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If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

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Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#451

Post by xmcqdpt2 »

CyanLite2 wrote: post #403
ashleyn wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This argument hinges rather strongly on whether or not AI is going to create a broad, durable, and lasting unemployment effect. Tractors did not cause this phenomenon because jevons paradox kicked in and induced demand rendered the problem moot, or demand eventually exceeded what mere tractors were capable of doing for agricultural productivity. The same can probably be said for contemporary AI, but it's tough to tel…

I think you're basing AI only on modern 2025 LLMs. If there is a magnitude increase in compute (TPUs, NPUs, etc) over the next 3-5 years then even marginal increases in LLM usability will take white collar jobs. If there is an exponential increase in power (fusion) and compute (quantum) combined with improvements in robotics and you're in the territory where humans can entirely be replaced in all industries (blue col…

OTOH if there is worldwide catastrophic economic collapse due to climate change none of these things will get built.

In French we say "With "ifs" you can put Paris in a bottle."

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#452

Post by h2zizzle »

jlawson wrote: post #401
immibis wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The wrong decision wasn't using productivity enhancers - it was building a society around the idea that everyone MUST have a job, even in the presence of substantial productivity enhancers which massively decrease the number of jobs. We've scraped by so far... so far.

The problem is that for the vast majority of people to be psychologically healthy they must have a job. This isn't a societal decision, it's a reality about how humans are. The alternative is like feeding an animal instead of letting it live the lifestyle it's adapted for. That helps it in the moment but over time its capacities atrophy and it ends up weakened, twisted and harmed with nothing to spend its natural ins…

I would wager that more jobs accelerate psychological and physiological issues than, say, volunteering or unemployment with active community engagement do. At the very least, the psychological benefits of unemployment are objectively an incidental side-effect of its actual purpose, which is labor for a profitable enterprise. That is to say that employment is still "functional" if it generates that labor even while destroying someone's psychological health. If that health is paramount, the structure of employment probably needs to change in order to privilege health over productivity, even to productivity's detriment. Otherwise, the vast majority of people would be better off with some other institution.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#453

Post by notyourwork »

CyanLite2 wrote: post #403
ashleyn wrote: post #366

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This argument hinges rather strongly on whether or not AI is going to create a broad, durable, and lasting unemployment effect. Tractors did not cause this phenomenon because jevons paradox kicked in and induced demand rendered the problem moot, or demand eventually exceeded what mere tractors were capable of doing for agricultural productivity. The same can probably be said for contemporary AI, but it's tough to tel…

I think you're basing AI only on modern 2025 LLMs. If there is a magnitude increase in compute (TPUs, NPUs, etc) over the next 3-5 years then even marginal increases in LLM usability will take white collar jobs. If there is an exponential increase in power (fusion) and compute (quantum) combined with improvements in robotics and you're in the territory where humans can entirely be replaced in all industries (blue col…

Where does all the power come from? Compute increases have to has sustainable power source and we don’t have that.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#454

Post by 9rx »

dystopiandevel wrote: post #445
testbjjl wrote: post #410

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Tractors replaced a task in specific fields, farming, construction largely. AI seems to have the potential to cover more territory. The potential blast radius is greater.

Agricultural jobs accounted for more than 80% of the preindustrial workforce. Granted you still needed people to maintain the jobs and some roles weren't entirely replaced or replaceable. I wonder how the two compare. I will say that AI has the opportunity to affect many lines of work which makes it scary for many.

80% was peak agriculture, but involvement was already in decline before the tractor. Necessarily so — nobody would have had time to create the tractor if they were still busy toiling in the field. The tractor was the final death knell, I suppose, but only around 40% of the workforce was involved in agriculture by the time the tractor started showing up on farms.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#455

Post by ororoo »

jlawson wrote: post #395
dymk wrote: post #391

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s a matter of where you get your taxes from. Plenty of corporations can afford to pay a more fair share. And studies on basic income have so far shown it to be effective.

Studies on basic income have shown that it's harmful to the people who receive it. They report no improvements on any measured outcome. Not lower stress, not more education, not better health. They work a bit less but that doesn't help them or their kids. Over the long term it harms them because their productive skills, values, and emotional capacities atrophy away from lack of use.

"Final verdict on Finland's basic income trial: More happiness but little employment effect"

https://yle.fi/a/3-11337944 https://www.helsinki.fi/en/news/fair-society/universal-basic...

so basic income caused more happiness, less stress. but those are not profitable things, so, no basic income in finland.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#456

Post by haizhung »

legacynl wrote: post #337
haizhung wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Very well put. I am working on tooling that will likely increase developer productivity by a large factor; and will most likely be used to lay off more developers as their labor is no longer required. I often ask myself whether that is ethical or not. But in the end, it’s not the tooling that’s unethical. Productivity increases are good for everyone, under normal circumstances. It’s the fact that all the gains are be…

> I often ask myself whether that is ethical or not. But in the end, it’s not the tooling that’s unethical. Productivity increases are good for everyone, under normal circumstances. So if I'm reading your comment right, you think it would be ethical under normal circumstances, but also believe we don't live under those normal circumstances? In that case i think the answer you're looking for is: it is not ethical to d…

Interesting take. Not that I disagree, but it’s interesting to see that on HN.

Wouldn’t that mean that it’s unethical to work on anything that improves productivity? AI, in particular?

As long as (almost) all the benefits/wealth generated by your work is captured by the 0.1%?

Because that’s the case right now.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#457

Post by AndrewKemendo »

zwnow wrote: post #416
AndrewKemendo wrote: post #402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nobody needs to kill anyone, people will just stop having kids which is what’s happening

Whats with the people already alive? If u continuously replace them with AI u need to support them in case of their inability to provide for themselves. Im afraid the worldwide available social security nets in place aren't made for withstanding this kind of unemployment.

They’ll have to adapt like every other generation has had to

My grandmother was born in 1924 and died in 2019 please appreciate how much change she had to adapt to over that period

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#458

Post by johnebgd »

twodave wrote: post #424
lelandfe wrote: post #408

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> technological unemployment is not something that will be sudden or obvious I already have friends experiencing technological unemployment. Programmers suddenly need backup plans. Several designers I know are changing careers. Not to mention, the voiceover artist profession will probably cease to exist besides this last batch of known voices. Writer, editor - these were dependable careers for friends, once. A friend…

People keep trying to tie these two things together, forgetting the fact that ZIRP also ended 3 years ago, and that combined with the end of the COVID-era employer credits are when the layoffs really began. I won't say LLMs are having no impact at all on employment, but not to the degree where the job pool has dried up. Companies were encouraged to over-hire for years, and now that the free money is gone, they're act…

The mishandling of how they rewrote section 174 of the tax code also caused a lot of layoffs of developers.

Re: If AI replaces workers, should it also pay taxes?

#460

Post by notyourwork »

9dev wrote: post #346
dns_snek wrote: post #221

It feels really alien to discuss this in terms of "taxing AI", like an economic abstraction completely breaking down. Ultimately when you take automation to its logical conclusion we have people with needs and we have machines and automation capable of meeting those needs with minimal human labor. No matter how you try to resolve this economically, it should hold that if something can be produced with minimal human l…

You're completely omitting externalised cost, though. As it stands, all this production requires gargantuan amounts of energy that have to come from somewhere, and cause pollution and waste that must be accounted for. As long as these factors aren't solved—if they can be solved in the first place—either the prices for consumers or the manufacturing cost must reflect this, I don't see the increased degree automation a…

Thank you, I keep reading these discussions and rarely see anyone touch on power and environmental factors.
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