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Rule #1 : Anything that can be economically automated will be. Corollary: Anything that is automated is not economically sensible for a human to do. - Freelan

by nico_h 10y ago

Rule #1 : Anything that can be economically automated will be. Corollary: Anything that is automated is not economically sensible for a human to do. - Freelancing and consulting gigs have huge overhead. - Uber drivers (for now) own the car but don't make most of the money. And they will be made redundant by self driving cars. - Medical services have the most overhead and require years of expensive training. - Making artisanal furniture might feed one or two person per town, but that's no way to feed a family. - Farming is also getting automated in vertical greenhouses. If you have health problem, or cannot make something with your hands or your brain _that people are willing to exchange enough money for_, should you be left out to die?

visarga 10y ago
> Anything that can be economically automated will be. Yes, but when you can't pay the wonderful automated hospital its fees, you hire the local unemployed doctor (replaced by an automatic diagnostic system) and in lieu of payment, you go and fix his roof. My point is that there are going to be lots of unemployed people and they are going to work for themselves because they need to survive, because they got no money or jobs. Automation will make it cheaper for corporations to manufacture things, but people are not going to buy their products because they don't have hard money. They only have barter money. And companies don't take that as payment. The alternative, UBI, requires that companies realize they actually want UBI. UBI would be like a pot of gold they can sink their hands into. People would buy shit and they would make profits. Of course, UBI comes out of their pockets, but hopefully they make more profit than the competition and win. Also, hopefully, with automation there is enough increase in productivity to cover UBI and some profits for the industries. If UBI doesn't come, they are busted. Rich people can't satiate economy's demand for customers. They can only eat so much food, and sleep on so much bed, and use so much car. The larger the UBI, the more money on the table each year. But for people it's going to be great to become more self reliant, even acquire automation and support themselves by directly benefiting. Automation is going to become much cheaper and an open-source community of makers is going to appear. We won't need to buy much except generic computers and raw materials. Or the government will subsidize buying commercial automation for self reliance, as a cheaper alternative to UBI. Automated farms, 3d printers and solar panels are going to empower people.
- nico_h 10y ago
  The trouble with all that is that we don't think about an alternative to "corporation extract the maximum economic value they can" (a.k.a profit). One hope is that with sufficient automation and competition, the marginal cost on providing a diagnostic or other services might fall to close enough to 0 to be free. The value provided to society would be very high. The profits might be astronomical? I agree that UBI or something like it is a necessity, but I'd rather live in a Star Trek "all needs provided for without currency exchange or social stigma" society rather than 5 trillionnaire families and 9 billions peoples surviving/mooching on UBI. Increased automation has a high chance to be very expensive, in the "printer cartridge" kind of way. Cheap "robot". Expensive maintenance and consumables. I wish you're right, and that corporations will not go full "Bacigalupi" and patent everything from the plant we are allowed to grow to the brand of electrons we're allowed to put in our robots.
- sqldba 10y ago
  No point fixing the roof if you don't own it. And nobody will be able to buy a house.
sqldba 10y ago
If you believe that anyone, including business, is always seeking the lowest cost, then you've never worked in a company that blows its money on useless shit - starting with executives and ending with subcontracting at ridiculously expensive rates just so that there's no employee cost on the books.

by nico_h 10y ago

visarga 10y ago

> Anything that can be economically automated will be. Yes, but when you can't pay the wonderful automated hospital its fees, you hire the local unemployed doctor (replaced by an automatic diagnostic system) and in lieu of payment, you go and fix his roof. My point is that there are going to be lots of unemployed people and they are going to work for themselves because they need to survive, because they got no money or jobs. Automation will make it cheaper for corporations to manufacture things, but people are not going to buy their products because they don't have hard money. They only have barter money. And companies don't take that as payment. The alternative, UBI, requires that companies realize they actually want UBI. UBI would be like a pot of gold they can sink their hands into. People would buy shit and they would make profits. Of course, UBI comes out of their pockets, but hopefully they make more profit than the competition and win. Also, hopefully, with automation there is enough increase in productivity to cover UBI and some profits for the industries. If UBI doesn't come, they are busted. Rich people can't satiate economy's demand for customers. They can only eat so much food, and sleep on so much bed, and use so much car. The larger the UBI, the more money on the table each year. But for people it's going to be great to become more self reliant, even acquire automation and support themselves by directly benefiting. Automation is going to become much cheaper and an open-source community of makers is going to appear. We won't need to buy much except generic computers and raw materials. Or the government will subsidize buying commercial automation for self reliance, as a cheaper alternative to UBI. Automated farms, 3d printers and solar panels are going to empower people.

nico_h 10y ago
The trouble with all that is that we don't think about an alternative to "corporation extract the maximum economic value they can" (a.k.a profit). One hope is that with sufficient automation and competition, the marginal cost on providing a diagnostic or other services might fall to close enough to 0 to be free. The value provided to society would be very high. The profits might be astronomical? I agree that UBI or something like it is a necessity, but I'd rather live in a Star Trek "all needs provided for without currency exchange or social stigma" society rather than 5 trillionnaire families and 9 billions peoples surviving/mooching on UBI. Increased automation has a high chance to be very expensive, in the "printer cartridge" kind of way. Cheap "robot". Expensive maintenance and consumables. I wish you're right, and that corporations will not go full "Bacigalupi" and patent everything from the plant we are allowed to grow to the brand of electrons we're allowed to put in our robots.
sqldba 10y ago
No point fixing the roof if you don't own it. And nobody will be able to buy a house.

sqldba 10y ago

If you believe that anyone, including business, is always seeking the lowest cost, then you've never worked in a company that blows its money on useless shit - starting with executives and ending with subcontracting at ridiculously expensive rates just so that there's no employee cost on the books.