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Because investment bankers are just salespeople? Nobody is suggesting AI will replace salespeople in the near future. I could see there being fewer grunt analys

Because investment bankers are just salespeople? Nobody is suggesting AI will replace salespeople in the near future. I could see there being fewer grunt analysts in the future, though.

sirclueless 10y ago
> Nobody is suggesting AI will replace salespeople in the near future. They aren't? Because I see this happening all the time. Automated checkout lines, E-Trade and online brokerages, etc. Low-value transactions are handled more and more by electronic "salespeople". All it takes to reach high-value transactions as well is for the clientele to decide they trust machines more than humans, which is not all that unlikely given the many sources of human error involved. It's possible that humans will be involved in high-value transactions like investment for a long time, since the marginal cost of human labor is low as the numbers get bigger, but it's not impossible to replace; we already have the technology.
- supercon 10y ago
  I think that the term 'salespeople' here refer to those who proactively push their products to the market and by doing so widen the market for the company they represent. The examples you give are indeed places where buying or selling happens, but where does the incentive to do these transactions come from? It's still from humans. Sure, we are bombarded left and right with ads that were carefully targeted for us by complex algorithms, but I don't think I've ever bought anything from Amazon without reading a review about the product from another user, or bought stock without going through several opinions written by more-or-less respected analysts.
- user5994461 10y ago
  You'll note that for a lot of online financial services, there wasn't anyone at all to serve low profile customers before robot-advisor/self-serving services came in. There is a line (few hundreds k) where it's enough to play but not enough to pay for the costs of a human to help you (sales people/financial advisor/trader type).
- argonaut 10y ago
  TIL cashiers are considered salespeople.
coldtea 10y ago
>Nobody is suggesting AI will replace salespeople in the near future. Huh? For one, investment bankers are "just salespeople" in the same way doctors are just nurses. Second, everybody and their mother is suggesting AI will replace retail level salespeople in the future. In fact lots of places, from British supermarkerts (where you can bill and pay for your purchases yourself), to Amazon's Go experiment, and numerous other uses of automation in retail.
- manmal 10y ago
  I think grandparent is referring to salespeople as in "human specialized in marketing and selling special/expensive/complicated products one-on-one to entities", not wholesale retailers.
- qq66 10y ago
  Cashiers aren't salespeople. Salespeople are people who convince you to buy something. Higher-end stores have them, grocery stores do not.
  - OJFord 10y ago
    > Salespeople are people who convince you to buy something. Higher-end stores have them Many more lower-end stores did too, pre- or earlier in Amazon's and online shopping's proliferation. It's already happened to a not insignificant extent.
  - coldtea 10y ago
    Well, in that case, travel agents have been replaced by "buy your own tickets online", real estate and rental agents have seen similar automation through web apps (+ reviews, photos, walkthroughs, etc for the "convincing part"), and lots of other salespeople jobs. Bookstores is probably a famous example, where the people working there were far more than cashiers, but they still got decimated by Amazon and co.

Because investment bankers are just salespeople? Nobody is suggesting AI will replace salespeople in the near future. I could see there being fewer grunt analysts in the future, though.

sirclueless 10y ago

> Nobody is suggesting AI will replace salespeople in the near future. They aren't? Because I see this happening all the time. Automated checkout lines, E-Trade and online brokerages, etc. Low-value transactions are handled more and more by electronic "salespeople". All it takes to reach high-value transactions as well is for the clientele to decide they trust machines more than humans, which is not all that unlikely given the many sources of human error involved. It's possible that humans will be involved in high-value transactions like investment for a long time, since the marginal cost of human labor is low as the numbers get bigger, but it's not impossible to replace; we already have the technology.

supercon 10y ago
I think that the term 'salespeople' here refer to those who proactively push their products to the market and by doing so widen the market for the company they represent. The examples you give are indeed places where buying or selling happens, but where does the incentive to do these transactions come from? It's still from humans. Sure, we are bombarded left and right with ads that were carefully targeted for us by complex algorithms, but I don't think I've ever bought anything from Amazon without reading a review about the product from another user, or bought stock without going through several opinions written by more-or-less respected analysts.
user5994461 10y ago
You'll note that for a lot of online financial services, there wasn't anyone at all to serve low profile customers before robot-advisor/self-serving services came in. There is a line (few hundreds k) where it's enough to play but not enough to pay for the costs of a human to help you (sales people/financial advisor/trader type).
argonaut 10y ago
TIL cashiers are considered salespeople.

coldtea 10y ago

>Nobody is suggesting AI will replace salespeople in the near future. Huh? For one, investment bankers are "just salespeople" in the same way doctors are just nurses. Second, everybody and their mother is suggesting AI will replace retail level salespeople in the future. In fact lots of places, from British supermarkerts (where you can bill and pay for your purchases yourself), to Amazon's Go experiment, and numerous other uses of automation in retail.

manmal 10y ago
I think grandparent is referring to salespeople as in "human specialized in marketing and selling special/expensive/complicated products one-on-one to entities", not wholesale retailers.
qq66 10y ago
Cashiers aren't salespeople. Salespeople are people who convince you to buy something. Higher-end stores have them, grocery stores do not.
- OJFord 10y ago
  > Salespeople are people who convince you to buy something. Higher-end stores have them Many more lower-end stores did too, pre- or earlier in Amazon's and online shopping's proliferation. It's already happened to a not insignificant extent.
- coldtea 10y ago
  Well, in that case, travel agents have been replaced by "buy your own tickets online", real estate and rental agents have seen similar automation through web apps (+ reviews, photos, walkthroughs, etc for the "convincing part"), and lots of other salespeople jobs. Bookstores is probably a famous example, where the people working there were far more than cashiers, but they still got decimated by Amazon and co.