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Are you so sure about that? Capitalism is at its core about the (private) accumulation of capital in the sense of means of production. This capital is used by h

Are you so sure about that? Capitalism is at its core about the (private) accumulation of capital in the sense of means of production. This capital is used by human labour to produce things. Technological change is ultimately a process by which the ratio of capital input to human labour input increases.[0] In a sense, robots (automated machines) are the perfection of capital, where the ratio becomes arbitrarily high: human labour becomes decreasingly needed until it's basically unnecessary. Private ownership of this capital - which is what capitalism is all about - is then absolutely the problem, because it pits a small group of capital owners against a majority which depends on the products produced by that capital without having anything useful to trade left. [0] How you measure this ratio is an important but difficult topic, and in fact one must be careful not to let an implicit definition of measures frame the discussion.

maratd 11y ago
> In a sense, robots (automated machines) are the perfection of capital, where the ratio becomes arbitrarily high: human labour becomes decreasingly needed until it's basically unnecessary. Where is the evidence for this? Your entire arguments falls apart when this isn't the case. As manufacturing moved towards automation, labor moved toward rendering services. The number of jobs is highly correlated to the size of the population. We didn't see a reduction in available employment due to automation. We simply saw a shift in the type of work performed, with jobs moving toward things that were more difficult to automate.
- scotty79 11y ago
  >> Technological change is ultimately a process by which the ratio of capital input to human labour input increases. > Where is the evidence for this? If you do more with same amount of people it still holds true. It doesn't mean technology causes people to loose jobs only that human labor needed for unit of stuff made per unit of capital decreases as technology progresses.
- spoiler 11y ago
  I kinda agree that jobs shifted, but you can't forget that not everyone is able or wants to shift. If you create a "perfect" car mechanic robot, the cat mechanic won't suddenly find a better job. He could maybe seek a job in another type of industry, but why should he have to? He was perfectly content working on cars.
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  You seem to be ignoring the current wave of automation, and focusing on the one that started with the industrial revolution. Automation used to provide muscle, and thus replace manufacturing. Nowadays it starts to provide brains, which makes it replace services. As it continues, where will the human labour go? The number of jobs was highly correlated to the size of population so far, but we already see the rise of bullshit jobs, that serve each other in closed loops, providing no real benefit except of wasting resources to give some people something to do. It's not as obvious as ordering people one day to dig up a hole and the next day to fill it up again, but e.g. a lifecycle of a leaflet - from commissioning, designing and printing it, to delivery, giving it to people and having it end up in a thrash can, seems really similar.
  - maratd 11y ago
    > Nowadays it starts to provide brains, which makes it replace services. As it continues, where will the human labour go? Is there actual evidence of this? As in, actual statistics rather than grandiose claims of AI destroying the human race? Yes, you might get replaced by a piece of software and you may need to retrain to a different industry, but this has always been true. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_destruction > The number of jobs was highly correlated to the size of population so far, but we already see the rise of bullshit jobs This doesn't make any sense. At some point, someone is handing over money and expects a specific amount of work be done, which he finds to be a good exchange. It's far easier not to hire someone, than to hire them. So if you don't need work done ... you don't hire anyone. Why would someone pay someone else money to perform "bullshit"? You only have instances of this when it is mandated by regulation, not in a free market.
    - TeMPOraL 11y ago
      > Is there actual evidence of this? As in, actual statistics rather than grandiose claims of AI destroying the human race? I'm not talking about AI, I'm talking about replacing people in service jobs who were needed for some particular function provided more by their brains than by brute strength. For instance, consider self-checkout machines replacing casheers in shops. It's already happening, it makes shops employ less people. Not zero, because automation is not a binary process, but less. (Also, n=1, I used to do inventory in a shop as an external contractor, because they couldn't count up everything in one night with the staff they had; that ended pretty much overnight when they got themselves automated inventory trackers with barcode scanners, which reduced the number of people needed by half.) So is automation replacing people in services? Yes, you can see this everywhere around you. Do those people end up jobless? Not yet. > Why would someone pay someone else money to perform "bullshit"? You only have instances of this when it is mandated by regulation, not in a free market. Because it's not obvious bullshit, per leaflet example I described. The nonsense nature of work done only becomes apparent when you look at the whole chain of services provided. At each link, someone is paying someone else for a job they need to get paid by someone else entirely. And as long as you get paid, why would you refuse the job, or care what happens with the artifact you've built later? So there you have, some chains of services are direct mind-to-thrashcan work. Others run against each other, in a zero-sum-game, each cancelling out the results of another one. They exist, because at each step someone is paid to do something that the other party needs.
- pdkl95 11y ago
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU The canonical introduction to why "better technology makes more better jobs for horses^Whumans" doesn't make sense.
scotty79 11y ago
> Private ownership of this capital - which is what capitalism is all about - is then absolutely the problem It's only a problem if you can't/won't tax. If you can tax owners of the capital and give away that money to other people (bureaucrats, army, unemployed, everybody) everything still works just fine. Everybody still has money to buy stuff and this keeps the game that capital owners play between themselves live. The only way we can screw this up is to weaken the governments and strengthen the corporations to the point that governments won't be able to tax. So probably private armies are bad idea, also neglecting people so that they pummel their own governments. So it's ok if billionaires own all the robots, that make stuff, sell stuff to poor (everybody who's not a billionaire), as long as government can tax billionaires 98% tax and bomb them if they don't pay up.
- Floegipoky 11y ago
  Is that just a thought experiment, or do you really think that would work? Because I don't think it would work. Why would producers give bombs to the government? Why would they give food to the populace? Why would they submit to taxation when they have more power than the entity trying to tax them?
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    Indeed. The government can now threaten to bomb a company because most companies are small enough not to pose a threat (though I wouldn't be sure if the USGOV would really be able to bomb Lockheed Martin). But as the companies merge and band together, at some point the government may start hearing demands to be met if they want to keep their satellite guidance active, or not accidentally showing capital city as an active target.
  - scotty79 11y ago
    > Is that just a thought experiment, or do you really think that would work? That's how it already works. Money is taken from capitalists and redistributed to bureaucrats and military and some expended to appease the populace. > Because I don't think it would work. Why would producers give bombs to the government? Because it's good money and government has already plenty of bombs to force people to make more bombs for them. Similarly you could ask, why on Earth any company supplies stuff to IRS. Because it's profitable and because you could face consequences if you openly refuse. > Why would they give food to the populace? Because populace will pay them with money, for the cheapest, best quality food they can make. Money will come almost in full from producers pockets, but it won't be a problem for them because as long as competition pays the same or more then it's all good. > Why would they submit to taxation when they have more power than the entity trying to tax them? Wait!? US capitalists have more firearms, bombs, tanks and planes than US army? What I am saying is that it's not some scheme that will get established. I'm saying that it's already the case. Governments are still stronger than corporations, same way North Korea is stronger than South Korea. Technologically and socially way behind, but with huge army. I'm basically saying that monopoly on violence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence is the factor that keeps capitalism from eating us, and right after that, itself.
tnorgaard 11y ago
Good questions you raise, nhaehnle. First of, I don't try to pretend to be a scholar in economics, so please bare with me. That a capital system contains people/entities that accumulate wealth is exactly why I finished off with the Thomas Piketty comment. His very interesting book, Capital in the 21st Century, argues that our current system favours capital owners and we should tax capital, not income. About labour being displaced, I can recommend Second Machine Age by Andrew McAfee and Erik Brynjolfsson, however it does not contain silver bullets. :-) I can only theorize on what Stephen Hawkings meant with his answer, but to me it didn't look like a general critic of capital, but more the system we have now.

maratd 11y ago

> In a sense, robots (automated machines) are the perfection of capital, where the ratio becomes arbitrarily high: human labour becomes decreasingly needed until it's basically unnecessary. Where is the evidence for this? Your entire arguments falls apart when this isn't the case. As manufacturing moved towards automation, labor moved toward rendering services. The number of jobs is highly correlated to the size of the population. We didn't see a reduction in available employment due to automation. We simply saw a shift in the type of work performed, with jobs moving toward things that were more difficult to automate.

scotty79 11y ago
>> Technological change is ultimately a process by which the ratio of capital input to human labour input increases. > Where is the evidence for this? If you do more with same amount of people it still holds true. It doesn't mean technology causes people to loose jobs only that human labor needed for unit of stuff made per unit of capital decreases as technology progresses.
spoiler 11y ago
I kinda agree that jobs shifted, but you can't forget that not everyone is able or wants to shift. If you create a "perfect" car mechanic robot, the cat mechanic won't suddenly find a better job. He could maybe seek a job in another type of industry, but why should he have to? He was perfectly content working on cars.
TeMPOraL 11y ago
You seem to be ignoring the current wave of automation, and focusing on the one that started with the industrial revolution. Automation used to provide muscle, and thus replace manufacturing. Nowadays it starts to provide brains, which makes it replace services. As it continues, where will the human labour go? The number of jobs was highly correlated to the size of population so far, but we already see the rise of bullshit jobs, that serve each other in closed loops, providing no real benefit except of wasting resources to give some people something to do. It's not as obvious as ordering people one day to dig up a hole and the next day to fill it up again, but e.g. a lifecycle of a leaflet - from commissioning, designing and printing it, to delivery, giving it to people and having it end up in a thrash can, seems really similar.
- maratd 11y ago
  > Nowadays it starts to provide brains, which makes it replace services. As it continues, where will the human labour go? Is there actual evidence of this? As in, actual statistics rather than grandiose claims of AI destroying the human race? Yes, you might get replaced by a piece of software and you may need to retrain to a different industry, but this has always been true. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_destruction https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Creative_destruction > The number of jobs was highly correlated to the size of population so far, but we already see the rise of bullshit jobs This doesn't make any sense. At some point, someone is handing over money and expects a specific amount of work be done, which he finds to be a good exchange. It's far easier not to hire someone, than to hire them. So if you don't need work done ... you don't hire anyone. Why would someone pay someone else money to perform "bullshit"? You only have instances of this when it is mandated by regulation, not in a free market.
  - TeMPOraL 11y ago
    > Is there actual evidence of this? As in, actual statistics rather than grandiose claims of AI destroying the human race? I'm not talking about AI, I'm talking about replacing people in service jobs who were needed for some particular function provided more by their brains than by brute strength. For instance, consider self-checkout machines replacing casheers in shops. It's already happening, it makes shops employ less people. Not zero, because automation is not a binary process, but less. (Also, n=1, I used to do inventory in a shop as an external contractor, because they couldn't count up everything in one night with the staff they had; that ended pretty much overnight when they got themselves automated inventory trackers with barcode scanners, which reduced the number of people needed by half.) So is automation replacing people in services? Yes, you can see this everywhere around you. Do those people end up jobless? Not yet. > Why would someone pay someone else money to perform "bullshit"? You only have instances of this when it is mandated by regulation, not in a free market. Because it's not obvious bullshit, per leaflet example I described. The nonsense nature of work done only becomes apparent when you look at the whole chain of services provided. At each link, someone is paying someone else for a job they need to get paid by someone else entirely. And as long as you get paid, why would you refuse the job, or care what happens with the artifact you've built later? So there you have, some chains of services are direct mind-to-thrashcan work. Others run against each other, in a zero-sum-game, each cancelling out the results of another one. They exist, because at each step someone is paid to do something that the other party needs.
pdkl95 11y ago
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU The canonical introduction to why "better technology makes more better jobs for horses^Whumans" doesn't make sense.

scotty79 11y ago

> Private ownership of this capital - which is what capitalism is all about - is then absolutely the problem It's only a problem if you can't/won't tax. If you can tax owners of the capital and give away that money to other people (bureaucrats, army, unemployed, everybody) everything still works just fine. Everybody still has money to buy stuff and this keeps the game that capital owners play between themselves live. The only way we can screw this up is to weaken the governments and strengthen the corporations to the point that governments won't be able to tax. So probably private armies are bad idea, also neglecting people so that they pummel their own governments. So it's ok if billionaires own all the robots, that make stuff, sell stuff to poor (everybody who's not a billionaire), as long as government can tax billionaires 98% tax and bomb them if they don't pay up.

Floegipoky 11y ago
Is that just a thought experiment, or do you really think that would work? Because I don't think it would work. Why would producers give bombs to the government? Why would they give food to the populace? Why would they submit to taxation when they have more power than the entity trying to tax them?
- TeMPOraL 11y ago
  Indeed. The government can now threaten to bomb a company because most companies are small enough not to pose a threat (though I wouldn't be sure if the USGOV would really be able to bomb Lockheed Martin). But as the companies merge and band together, at some point the government may start hearing demands to be met if they want to keep their satellite guidance active, or not accidentally showing capital city as an active target.
- scotty79 11y ago
  > Is that just a thought experiment, or do you really think that would work? That's how it already works. Money is taken from capitalists and redistributed to bureaucrats and military and some expended to appease the populace. > Because I don't think it would work. Why would producers give bombs to the government? Because it's good money and government has already plenty of bombs to force people to make more bombs for them. Similarly you could ask, why on Earth any company supplies stuff to IRS. Because it's profitable and because you could face consequences if you openly refuse. > Why would they give food to the populace? Because populace will pay them with money, for the cheapest, best quality food they can make. Money will come almost in full from producers pockets, but it won't be a problem for them because as long as competition pays the same or more then it's all good. > Why would they submit to taxation when they have more power than the entity trying to tax them? Wait!? US capitalists have more firearms, bombs, tanks and planes than US army? What I am saying is that it's not some scheme that will get established. I'm saying that it's already the case. Governments are still stronger than corporations, same way North Korea is stronger than South Korea. Technologically and socially way behind, but with huge army. I'm basically saying that monopoly on violence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopoly_on_violence is the factor that keeps capitalism from eating us, and right after that, itself.

tnorgaard 11y ago

Good questions you raise, nhaehnle. First of, I don't try to pretend to be a scholar in economics, so please bare with me. That a capital system contains people/entities that accumulate wealth is exactly why I finished off with the Thomas Piketty comment. His very interesting book, Capital in the 21st Century, argues that our current system favours capital owners and we should tax capital, not income. About labour being displaced, I can recommend Second Machine Age by Andrew McAfee and Erik Brynjolfsson, however it does not contain silver bullets. :-) I can only theorize on what Stephen Hawkings meant with his answer, but to me it didn't look like a general critic of capital, but more the system we have now.