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Completely agree: automation is already changing the employment landscape. The number of people who tell me how the unemployed truck driver or factory worker ca

by redwood 10y ago

Completely agree: automation is already changing the employment landscape. The number of people who tell me how the unemployed truck driver or factory worker can become a robot designer boggles my mind. It's a total break-down in the ability to see quantities vividly for what they are. I grew up in a field where orders of magnitude were the first class citizen and it's clear that order of magnitudes more people do mundane automate-able work than will be able to contribute on the design side of the next era's production systems. To your point: the way to fix these problems is to make sure that everyone, irrespective of their ability to make money selling their labor, is able to consume a fair amount. Hence the need for a basic income for all: the higher the better. The quicker we break from the moralistic perspective that everyone should "work" in a world where not everyone can, the quicker we can create a world that is about "the pursuit if happiness" again.

gumby 10y ago
Automation has always increased employment in the long term. And maybe it will this time as well: the truck drivers will not become robot designers but their kids could, instead of becoming truck drivers as well. The fact is that we don't live in the long term so although truck driving and coal mining are shitty jobs (and absolutely should be automated or eliminated) we have to take care of the current practitioners (both financially and finding a way for them to preserve their dignity) as their employment goes away. Separately I don't think we'll need all that many robot designers either.
- redwood 10y ago
  I could not disagree more. We are probably working the least hours as a total number of waking hours of the total population than we ever have as a species. Automation has always decreased the amount of work that needed to be done. Now admittedly "work needing to be done" is different from "employment" but I would argue that the less work that needs to be done, the less easy it is to create paying jobs to pay people to do those non-things. Yes many of the "workers" of the 1800s were domestic and not counted on wage payrolls... and we had a lot of them shift into the "work force" and begin getting wages in the 1900s. But that's not to say there is a net trend away from work and pay rolls. If we don't wake up and see this problem the inequality situation will continue to get worse.
codingmyway 10y ago
Not while there is work to do. So long as there is a need for more housing, bridges to be repaired and roads to be maintained and anything else that can't be automated and can be trained for then government should employ people to do those jobs and quit with the nonsense that only the private sector can add value. If there is shortage of skilled workers to do those jobs then they should train them too. The lack of long term job security has lead to the end of loyalty which means private companies have no incentive to train people which means the unemployed have to take on debt to study courses which aren't necessarily giving the skills they need. That and companies need to start sponsoring and training and accept that some will end up at a competitor.

by redwood 10y ago

gumby 10y ago

Automation has always increased employment in the long term. And maybe it will this time as well: the truck drivers will not become robot designers but their kids could, instead of becoming truck drivers as well. The fact is that we don't live in the long term so although truck driving and coal mining are shitty jobs (and absolutely should be automated or eliminated) we have to take care of the current practitioners (both financially and finding a way for them to preserve their dignity) as their employment goes away. Separately I don't think we'll need all that many robot designers either.

redwood 10y ago
I could not disagree more. We are probably working the least hours as a total number of waking hours of the total population than we ever have as a species. Automation has always decreased the amount of work that needed to be done. Now admittedly "work needing to be done" is different from "employment" but I would argue that the less work that needs to be done, the less easy it is to create paying jobs to pay people to do those non-things. Yes many of the "workers" of the 1800s were domestic and not counted on wage payrolls... and we had a lot of them shift into the "work force" and begin getting wages in the 1900s. But that's not to say there is a net trend away from work and pay rolls. If we don't wake up and see this problem the inequality situation will continue to get worse.

codingmyway 10y ago

Not while there is work to do. So long as there is a need for more housing, bridges to be repaired and roads to be maintained and anything else that can't be automated and can be trained for then government should employ people to do those jobs and quit with the nonsense that only the private sector can add value. If there is shortage of skilled workers to do those jobs then they should train them too. The lack of long term job security has lead to the end of loyalty which means private companies have no incentive to train people which means the unemployed have to take on debt to study courses which aren't necessarily giving the skills they need. That and companies need to start sponsoring and training and accept that some will end up at a competitor.