history as a species, most of which did not have nearly the same level of progress. The burden is on to you to explain what made those 2 centuries so great.

Re: The Long-Term Jobs Killer Is Not China, It’s Automation

#200

Post by jganetsk »

diego_moita wrote: post #194
jganetsk wrote: post #161

This is exactly wrong. Automation happened already, 200 years ago. It upended society. It was called the Industrial Revolution. Things changed dramatically, and nothing remotely of that scale is occurring now. We are suffering today not because of technological progress, but rather the contrary: the rapid technological progress of the 20th century that brought tremendous economic prosperity to humanity has finally co…

> the rapid technological progress of the 20th century that brought tremendous economic prosperity to humanity has finally come to a grinding halt Fine, I can buy that. But stagnant productivity alone doesn't generate low employment. How do you explain low employment then?

Secular stagnation
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