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The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

cnn.com

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Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#831

Post by rglover »

simonsarris wrote: post #465

I think the real white collar bloodbath is that the end of ZIRP was the end of infinite software job postings, and the start of layoffs. I think its easy to now point to AI, but it seems like a canard for the huge thing that already happened. just look at this: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1JmOr In terms of magnitude the effect of this is just enormous and still being felt, and never recovered to pre-2020 lev…

IMO this is dead on. AI is a hell of a scapegoat for companies that want to save face and pretend that their success wasn't because of cheap money being pumped into them. And in a world addicted to status games, that's a gift from the heavens.

Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#832

Post by throwaway314155 »

absurdo wrote: post #770
infinitebit wrote: post #552

So glad to see a MSM outlet take the words of an AI ceo with even a single grain of salt. I’ve been really disappointed with the way so many publications have just been breathlessly repeating what is essentially a sales pitch. (ftr i’m not even taking a side re: is AI going to take all the jobs. regardless of what happens the fact remains that the reporting has been absolute sh*t on this. i guess “the singularity is…

HN does the same. We don’t really have a platform on the internet for good discussions so we mostly get regurgitated talking points and a lot of flags/downvotes if it’s deemed a serious enough issue (f.e. pandemic) that taking a contrary stance is strictly forbidden.

Case in point ^

Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#834

Post by rglover »

mjburgess wrote: post #198
swyx wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

its not part of the conversation because the influence here is tangential at best (1) and your sense of how much vc money is on the table at any given time is not good (2). 1a. most seed/A stage investing is acyclical because it is not really about timing for exits, people just always need dry powder 1b. tech advancement is definitely acyclical - alexnet, transformers, and gpt were all just done by very small teams w…

I'm not seeing how you're replying to this comment. I'm not sure you've understood their point. The point is that there's a correlation between macroeconomic dynamics (ie., the price of credit increasing) and the "rise of AI". In ordinary times, absent AI, the macroeconomic dynamics would fully explain the economic shifts we're seeing. So the question is why do we event need to mention AI in our explanation of recent…

Social media. Especially in SV, the embarrassment of failing publicly having been given so much money is far too painful psychologically.

Spinning that to say you're a "visionary" for replacing expensive employees with AI (even when it's clear we're not there yet) is risky, but a good enough smoke screen to distract the average bear from poking holes in your financials.

Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#835

Post by antithesizer »

tdeck wrote: post #416

Maybe someone can help me wrap my head around this in a different way, because here's how I see it. If these tools are really making people so productive, shouldn't it be painfully obvious in companies' output? For example, if these AI coding tools were an amazing productivity boost in the end, we'd expect to see software companies shipping features and fixes faster than ever before. There would be a huge burst in in…

Before enterprise AI systems are allowed to spread their wings, first they need to support existing processes. Once they're able to generate the same customer-facing results relatively autonomously, then they'll have the opportunity to improve those results. So the first place to look for their impact is, I'd wager, cost-cutting. So watch those quarterly earnings reports.

Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#836

Post by jt2190 »

simonsarris wrote: post #465

I think the real white collar bloodbath is that the end of ZIRP was the end of infinite software job postings, and the start of layoffs. I think its easy to now point to AI, but it seems like a canard for the huge thing that already happened. just look at this: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1JmOr In terms of magnitude the effect of this is just enormous and still being felt, and never recovered to pre-2020 lev…

It’s a shame that this is the top comment because it’s backward looking (“here’s why white-collar workers lost their jobs in the last year”) instead of looking forward and noticing that even if interest rates are reduced back to zero these jobs will not be performed by humans ever again. THAT is the message here. These workers need to retrain and move on.

Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#837

Post by SR2Z »

jt2190 wrote: post #836
simonsarris wrote: post #465

I think the real white collar bloodbath is that the end of ZIRP was the end of infinite software job postings, and the start of layoffs. I think its easy to now point to AI, but it seems like a canard for the huge thing that already happened. just look at this: https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/?g=1JmOr In terms of magnitude the effect of this is just enormous and still being felt, and never recovered to pre-2020 lev…

It’s a shame that this is the top comment because it’s backward looking (“here’s why white-collar workers lost their jobs in the last year”) instead of looking forward and noticing that even if interest rates are reduced back to zero these jobs will not be performed by humans ever again. THAT is the message here. These workers need to retrain and move on.

> even if interest rates are reduced back to zero these jobs will not be performed by humans ever again

It's not like companies laid off whole functions. These jobs will continue to be performed by humans - ZIRP just changes the number of humans and how much they get paid.

> These workers need to retrain and move on.

They only need to "retrain" insofar as they keep up with the current standards and practices. Software engineers are not going anywhere.

Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#838

Post by 0xbadcafebee »

tdeck wrote: post #416

Maybe someone can help me wrap my head around this in a different way, because here's how I see it. If these tools are really making people so productive, shouldn't it be painfully obvious in companies' output? For example, if these AI coding tools were an amazing productivity boost in the end, we'd expect to see software companies shipping features and fixes faster than ever before. There would be a huge burst in in…

Productivity results in increased profit, not necessarily output. They don't need to innovate, make new products, or improve things. They just need to make their shit cheaper so their profit margin is higher. If you can just keep churning out more money, there is no need to improve anything.

Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#839

Post by DenisM »

ccorcos wrote: post #450
janalsncm wrote: post #356

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don’t like this argument because 1) it doesn’t address the social consequences of rapid onset and large scale unemployment and 2) there is no law of nature that a job lost here creates a new job there. On the first point, unemployment during the Great Depression was “only” 30%. And those people were eventually able to find other jobs. Here, we are talking about permanent unemployment for even larger numbers of peop…

What makes you so concerned about rapid onset of we haven’t seen any significant change in the (USA) unemployment rate? And there are some laws of nature that are relevant such as supply-demand economics. Technology often makes things cheaper which unlocks more demand. For example, I’m sure many small businesses would love to build custom software to help them operate but it’s too expensive.

It’s an interesting argument, thanks.

A good analogy would be web development transition from c to java to php to Wordpress. I feel like it did make web sites creation for small business more accessible. OTOH a parallel trend was also mass-scale production of industry-specific platforms, such as Yahoo Shopping.

It’s not clear to me which trend won in the end.

Re: The ‘white-collar bloodbath’ is all part of the AI hype machine

#840

Post by marcosdumay »

tdeck wrote: post #416

Maybe someone can help me wrap my head around this in a different way, because here's how I see it. If these tools are really making people so productive, shouldn't it be painfully obvious in companies' output? For example, if these AI coding tools were an amazing productivity boost in the end, we'd expect to see software companies shipping features and fixes faster than ever before. There would be a huge burst in in…

I don't think extra productivity in software development ever reflected in established companies building things faster.

The more likely scenario is that if those tools make developer so much more productive, we would see a large surge in new companies, with 1 to 3 developers creating things that were deemed too hard for them to do.

But it's still possible that we didn't give people enough time yet.

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