What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like • Hacker News Board

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#41

Post by TeMPOraL » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:17 PM UTC

logfromblammo wrote: post #38

Phlarp wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

uh, money?

Currency is the intermediate trade good. Currency is only worth what you can buy with it. If nobody makes anything, no amount of money can buy anything. If the only people making things are the rich folks who own production capital, they can only trade with each other. If they are not producing the things that rich people want, they can't trade. Imagine a degenerate world where there are two rich factory owners and 7…

> In this degenerate world, the most commonly sold service is likely going to be "not murdering you in your sleep and taking control of your factory the next day".

Which will be solved by the third richie who has a military drone production and maintenance facility.

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#42

Post by skybrian » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:19 PM UTC

scrumper wrote: post #39

jjoonathan wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a lie and it is insulting to expect that it will slip past most people (it's a "some of the people all of the time" lie). I agree with everything except your last sentence. Some alternatives to socialism: * basic income * putting teeth back in overtime laws and shortening the workweek * "Communes" that arise naturally as the rising cost of rent-seeking exceeds the falling inefficiency of small-scale production.…

I wanted to engage with this but I'm having a hard time getting past: the internet almost certainly improved the viability of social economic systems by a factor of 10 or so Certainly for me, arbitrary, dimensionless quantification of an essentially unmeasurable factor casts the rest of your post in a bad light. Still, basic income isn't entirely good: it denies people the ability to meet a basic need - that of being…

There's nothing about basic income that prevents working. In general, having more money gives people better options. For example, it can make it more practical to go back to school, or to take a rewarding but low-paying job such as teaching.

On the margin, there may be people who choose not to work. For example, they may decide that staying home to raise the kids is a better choice than a job that's barely worth it. Businesses might need to pay people somewhat more or treat their employees somewhat better to fill positions. I don't see how this is a bad thing.

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#43

Post by TeMPOraL » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:24 PM UTC

scrumper wrote: post #39

jjoonathan wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a lie and it is insulting to expect that it will slip past most people (it's a "some of the people all of the time" lie). I agree with everything except your last sentence. Some alternatives to socialism: * basic income * putting teeth back in overtime laws and shortening the workweek * "Communes" that arise naturally as the rising cost of rent-seeking exceeds the falling inefficiency of small-scale production.…

I wanted to engage with this but I'm having a hard time getting past: the internet almost certainly improved the viability of social economic systems by a factor of 10 or so Certainly for me, arbitrary, dimensionless quantification of an essentially unmeasurable factor casts the rest of your post in a bad light. Still, basic income isn't entirely good: it denies people the ability to meet a basic need - that of being…

> In other words, it replaces the good feeling of doing honest work with a kind of glorified unemployment benefit. While it would be good culturally (by allowing those of an artistic bent to pursue their craft, for example), it's not going to do much for the mental well-being of most of those laid-off factory workers.

We need to move away from the meme that your 'honest work' determines your worth. It was very instrumental in the past, so it's not a surprise we've integrated it culturally, but it makes no sense in a post-scarcity world. Humans do have a need to do something worthwhile, but it doesn't necessarily have to be put inside the current "slave away your life for the right to live" framework of jobs.

Come to think of it, how much of that "good feeling of doing honest work" do people have today, when more and more are employed doing bullshit jobs that are artifacts of various zero-sum games existing in our economic system?

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#44

Post by TeMPOraL » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:27 PM UTC

6d0debc071 wrote: post #29

kokey wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am starting enjoy imagining what would happen. Without much thinking people worry first about people losing their mundane jobs to machines, and the machine owners making bigger profits. The variables to consider run much wider than that, for example this will allow manufacturers to make the cost of their goods much lower, and undercutting that of other manufacturers. Socially owned factories will have limited value…

> The manufactured goods will also need buyers, there's no end game where someone replaces all the workers with machines and then try to sell the output to... machines? If I were an evil factory owner, then I would replace my workers with machines and sell the produce of my factory to those providing the raw materials and to those owning other factories that produced goods that I wanted. It wouldn't be a matter of se…

A closed market system that will likely get smaller in time, or even eventually devoid of humans altogether. It's not hard to imagine that at some point the feedback loop will close over the automated economy and it will be able to function on its own, without any input from humans.

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#45

Post by TeMPOraL » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:33 PM UTC

dothething wrote: post #12

It must be much more fascinating to imagine machines managing everyday life than to imagine the societal complications that will result. I've seen like 3-4 of these machines do it all posts and nothing to examine what people will do. It's a bit silly to imagine everyone suddenly becoming creative and entrepreneurial - of the people I know and the people I see they are such a small minority.

What people will do? Probably finally get around all those things they really want to do but they don't have time because of their job and commute. People are generally creative and have dreams - even those who one would dismiss as dumb/lazy. It usually takes talking to them to discover it.

INB4: I don't believe people would sit all day in front of TV/Netflix - it's a kind of thing you do because after 8+ hours of working, some commute, making dinner and stuff you're really too tired to do anything else.

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#46

Post by mlvljr » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:40 PM UTC

oliveira12345 wrote: post #5

"Yet rather than putting people out of work, this will supposedly free them up for more creative, skilled tasks, rather than subjecting them to menial, low-skilled work" This is a lie. It pretends that the factory owner will continue to pay the wages of existing employees and also the acquisition-and-maintenance of new CPS machines. Simply a lie. It pretends that the employees will be free "for more creative skilled…

Let the people own the machines, and the promise will be fulfilled :)

[requires socialism, indeed, and having been there, I vote yes -- with both hands, if this is about V 2.0]

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#47

Post by dragonwriter » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:41 PM UTC

scrumper wrote: post #39

jjoonathan wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a lie and it is insulting to expect that it will slip past most people (it's a "some of the people all of the time" lie). I agree with everything except your last sentence. Some alternatives to socialism: * basic income * putting teeth back in overtime laws and shortening the workweek * "Communes" that arise naturally as the rising cost of rent-seeking exceeds the falling inefficiency of small-scale production.…

I wanted to engage with this but I'm having a hard time getting past: the internet almost certainly improved the viability of social economic systems by a factor of 10 or so Certainly for me, arbitrary, dimensionless quantification of an essentially unmeasurable factor casts the rest of your post in a bad light. Still, basic income isn't entirely good: it denies people the ability to meet a basic need - that of being…

> Still, basic income isn't entirely good: it denies people the ability to meet a basic need - that of being valued for their contribution to society or some other enterprise.

No, it doesn't. Basic income does not prohibit people from working and being paid for their work; in fact, one of the arguments for BI is that it among the things it can replace is the minimum wage, allowing work that has positive value but which is not viable in an environment with a minimum wage to be done. Including, e.g., jobs that have a low short-term net value to the employer because they have a high investment in training, but which also prepare people for the higher-paying jobs which are available in society.

> In other words, it replaces the good feeling of doing honest work with a kind of glorified unemployment benefit.

BI is not anything like an unemployment benefit. Particularly, because you don't have to be unemployed to get it, and because it doesn't have the behavioral testing associated with unemployment insurance.

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#48

Post by dragonwriter » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:44 PM UTC

phkahler wrote: post #20

jjoonathan wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is a lie and it is insulting to expect that it will slip past most people (it's a "some of the people all of the time" lie). I agree with everything except your last sentence. Some alternatives to socialism: * basic income * putting teeth back in overtime laws and shortening the workweek * "Communes" that arise naturally as the rising cost of rent-seeking exceeds the falling inefficiency of small-scale production.…

How about Less People. Most of the worlds problems would be reduced with fewer people. This is only a partial solution if you think about it.

> How about Less People. Most of the worlds problems would be reduced with fewer people.

Less people is not a policy, its a policy outcome.

(IIRC, the evidence suggest that the best policy to get fewer people and reduce natural rate of population increase is stronger social safety nets that reduce people's reliance on family -- usually children -- for security against financial misfortune. So, actually, the things discussed upthread like BI might reasonably be seen as likely to contribute to "less people".)

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#49

Post by HeyLaughingBoy » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:44 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #40

nine_k wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because these same people pay them money. If you're a producer, your first and foremost care is your consumer. If the great majority of people cannot afford to buy what your machines produce, your market is very narrow. If every producer's market is narrow, there's not enough wealth on it, and they are suddenly poor, too. This is why most producers, especially huge corporations, go to great lengths to lower prices fo…

> If you're a producer, your first and foremost care is your consumer. No, this is not true, and it's pretty clear everywhere you look. If you're a producer, your first and foremost care is money , not your consumer. Sure, appealing to your customers is a good way to get that money, but it's not the only one . Why do you think that, to pick just one example, companies put so much malware on the computers they sell? B…

You're both correct, but coming at it from different levels. Most manufacturing businesses build things for other manufacturing businesses. In that light, the producer's first care is the "consumer" because his consumer isn't a person; it's another business. As long as that other business is profitable, the guy upstream can get paid and that's his primary concern.

It's only once you get to the factories building actual "consumer goods" that you see the real concern over "who is going to buy this."

The funny thing is that I spend a lot of time on a forum mainly populated by owners of small factories and I see this come up from time to time. The guys (and they're mostly owners & workers at small manufacturing businesses) are concerned about too much automation having an impact on society, but by far their primary concern is making sure that they automate enough to stay in business and be profitable. After all, it's their kids being able to eat that they're going to be mainly concerned with.

Re: What the Fourth Industrial Revolution Looks Like

#50

Post by YokoZar » Tue, Apr 14, 2015, 4:45 PM UTC

phkahler wrote: post #17

oliveira12345 wrote: post #5

"Yet rather than putting people out of work, this will supposedly free them up for more creative, skilled tasks, rather than subjecting them to menial, low-skilled work" This is a lie. It pretends that the factory owner will continue to pay the wages of existing employees and also the acquisition-and-maintenance of new CPS machines. Simply a lie. It pretends that the employees will be free "for more creative skilled…

The best way I've found to explain the lie is this: The business owner is not stupid. He knows that TCO (total cost of ownership) of automated production systems is cheaper than manual labor. This means that the total cost of paying for design, installation, operation, and maintenance is lower than manual production labor. Got that? It costs less to pay the "high skilled" workers than the lower skilled ones - because…

The first industrial revolution was entirely about replacing high-skilled manual laborers with relatively low-skilled factory workers. There's no inherent economic law requiring such a shift to be a net drain on employment - sometimes 100 people manning power looms can do something cheaper than 90 skilled weavers.

Sometimes not, though: the clothes end up just being cheaper as a result and net employment in the clothing industry drops, but if there's anything resembling competition in the market there'll be a drop in prices, and now everyone who was buying clothes will create a bit more aggregate demand for other things. That's the "work in other sectors of the economy" part that occasionally gets mentioned as a solution, and is in large part why we're at 95% employment despite 4 centuries of "job-killing" innovation.