4 ms·

I'm genuinely curious: what is the alternative here? Keep taxis around? Encourage people to take more manufacturing jobs? These don't seem like sustainable or v

by darawk 11y ago

I'm genuinely curious: what is the alternative here? Keep taxis around? Encourage people to take more manufacturing jobs? These don't seem like sustainable or viable alternatives. Over the coming years, all jobs are going to require an element of creativity, innovation, and probably some degree of higher education (not necessarily university-based, but some form of specialized, knowledge-intensive learning). This is something that is inevitable, and it's coming up fast. To the extent that we subsidize and protect dying industries to maintain the jobs of their workers, we hinder their retrainment in new professions and further entrench the inefficiencies of the past. In even the medium term, this is nothing but harmful. Now, I think there are things that probably can and should be done to help these people get into new jobs. Subsidizing retraining and education, providing interim assistance to help them get through these periods, and maybe eventually even a universal basic income (fundamentally the economics of this probably don't make sense quite yet, but I think they will in the future). But what is fundamentally not ok, what is never ok, is shielding dying industries under the aegis of employment.

pron 11y ago
The word "inevitable" always makes me uneasy. I think it usually embodies an actual observation, combined with a certain agenda and/or a lack of imagination. That technological progress is inevitable is one thing; that it benefits mostly a certain class of people is another. On a more philosophical level, I am not at all certain that efficiency should be society's goal[1], but I think that at least for the foreseeable future, fighting such unquestioned axioms is an uphill battle... [1]: It's fascinating how long it took in the early modern period to convince society that efficiency is a desirable goal at all; see Max Weber's classic 1905 book, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.
- darawk 11y ago
  Ya, I grant you that 'inevitable' is probably too strong. But it does seem that way to me, and that also seems to be the prevailing opinion. And, at the risk of misinterpreting you or putting words in your mouth, I think you may be interpreting 'efficiency' as necessarily squeezing more and more out of workers. And this is, in general, true. However, efficiency can also ultimately mean a society where people no longer have to work at all - where only a comparatively small number of people need to be engaged in intense knowledge work, and the rest of civilization can live entirely from the fruits of those people's labors, and the automated production processes they operate and advance.
  - pron 11y ago
    > However, efficiency can also ultimately mean a society where people no longer have to work at all Indeed, that is an interesting concept, but at this point in time that goal is still far off and somewhat utopic, and so the question is whether there is only one path towards that goal (assuming it is achievable, desirable, or even if it is inevitable), and what and who we choose to sacrifice in the meantime.
    - darawk 11y ago
      Ya, I agree. To me the right thing to do looks like this: Efficiency at some (possibly significant) cost to workers, and then use some of the fruits of that efficiency to subsidize the migration of those people to new jobs, or just subsidize their lives. I suppose the way I see it efficiency is an absolute goal - the debate should be about what we do with the product of that efficiency.
  - Joof 11y ago
    I think that society is excellent at finding new ways to find things that we can classify as work. All our needs and wants may be possible to meet, but people will still believe that everyone must work. If you want that as a goal, social change may be more important than technological change. Who controls the automation? A small set of people.
lsiebert 11y ago
I think the alternative (and we can debate whether it's the right choice) is to regulate companies like Uber that are monopsonies for a segment (in this case Uber is the only buyer of Uber drivers, and works to reduce the elasticity of labor supply so drivers will stay with Uber). That could take the form of a minimum wage for drivers, or regulation that establishes a separate market for drivers that ridesharing platforms would need to all use. The issue is not the job loss, but that the benefits of the disruption accrue not only accrue mainly with the employer, but are less valuable to the employer and the economy then the loss of taxable income and stable jobs. The Wikipedia page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony isn't a bad read.
- jdminhbg 11y ago
  Uber has a monopsony on Uber drivers in the same way that Apple has a monopoly on selling Apple devices, which is to say, not for any useful definition of the term. Plenty of Uber drivers also drive for e.g. Lyft.
  - lsiebert 11y ago
    Uber drivers aren't consumers, they are independent contractors. The better metaphor would be IOS developers.
- darawk 11y ago
  As the other commenter did I might quibble with your description of them as a monopsony, but I think the spirit of your criticism is valid. And I agree, I think we should think very carefully about how these companies are taxed and regulated, because ultimately it does make sense for them to consolidate to a single provider. Especially so once they start using self-driving cars and stop employing drivers at all. I think what we need to think very carefully about is how we distribute and deal with the gains of this massive step-change in efficiency we are about to experience / are experiencing. What we must not do though is allow fears about those gains to prevent us from attaining them. In other words, if you're worried about the plight of laborers or drivers, tax Uber and just give them the money. Don't enact protectionist policies for the taxi industry.
tdaltonc 11y ago
The globalization process has nearly run it's course. In the near future we're going to need to pick one: tariffs, redistribution, or poor-people-with-pitch-forks.
- darawk 11y ago
  I agree completely. My choice is redistribution. Tariffs and pitch-forks both shrink the pie for everyone. Striving for efficiency and progress at all costs, and then redistributing the results seems like the clearly optimal path to me.
  - alphapapa 11y ago
    How much are you giving to charity right now?
    - darawk 11y ago
      Very little. That doesn't mean I wouldn't be in favor of wealth being redistributed from me as a matter of policy, though.
      - alphapapa 11y ago
        Why wait for the government to force you to give to help people?
        darawk 11y ago
        Because i'm not interested in making incremental differences. If it's me or one other faceless person, i'll choose me. Call me selfish if you like, but if it's not part of a sweeping policy that furthers civilization generally, or i'm not rich enough to personally make a significant dent, it's just not all that appealing to me to make small incremental contributions. Now, you can disagree with that philosophy of personal charity. I'm not even sure I agree with it - but it's really of no relevance to the point under discussion.
    - 11y ago
ars 11y ago
> I'm genuinely curious: what is the alternative here? Basic income. It would cause some inflation, but it would mean everyone could at least afford the basics. It would remove an entire class of complexity from the government by reducing paperwork associated with all other assistance programs. Personally I'm in favor of funding it with pollution taxes, but there are other ways as well. If done properly it could be a net-zero program - money in = money out, by law.
- darawk 11y ago
  Ya I do agree, which is why I mentioned it at the end of my comment :). However, basic income, elegant though it may be, is likely impractical at the scale that would be necessary, consider a quick calculation: $1k/month for every US citizen over the age of 18. That's roughly 235 million people, each getting $12k/year. That's 2.8 trillion dollars. Just for the basic income, not funding any other part of government (for scale, the entire federal budget is currently 3.8 trillion). I am optimistic about the UBI, and I think we would recover an enormous amount of those dollars in increased economic activity, but I think it's not quite ready for prime time yet. It needs to be tested on a small scale to see whether or not the purported economic benefits will materialize and in sufficient quantity to counter the enormous cost of such a program (though i'm optimistic that they may).

by darawk 11y ago

pron 11y ago

The word "inevitable" always makes me uneasy. I think it usually embodies an actual observation, combined with a certain agenda and/or a lack of imagination. That technological progress is inevitable is one thing; that it benefits mostly a certain class of people is another. On a more philosophical level, I am not at all certain that efficiency should be society's goal[1], but I think that at least for the foreseeable future, fighting such unquestioned axioms is an uphill battle... [1]: It's fascinating how long it took in the early modern period to convince society that efficiency is a desirable goal at all; see Max Weber's classic 1905 book, The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.

darawk 11y ago
Ya, I grant you that 'inevitable' is probably too strong. But it does seem that way to me, and that also seems to be the prevailing opinion. And, at the risk of misinterpreting you or putting words in your mouth, I think you may be interpreting 'efficiency' as necessarily squeezing more and more out of workers. And this is, in general, true. However, efficiency can also ultimately mean a society where people no longer have to work at all - where only a comparatively small number of people need to be engaged in intense knowledge work, and the rest of civilization can live entirely from the fruits of those people's labors, and the automated production processes they operate and advance.
- pron 11y ago
  > However, efficiency can also ultimately mean a society where people no longer have to work at all Indeed, that is an interesting concept, but at this point in time that goal is still far off and somewhat utopic, and so the question is whether there is only one path towards that goal (assuming it is achievable, desirable, or even if it is inevitable), and what and who we choose to sacrifice in the meantime.
  - darawk 11y ago
    Ya, I agree. To me the right thing to do looks like this: Efficiency at some (possibly significant) cost to workers, and then use some of the fruits of that efficiency to subsidize the migration of those people to new jobs, or just subsidize their lives. I suppose the way I see it efficiency is an absolute goal - the debate should be about what we do with the product of that efficiency.
- Joof 11y ago
  I think that society is excellent at finding new ways to find things that we can classify as work. All our needs and wants may be possible to meet, but people will still believe that everyone must work. If you want that as a goal, social change may be more important than technological change. Who controls the automation? A small set of people.

lsiebert 11y ago

I think the alternative (and we can debate whether it's the right choice) is to regulate companies like Uber that are monopsonies for a segment (in this case Uber is the only buyer of Uber drivers, and works to reduce the elasticity of labor supply so drivers will stay with Uber). That could take the form of a minimum wage for drivers, or regulation that establishes a separate market for drivers that ridesharing platforms would need to all use. The issue is not the job loss, but that the benefits of the disruption accrue not only accrue mainly with the employer, but are less valuable to the employer and the economy then the loss of taxable income and stable jobs. The Wikipedia page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monopsony isn't a bad read.

jdminhbg 11y ago
Uber has a monopsony on Uber drivers in the same way that Apple has a monopoly on selling Apple devices, which is to say, not for any useful definition of the term. Plenty of Uber drivers also drive for e.g. Lyft.
- lsiebert 11y ago
  Uber drivers aren't consumers, they are independent contractors. The better metaphor would be IOS developers.
darawk 11y ago
As the other commenter did I might quibble with your description of them as a monopsony, but I think the spirit of your criticism is valid. And I agree, I think we should think very carefully about how these companies are taxed and regulated, because ultimately it does make sense for them to consolidate to a single provider. Especially so once they start using self-driving cars and stop employing drivers at all. I think what we need to think very carefully about is how we distribute and deal with the gains of this massive step-change in efficiency we are about to experience / are experiencing. What we must not do though is allow fears about those gains to prevent us from attaining them. In other words, if you're worried about the plight of laborers or drivers, tax Uber and just give them the money. Don't enact protectionist policies for the taxi industry.

tdaltonc 11y ago

The globalization process has nearly run it's course. In the near future we're going to need to pick one: tariffs, redistribution, or poor-people-with-pitch-forks.

darawk 11y ago
I agree completely. My choice is redistribution. Tariffs and pitch-forks both shrink the pie for everyone. Striving for efficiency and progress at all costs, and then redistributing the results seems like the clearly optimal path to me.
- alphapapa 11y ago
  How much are you giving to charity right now?
  - darawk 11y ago
    Very little. That doesn't mean I wouldn't be in favor of wealth being redistributed from me as a matter of policy, though.
    - alphapapa 11y ago
      Why wait for the government to force you to give to help people?
      - darawk 11y ago
        Because i'm not interested in making incremental differences. If it's me or one other faceless person, i'll choose me. Call me selfish if you like, but if it's not part of a sweeping policy that furthers civilization generally, or i'm not rich enough to personally make a significant dent, it's just not all that appealing to me to make small incremental contributions. Now, you can disagree with that philosophy of personal charity. I'm not even sure I agree with it - but it's really of no relevance to the point under discussion.
  - 11y ago

ars 11y ago

> I'm genuinely curious: what is the alternative here? Basic income. It would cause some inflation, but it would mean everyone could at least afford the basics. It would remove an entire class of complexity from the government by reducing paperwork associated with all other assistance programs. Personally I'm in favor of funding it with pollution taxes, but there are other ways as well. If done properly it could be a net-zero program - money in = money out, by law.

darawk 11y ago
Ya I do agree, which is why I mentioned it at the end of my comment :). However, basic income, elegant though it may be, is likely impractical at the scale that would be necessary, consider a quick calculation: $1k/month for every US citizen over the age of 18. That's roughly 235 million people, each getting $12k/year. That's 2.8 trillion dollars. Just for the basic income, not funding any other part of government (for scale, the entire federal budget is currently 3.8 trillion). I am optimistic about the UBI, and I think we would recover an enormous amount of those dollars in increased economic activity, but I think it's not quite ready for prime time yet. It needs to be tested on a small scale to see whether or not the purported economic benefits will materialize and in sufficient quantity to counter the enormous cost of such a program (though i'm optimistic that they may).