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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

#91

Post by terryf »

edblarney wrote: post #21
torpfactory wrote: post #12

I think we are destined for a future of political and social instability in the world if we continue to define labor and its compensation as we do now. We currently don't have a social understanding for navigating a world where little human labor is required. The resentment of the winners (capital owners) by the losers (jobless masses) may lead to great upheaval, to be harnessed by willing politicians of short-sighte…

"We currently don't have a social understanding for navigating a world where little human labor is required" Yes we do. The industrial revolution had far greater impact on labour than any of this mysterious AI will ever have. The first 'machines' powered by coal etc. instantly 'unemployed' hundreds of people per unit. Go ahead and look at the productivity/capita charts for the early 19th century - UK citizens were mu…

> tell me which people you know, in which industries, have outright 'lost their jobs' due to some AI or machine?

I have literally seen a room full of people that lost their jobs because of software I wrote (admittedly, not alone, but still). The software was almost ready by that point and it was quite a disturbing experience that still bothers me up to this day to be honest.

It had nothing to do with AI and was quite a long time ago, but I still remember it very vividly.

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

#92

Post by cm2187 »

tmnvix wrote: post #2

One upside to automation is that comparative advantage with regard to labour costs becomes much less important. This means that manufacturers can more easily afford to keep production in high wage economies. There are other considerations of course, such as proximity to resources, transport hubs, and markets. Ultimately though, this doesn't change the fact that automation is mostly beneficial to capital owners and no…

> Ultimately though, this doesn't change the fact that automation is mostly beneficial to capital owners

I think that inequality will increase but not because of owning capital. Rather because this automation will shift demand away from unskilled workers and into software developers, marketing experts, etc. And I do not think that the supply of skilled worker can adapt fast enough, if any.

The good news (for the US) is that China will be the main casualty. In a way the US has already largely paid this tax to automation by outsourcing factory jobs to China. It is chinese factory workers that are going to be automated the first. Some low skilled jobs that couldn't be outsourced offshore like construction, taxis, etc will suffer but I'd argue a large part of the impact is behind us.

Obviously the tax paid to outsourcing is also having Trump at the white house.

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

#93

Post by warmwaffles »

remir wrote: post #25

Self-driving cars and robots replacing factory workers are obviously just the beginning. How about computers that can program themselves? How about machines that can think and create like we do (and better)? We approach 2017, we know climate change is a real threat, we know automation is going to be a big problem, we know we're consuming the world's resources at an alarming rate and there's 7.5 billion people on this…

Time to invest in firearms. Apocalypse is near.

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

#94

Post by dispose13432 »

remir wrote: post #25

Self-driving cars and robots replacing factory workers are obviously just the beginning. How about computers that can program themselves? How about machines that can think and create like we do (and better)? We approach 2017, we know climate change is a real threat, we know automation is going to be a big problem, we know we're consuming the world's resources at an alarming rate and there's 7.5 billion people on this…

>How about computers that can program themselves

We've done that. Starting with the first language after Assembly.

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

#95

Post by cm2187 »

terryf wrote: post #91
edblarney wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We currently don't have a social understanding for navigating a world where little human labor is required" Yes we do. The industrial revolution had far greater impact on labour than any of this mysterious AI will ever have. The first 'machines' powered by coal etc. instantly 'unemployed' hundreds of people per unit. Go ahead and look at the productivity/capita charts for the early 19th century - UK citizens were mu…

> tell me which people you know, in which industries, have outright 'lost their jobs' due to some AI or machine? I have literally seen a room full of people that lost their jobs because of software I wrote (admittedly, not alone, but still). The software was almost ready by that point and it was quite a disturbing experience that still bothers me up to this day to be honest. It had nothing to do with AI and was quite…

Losing their job is a violent and unpleasant process but a sort of necessary one as a society. I have seen that first hand many times. It forces people to reconsider their career, move to another more promising industry, move to another city or another country. That's how the economy adapts to change and resources are allocated efficiently.

What I have seen often too is bankers wealthy enough to be able to live on their savings for a long time, and therefore not willing to reconsider their career. And as a result staying unemployed for a long time before coming to the conclusion that they need to do something else.

I'm not saying this is fun and that I wouldn't mind going through it myself but this is capitalist's creative destruction at work. Not something you should feel particularly bad about.

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

#96

Post by cm2187 »

edblarney wrote: post #90
cm2187 wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I agree with your main point (that this is a small increment to the industrial revolution), but two objections: > tell me which people you know, in which industries, have outright 'lost their jobs' due to some AI or machine Right now AI is still a future technology. The current AI algorithms are the equivalent of the early GSM phones, which looked like car batteries, very far from modern smartphones. But it is reason…

" But it is reasonable to expect that they will get better, and it is reasonable to expect that we will be able to emulate the brain with transistors and on a much bigger scale some days." No, it's not reasonable to assume they will emulate brains. Not even the experts are saying that. They're not trying to emulate brains at all.

I was under the impression that neural networks are inspired by the brain. And as we understand how the brain works better, it is obvious that we will be replicating it mechanically.

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

#97

Post by visarga »

smallnamespace wrote: post #72
visarga wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Economies of scale have been the bread and butter of progress in the last 100 years, but we're entering the age of customization now. Adaptive technologies can work on small scale as well as on large scale. And large scale can still be achieved by coops that provide services for many people at once. People do have capital and resources, it's just spread and divided. What we need is to organize. I give self-replicatin…

Even if everyone has their own replicator, the competition shifts to who controls raw materials, and who controls energy. Fresh water, for example, is a scarce (and becoming scarcer) resource, and it's impossible to farm or live without it.

I agree. That's why capitalists owning automation should pay UBI - because they get to use raw materials.

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

#98

Post by alkonaut »

I'm not sure what everyone is so afraid of? There will be tensions and a political problem about redistribution if "simple" jobs dry up, sure, but isn't automation a good thing regardless? It means we make more stuff withuot putting in more effort.

Automation and industrialization over the last 150 years already meant we went from 120h weeks on farms to 40h weeks in offices and factories, while living standards increased. Measured in 40h/week jobs per person that means we lost 2 of 3 jobs in the industrialization! The world didn't end. And now everyone is worried that if we go from 40 to 30h or 20h weeks that will be a disaster?

We can't afford to have a large fraction of the people unemployed and the rest still working 40h weeks in ever fewer jobs of course, but that's a problem societies will hopefully solve.

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

#99

Post by ab5tract »

clock_tower wrote: post #26
torpfactory wrote: post #12

I think we are destined for a future of political and social instability in the world if we continue to define labor and its compensation as we do now. We currently don't have a social understanding for navigating a world where little human labor is required. The resentment of the winners (capital owners) by the losers (jobless masses) may lead to great upheaval, to be harnessed by willing politicians of short-sighte…

Are you familiar with potlatch society in the old Pacific Northwest? With wealth readily available, the "big men" of a tribe (roughly chiefs, but not hereditary) competed to see how much they could give away to their neighbors and rivals; all you had to do to eat well, or make it through a bad winter, was to admit that your neighbors were led by a great and glorious chief. This system didn't work very well at the tim…

Interesting that your example of warlordism in a "potlach-like" culture is from a feudal society.

The rest you've said is a gross misrepresentation of the giveaway culture shared amongst many more tribes than just the Northwest ones. And of course, white academia will just refuse and say "our written documentation written by genocidal outsiders is way more accurate than what the cultures themselves say about themselves through their own oral traditions".

This must be an interesting book that somehow argues that wars that killed huge numbers of civilians somehow had zero impact. Looking at the criticism of the book it seems to also argue that there were no negative effects of colonialism.

Funny, I wonder if the millions of people killed in North America between 1500 and 1900 would agree with that.

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

#100

Post by adrianN »

visarga wrote: post #59
mjevans wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I really hope we end up with something much closer to socialism than we do either the future from "The Time Machine" or perpetual cycles of Viva-La-Revolution.

Up until global trade took off, cities, villages and even individual farms were almost self sufficient. Why couldn't people be self sufficient with automation?

Because self-sufficiency provides a much lower standard of living than what you can get with trade and specialization.
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