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My current theory is that this “automation bomb” won't really happen in the sense that 5 million Truckers are going to get laid off all of a sudden. Especially

My current theory is that this “automation bomb” won't really happen in the sense that 5 million Truckers are going to get laid off all of a sudden. Especially in the case of Truckers the average age is getting higher and higher every year because Millennials have said that is not a job they want. So my theory is that as Baby Boomer/Early Gen Xers retire automation will step in and fill the employment gap. So there won't massive amounts of laid off Truckers sitting around. It will be under-employed Millennials, which is the same issue we have now.

gozur88 10y ago
That's how it works when the fundamentals shift, and it's hard to see because it's not like you lost a job - you just never got it to start with.
humanrebar 10y ago
> So my theory is that as Baby Boomer/Early Gen Xers retire automation will step in and fill the employment gap. So there won't massive amounts of laid off Truckers sitting around. Young workers used to take those jobs, though. The young (especially men) are underemployed right now. If you're right, they are the ones hurt the most in the long run by automation.
- neuromancer2701 10y ago
  I think the better question is why don't/haven't Millennials taken those jobs as previous generations did. This is a problem that has occurred outside of the technology debate.
  - mdorazio 10y ago
    There has actually been quite a bit of discussion around this. Here's one article discussing it [1]. It's a combination of factors including low pay for the number of hours worked, social stigma/low respect, huge amount of time away from home/fun activities, and the fact that driving just kind of sucks. Also, as another commenter mentioned, trucking companies have not made it all that easy to get started from zero skill/certification recently. [1] http://www.overdriveonline.com/trucking-or-not-with-the-twenty-somethings/ http://www.overdriveonline.com/trucking-or-not-with-the-twen...
douche 10y ago
One of the problems is that there aren't any openings in these jobs - at least not for somebody who isn't already trained and experienced. This is common across many fields. Nobody wants to invest in training anymore, so there are tons of openings for skilled workers with certifications and 5-10 years of experience, but few entry-level positions that would get you to those 5-10 years of experience.
simonh 10y ago
There's also the economy of truck stops, diners and motels that depends on all those truckers. They're going to be hit hard.
- hyperbovine 10y ago
  Indeed. I did not realize what a staggering fraction of blue collar jobs in the US are related, directly or indirectly, to long haul trucking: nearly 9 million. Disappearance of this industry will make the deindustrialization of the rust belt look absolutely trivial by comparison. https://medium.com/basic-income/self-driving-trucks-are-going-to-hit-us-like-a-human-driven-truck-b8507d9c5961 https://medium.com/basic-income/self-driving-trucks-are-goin...
xeniak 10y ago
I think it honestly depends on the political climate at the time: If it looks like a heap of truckers will lose their jobs, the government might step in and try and legislate sideways for jobs to remain - think mandating an operator for safety reasons. I'm not a national of Australia but spent a significant amount of time there in the lower echelons of the auto industry; There the government could see that the local auto manufacturing industry was being priced out by lower-cost SEA operations, and not wanting to have "hard-working Aussies" lose their jobs while in power, were pressured into heavily subsidising (> 40%) some factory workers' salaries. A couple of party changes later and this was wound back, and almost immediately the two largest employers in the sector announced they were pulling out. The net result was that instead of some workers losing their jobs gradually, or the plants freezing hires and people seeing this an being incentivised to look at alternate industries for light-labour positions, several thousand workers are expected to be laid off all at once some time next year - fodder for a media shit-storm. It's a bit off the topic, but the question is, where would those workers be if the government subsidies were instead used for educating/re-training?

gozur88 10y ago

That's how it works when the fundamentals shift, and it's hard to see because it's not like you lost a job - you just never got it to start with.

humanrebar 10y ago

> So my theory is that as Baby Boomer/Early Gen Xers retire automation will step in and fill the employment gap. So there won't massive amounts of laid off Truckers sitting around. Young workers used to take those jobs, though. The young (especially men) are underemployed right now. If you're right, they are the ones hurt the most in the long run by automation.

neuromancer2701 10y ago
I think the better question is why don't/haven't Millennials taken those jobs as previous generations did. This is a problem that has occurred outside of the technology debate.
- mdorazio 10y ago
  There has actually been quite a bit of discussion around this. Here's one article discussing it [1]. It's a combination of factors including low pay for the number of hours worked, social stigma/low respect, huge amount of time away from home/fun activities, and the fact that driving just kind of sucks. Also, as another commenter mentioned, trucking companies have not made it all that easy to get started from zero skill/certification recently. [1] http://www.overdriveonline.com/trucking-or-not-with-the-twenty-somethings/ http://www.overdriveonline.com/trucking-or-not-with-the-twen...

douche 10y ago

One of the problems is that there aren't any openings in these jobs - at least not for somebody who isn't already trained and experienced. This is common across many fields. Nobody wants to invest in training anymore, so there are tons of openings for skilled workers with certifications and 5-10 years of experience, but few entry-level positions that would get you to those 5-10 years of experience.

simonh 10y ago

There's also the economy of truck stops, diners and motels that depends on all those truckers. They're going to be hit hard.

hyperbovine 10y ago
Indeed. I did not realize what a staggering fraction of blue collar jobs in the US are related, directly or indirectly, to long haul trucking: nearly 9 million. Disappearance of this industry will make the deindustrialization of the rust belt look absolutely trivial by comparison. https://medium.com/basic-income/self-driving-trucks-are-going-to-hit-us-like-a-human-driven-truck-b8507d9c5961 https://medium.com/basic-income/self-driving-trucks-are-goin...

xeniak 10y ago

I think it honestly depends on the political climate at the time: If it looks like a heap of truckers will lose their jobs, the government might step in and try and legislate sideways for jobs to remain - think mandating an operator for safety reasons. I'm not a national of Australia but spent a significant amount of time there in the lower echelons of the auto industry; There the government could see that the local auto manufacturing industry was being priced out by lower-cost SEA operations, and not wanting to have "hard-working Aussies" lose their jobs while in power, were pressured into heavily subsidising (> 40%) some factory workers' salaries. A couple of party changes later and this was wound back, and almost immediately the two largest employers in the sector announced they were pulling out. The net result was that instead of some workers losing their jobs gradually, or the plants freezing hires and people seeing this an being incentivised to look at alternate industries for light-labour positions, several thousand workers are expected to be laid off all at once some time next year - fodder for a media shit-storm. It's a bit off the topic, but the question is, where would those workers be if the government subsidies were instead used for educating/re-training?