PILOT SPIN
Spin Zone => Spin Zone => Topic started by: Little Joe on December 10, 2016, 11:47:23 AM
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When I was a teenager in the '60s, I remember reading stories about how automation was going to start doing more and more of the manual work for us, which would leave us more free time to pursue our hobbies and interests. They would show pictures of families having picnics in the park, with artists at their easels painting. It was idyllic, or utopian if you wish. But I remember thinking, without work, where are people going to get the money to pay the bills? Somebody is still going to have to do the "non-automated" jobs, and run things. Who has to do that work and who gets to have all that time off? Will the few people that work get paid more and live like kings? I could never understand what the "plan" was?
We are not there yet, but we are getting there. Airline ticket clerks, bank tellers, retail clerks have largely been replaced by kiosks or ATMs or web sites. Pretty soon taxi drivers, truck drivers and pilots will be replaced. Fast food workers are probably next and who knows what else will be automated.
So what will we do with all those people with too much free time. And what is that old saying about idle hands and the devils workshop? If people don't have jobs, they won't have money but they will have idle hands. What happens to crime rates?
I have some ideas of solutions, but I don't like them.
What kind of ideas do you guys have as to how the human race will function once we automated most of the jobs? Even computer programmers will eventually be replaced with AI. A large part of the population won't be able to cope with the new types of jobs that are created. What do we do with those people? Build a lot of homeless shelters?
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All good questions. I wish I had some answers, but we are going to need to innovate, and create new industries that require human work. Maybe get training, on building, repairing, and maintaining the automation? :)
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Those that don't die of starvation will die in the revolution against our robot overlords. The few survivors will become the automation, serving the robots until they outlive their usefulness.
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When I was a teenager in the '60s, I remember reading stories about how automation was going to start doing more and more of the manual work for us, which would leave us more free time to pursue our hobbies and interests. They would show pictures of families having picnics in the park, with artists at their easels painting. It was idyllic, or utopian if you wish.
Just so you recognize it, this story is from the socialists/communists. It is part of their manifesto that automation will require less effort by employees. In their mind, the company is allowed to exist solely for the purpose of providing work and producing something useful. It should be unconcerned with profit or profitability. Therefore, as automation replaces the effort, it does not replace the person, who stays on at full salary but is required to work fewer hours. Oh, and the whole thing would be overseen by the benevolent socialist/communist overlords.
Of course, at your young age, you hit on exactly the fault in their tale. The company does not maintain a full workforce of part timers, it reduces headcount and has fewer employees, all still working full time or longer. In fact rather than having more time to take their leisure, the employee has less.
I suppose you can debate whether they actually believed the fairy tale they were selling or if they were just using it to deceive the useful idiots needed to pull off their plan.
I don't know the answer either. In some instances, it means a shift to more service jobs or a shift to jobs that didn't exist before. For example, before 2007, there was never an industry for smartphone sales, replacement, repair or salvage. All those are new jobs which require new workers to fill. Are there more or less of these people compared to the number of telephone workers replaced? I believe the complexity promotes more jobs, but that is just one industry.
McDonalds is placing kiosks in their restaurants to take orders and eliminating all but one cashier. But someone has to build, install, service and eventually replace the kiosks. Are there more or fewer jobs than line workers being replaced? In this case, I suspect fewer, but the jobs are of higher quality.
Overall...unknown what the impact has been. I think capitalism is and remains the best mechanism for allowing people to provide for themselves, whether that is an independent kiosk repair man, a smart phone sales clerk or even a migrant farmer picking crops. I think capitalism is the best mechanism for creating new jobs and new ways of doing jobs and therefore remains our best hope of at least maintaining the jobs race.