5 ms·

I wonder what they'll do when there's nobody left to buy the products. Maybe they can sell them to the robots themselves?

oneplane 10y ago
Why would there be nobody left to buy the products? And what does it have to do with replacing workers? I imagine that if they are producing something, they are doing so because of a demand. Once the demand is gone, they most likely will stop producing.
- metaphorm 10y ago
  demand for consumer products is driven by consumer confidence, i.e. by surplus in worker wages after cost of living is accounted for. if the workers are having trouble getting a decent wage, where does that surplus come from? what happens to consumer confidence, and aggregate demand if people are losing their jobs?
  - CaptSpify 10y ago
    If we can figure out a decent economic system, then there won't be problems giving people a decent wage. Sure, if we keep doing things the way we are now then nobody will get a decent wage, but that's a very fixable problem.
    - Bombthecat 10y ago
      It is not a fixable thing. You don't fix thousands of years of human evolution overnight. Or one generation. It will take several thousand years to fix that.
      - CaptSpify 10y ago
        Are you actually arguing that it will take several thousands of years to change our economic model? I find this argument hard to take seriously
        Bombthecat 10y ago
        My guess is five to six thousand years before humans move away from the "winner takes it all" scheme ( or alpha behaviour) In twenty years we pretty much will know who is right. I'd rather buy shares of companies then hoping for a sudden change in human behaviour.
        CaptSpify 10y ago
        We can change human behavior. We do it all the time. We just need to incentive it differently like we do with other systems. In 20 years we won't know "who is right", we'll just know that we went with system X instead of system Y.
        vorotato 10y ago
        Funny because there have been societies which have not been that way in the past. Also there's pretty much 0 evidence that that's a component of evolutionary psychology vs just the social norms in our given society.
  - FLUX-YOU 10y ago
    >if the workers are having trouble getting a decent wage, where does that surplus come from? what happens to consumer confidence, and aggregate demand if people are losing their jobs? Probably not a lot. Automation headlines are probably going to take a back seat to Trump administration headlines for a good long while. Just from feeling, it seems to be happening fast enough to be a real concern, but not fast enough to cause panic, draw attention, and quick action.
- paulryanrogers 10y ago
  My guess is that if robots put enough people out of work then the ability to pay will impact the demand
homero 10y ago
Basic income is the only future, truck drivers will be all out of work by 2020 for example
- base698 10y ago
  Read "The True Believer" and see if you come to the same conclusion. "It is usually those whose poverty is relatively recent, the “new poor,” who throb with the ferment of frustration. The memory of better things is as fire in their veins. They are the disinherited and dispossessed who respond to every rising mass movement."
- noarchy 10y ago
  >Basic income is the only future, truck drivers will be all out of work by 2020 for example This has become the refrain in the comment section for every article dealing with automation I've seen, of late. Some of the articles, I suspect, are being posted by basic income proponents. Even accepting the premise that a basic income would be needed in the case of near-universal automation, there are plenty of us who are yet to be convinced that we're heading in that direction.
  - olegkikin 10y ago
    I don't think most of the people talking about basic income are the proponents. I'm a strong believer in that you should be paid the market rate for your work, so if you want to make good money, you must make smart choices about your education and career. That makes the whole system more efficient. I do however think that basic income is inevitable, because of the automation on the scale we've never seen before. Inevitable, because the other option is to let the unemployed starve. So not really an option.
    - gloverkcn 10y ago
      I'd like to think that letting the unemployed starve is not an option, but it is. People can be extremely cruel when they don't have to take responsibility for the outcomes of government policies. They lean on "those people should have worked harder/planned better" It wasn't that long ago that poor people who needed critical medical care were kicked to the curb to die on the street because they couldn't pay.

oneplane 10y ago

Why would there be nobody left to buy the products? And what does it have to do with replacing workers? I imagine that if they are producing something, they are doing so because of a demand. Once the demand is gone, they most likely will stop producing.

metaphorm 10y ago
demand for consumer products is driven by consumer confidence, i.e. by surplus in worker wages after cost of living is accounted for. if the workers are having trouble getting a decent wage, where does that surplus come from? what happens to consumer confidence, and aggregate demand if people are losing their jobs?
- CaptSpify 10y ago
  If we can figure out a decent economic system, then there won't be problems giving people a decent wage. Sure, if we keep doing things the way we are now then nobody will get a decent wage, but that's a very fixable problem.
  - Bombthecat 10y ago
    It is not a fixable thing. You don't fix thousands of years of human evolution overnight. Or one generation. It will take several thousand years to fix that.
    - CaptSpify 10y ago
      Are you actually arguing that it will take several thousands of years to change our economic model? I find this argument hard to take seriously
      - Bombthecat 10y ago
        My guess is five to six thousand years before humans move away from the "winner takes it all" scheme ( or alpha behaviour) In twenty years we pretty much will know who is right. I'd rather buy shares of companies then hoping for a sudden change in human behaviour.
        CaptSpify 10y ago
        We can change human behavior. We do it all the time. We just need to incentive it differently like we do with other systems. In 20 years we won't know "who is right", we'll just know that we went with system X instead of system Y.
        vorotato 10y ago
        Funny because there have been societies which have not been that way in the past. Also there's pretty much 0 evidence that that's a component of evolutionary psychology vs just the social norms in our given society.
- FLUX-YOU 10y ago
  >if the workers are having trouble getting a decent wage, where does that surplus come from? what happens to consumer confidence, and aggregate demand if people are losing their jobs? Probably not a lot. Automation headlines are probably going to take a back seat to Trump administration headlines for a good long while. Just from feeling, it seems to be happening fast enough to be a real concern, but not fast enough to cause panic, draw attention, and quick action.
paulryanrogers 10y ago
My guess is that if robots put enough people out of work then the ability to pay will impact the demand

homero 10y ago

Basic income is the only future, truck drivers will be all out of work by 2020 for example

base698 10y ago
Read "The True Believer" and see if you come to the same conclusion. "It is usually those whose poverty is relatively recent, the “new poor,” who throb with the ferment of frustration. The memory of better things is as fire in their veins. They are the disinherited and dispossessed who respond to every rising mass movement."
noarchy 10y ago
>Basic income is the only future, truck drivers will be all out of work by 2020 for example This has become the refrain in the comment section for every article dealing with automation I've seen, of late. Some of the articles, I suspect, are being posted by basic income proponents. Even accepting the premise that a basic income would be needed in the case of near-universal automation, there are plenty of us who are yet to be convinced that we're heading in that direction.
- olegkikin 10y ago
  I don't think most of the people talking about basic income are the proponents. I'm a strong believer in that you should be paid the market rate for your work, so if you want to make good money, you must make smart choices about your education and career. That makes the whole system more efficient. I do however think that basic income is inevitable, because of the automation on the scale we've never seen before. Inevitable, because the other option is to let the unemployed starve. So not really an option.
  - gloverkcn 10y ago
    I'd like to think that letting the unemployed starve is not an option, but it is. People can be extremely cruel when they don't have to take responsibility for the outcomes of government policies. They lean on "those people should have worked harder/planned better" It wasn't that long ago that poor people who needed critical medical care were kicked to the curb to die on the street because they couldn't pay.