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Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

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Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#61

Post by gnaritas »

witty_username wrote: post #44
coralreef wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to achieve social welfare goals why not use NIT (negative income tax) or less preferably, UBI (universal basic income)? The money for this would have to come from somewhere. Thus it makes sense to tax the biggest beneficiaries, the capital owners who permanently replaced workers with machines. They're paying because they're gaining the most. The world population is something like ~7.5 billion people. Ever…

> The money for this would have to come from somewhere. Thus it makes sense to tax the biggest beneficiaries, the capital owners who permanently replaced workers with machines. They're paying because they're gaining the most. How do you know they're gaining the most? That depends on the relative elasticities. Economics is not zero-sum. Even the unemployed people will gain in the long-term as the gains trickle down an…

People aren't an economic game. Society has a pace at which it can absorb change, and a pace at which change is too fast causing too much harm to too many people. I agree with you that BI or a negative income tax is a good option for distribution, however that money does have to come from somewhere and he's correct, those benefiting the most financially from automation are the ones who are keeping the gains that used to be salaries paid out to employees they no longer have.

Is that the best way to find the money, taxing progress? I don't think so either, but it's not at all irrational, though it is a bit indirect. I'd much prefer just taxing wealth directly, not income, wealth. In either case, heavier taxes on the wealthy in whatever means they come is preferable to the degradation of society at large due to mass unemployment which will lead to social unrest and eventually war.

Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#62

Post by gnaritas »

witty_username wrote: post #31
coralreef wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Depends how many human calculators lost their jobs. If it was a big part of society, then it may have been a good idea.

Why? In the long-term disruptions and changes in jobs are part of the changes in the world. These people are unemployed temporarily and will lose some wages in the short-term but in the long term they will benefit from technological changes. Taxing innovation is bad. If you want to achieve social welfare goals why not use NIT (negative income tax) or less preferably, UBI (universal basic income)? Why should people us…

> In the long-term disruptions and changes in jobs are part of the changes in the world.

By the way, that's a terrible argument. You may as well call it the naturalistic fallacy. That it's a natural consequence of progress does not make it good. You ask why... because it's painful to large parts of society, that's why.

> Taxing innovation is bad.

So is mass unemployment, in fact it's much worse than taxing innovation.

Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#63

Post by dbg31415 »

frik wrote: post #51
dopeboy wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That piqued my curiosity - didn't know that. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MSN_Dial-up

Video of The Microsoft Network - 1995 advertisement video with young Jennifer Aniston actress: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGYcNcFhctc&t=17m44s

And Matthew Perry!

But seriously... angry dudes talking about music nuances without realizing that sarcasm doesn't translate over typing, and cat photos. Things haven't changed that much...

Until you watch about 30 seconds here... remember this is a MARKETING video. Ha, wow that's changed... a lot. Can you imagine any marketing video today going into technical detail like this?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGYcNcFhctc&t=44m30s

Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#64

Post by witty_username »

majewsky wrote: post #53
witty_username wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If there's no way to invent jobs then we've reached an utopia where robots do everything.

Which is a dystopia if any large number of people don't have enough income to pay for their basic needs.

If there's no need for jobs then that means robots are doing everything and so everything is cheap. That means the small nominal income becomes a large real income.

Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#65

Post by witty_username »

coralreef wrote: post #48
witty_username wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The money for this would have to come from somewhere. Thus it makes sense to tax the biggest beneficiaries, the capital owners who permanently replaced workers with machines. They're paying because they're gaining the most. How do you know they're gaining the most? That depends on the relative elasticities. Economics is not zero-sum. Even the unemployed people will gain in the long-term as the gains trickle down an…

How do you know they're gaining the most? Because profits go up, but wages are stagnant. Corporations are increasingly cutting benefits, pensions, and treating employees as contractors and outsourcing. Millennials today are poorer than their parents were. This is the age we live in, profit maximization over everything else. The rich got richer, but the middle class and poor haven't seen any of these gains. Why should…

> Because profits go up, but wages are stagnant. Corporations are increasingly cutting benefits, pensions, and treating employees as contractors and outsourcing. Millennials today are poorer than their parents were. This is the age we live in, profit maximization over everything else. The rich got richer, but the middle class and poor haven't seen any of these gains. Why should anyone believe that anything would change otherwise?

CPI (a measure of living cost--note that living standards increase)-adjusted hourly wages have increased 8% in the past decade. That's not that good, but we're looking at one of the richest countries in the world.

But PPP (measure of purchasing power) adjusted GNI per capita in the U.S. has increased by 25% in the past decade.

If you look at India (where huge portion of the world lives), PPP adjusted GNI per capita has doubled from 2003-2013. You'll probably retort "that's just numbers", but I live in India ;)

Similarly PPP adjusted GNI per capita has increased greatly in most poor countries.

> This is the age we live in, profit maximization over everything else.

In which age people don't want more money? Corporations are owned by shareholder who are people who want to make more money like everybody. Obviously, they will profit maximize.

> If the only jobs available are low paying with terrible conditions, then that's not a society you want to live in.

You misunderstood my point; I mean that automation increases real wages thus creating jobs.

> Its convenient to hide behind the economic theories

Haha, the good ol' economist bashing.

Those stupid eCONomists with their statist-tricks who just play around with graphs. /s

Kind of ironical when you hear HNers talk about supporting science w.r.t climate change but when it's economics suddenly many are the opposite. I guess people only support science when it confirms their priors.

Economics is a real science just like physics, mathematics, etc. Papers are published with statistical rigor and empirical testing. Indeed, economics is complex and counter-intuitive because the world isn't simple.

Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#66

Post by coralreef »

witty_username wrote: post #65
coralreef wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know they're gaining the most? Because profits go up, but wages are stagnant. Corporations are increasingly cutting benefits, pensions, and treating employees as contractors and outsourcing. Millennials today are poorer than their parents were. This is the age we live in, profit maximization over everything else. The rich got richer, but the middle class and poor haven't seen any of these gains. Why should…

> Because profits go up, but wages are stagnant. Corporations are increasingly cutting benefits, pensions, and treating employees as contractors and outsourcing. Millennials today are poorer than their parents were. This is the age we live in, profit maximization over everything else. The rich got richer, but the middle class and poor haven't seen any of these gains. Why should anyone believe that anything would chan…

Actually my bachelor's is in economics, I'm not against it, nor am I against technology. Economics is a study of the behavior of people, and people aren't numbers, so there is a bit of an art to it (but that's another discussion). What we mean is you can't just use the theory and assume the world will happily follow it.

In the US, real wages and purchasing power have been falling: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2014/10/09/for-most-wor...

Places like China and India have obviously gained the most because their industrialization is just now.

Like another comment said, societies aren't just lines on a graph, they can only handle so much change at once. Its important to think about the people being affected, rather than just assume they fall into place.

Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#68

Post by witty_username »

coralreef wrote: post #66
witty_username wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Because profits go up, but wages are stagnant. Corporations are increasingly cutting benefits, pensions, and treating employees as contractors and outsourcing. Millennials today are poorer than their parents were. This is the age we live in, profit maximization over everything else. The rich got richer, but the middle class and poor haven't seen any of these gains. Why should anyone believe that anything would chan…

Actually my bachelor's is in economics, I'm not against it, nor am I against technology. Economics is a study of the behavior of people, and people aren't numbers, so there is a bit of an art to it (but that's another discussion). What we mean is you can't just use the theory and assume the world will happily follow it. In the US, real wages and purchasing power have been falling: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank…

> In the US, real wages and purchasing power have been falling

Where did you get the idea that real wages are falling? Even that graph seems to contradict what you're saying.

I used BLS data to compute an 8% increase in hourly wages CPI (cost of living)-adjusted from 2007 to 2017.

> Economics is a study of the behavior of people, and people aren't numbers

Yes, but that's useless. Atoms aren't numbers but we model them with numbers. You can't do anything with an abstract notion of "person".

> What we mean is you can't just use the theory and assume the world will happily follow it.

You haven't said why the theory is wrong. You can say the exact same thing about evolution. "You can't just use the theory of evolution and assume the world will happily follow it."

> rather than just assume they fall into place.

I'm not assuming they fall in place; I'm giving reasons why they will benefit in the long-term.

With regards to the original submission, see https://www.reddit.com/r/badeconomics/comments/5uo9p3/bill_g... and https://www.reddit.com/r/badeconomics/comments/5uoowk/beatin... .

Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#69

Post by witty_username »

gnaritas wrote: post #60
coralreef wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know they're gaining the most? Because profits go up, but wages are stagnant. Corporations are increasingly cutting benefits, pensions, and treating employees as contractors and outsourcing. Millennials today are poorer than their parents were. This is the age we live in, profit maximization over everything else. The rich got richer, but the middle class and poor haven't seen any of these gains. Why should…

> They will need to be retrained and educated. And that's not even always possible. People who are easily replaced by robots aren't going to suddenly start building those robots; it's likely above their intellectual ceiling. As low skilled jobs are replaced by fewer and fewer high skilled jobs, low skilled workers will be left permanently out in the cold. Education can be a solution generationally, but the notion tha…

See lump of labour fallacy.

No, they can still build robots inefficiently at low wages. And thanks to the heavy automation their real wage would be decent.

> older person is going to suddenly go back to school to learn a new trade is simply not how people in general work.

What if they have good incentives to go back to school?

Re: Bill Gates Wants to Tax Robots

#70

Post by majewsky »

witty_username wrote: post #64
majewsky wrote: post #53

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is a dystopia if any large number of people don't have enough income to pay for their basic needs.

If there's no need for jobs then that means robots are doing everything and so everything is cheap. That means the small nominal income becomes a large real income.

But where's the "small nominal income" coming from if there are no jobs? UBI?
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