7 ms·

Great post. I hope we get over the stigma of "destroying jobs" when it comes to ones like these that machines can easily do. Whenever I walk around the streets

Great post. I hope we get over the stigma of "destroying jobs" when it comes to ones like these that machines can easily do. Whenever I walk around the streets of New York I can't help but think about this. Be it the miserable cab drivers sitting in traffic staring at red lights their entire life; or guys hauling dusty insulation out of a demolition site and throwing it into the back of a truck while coughing up a fit; or delivery guys biking up and down the hostile avenues of manhattan in whatever weather to deliver Chinese food. To me it will be a great tragedy if we never end up filling these necessary jobs with machines, be it for political reasons or something else. There's nothing stimulating or fulfilling about these jobs. It's first world human misery.

djrogers 10y ago
> There's nothing stimulating or fulfilling about these jobs. It's first world human misery. That's really nice of you to make that determination for those miserables. They're probably so uneducated they don't even know how bad they have it. They are lucky that's people like you can come along to take away those horrible bill-paying, medicine buying, sources of personal satisfaction.
- artursapek 10y ago
  You could have made the same inane argument for all the uneducated factory laborers who have been replaced by machines. Nowhere did I suggest these people should be broke and without health care instead. And you can't argue with me that these people I mentioned genuinely, deep down, enjoy what they do for a living.
  - swimfar 10y ago
    Why not? I worked on an electronics assembly line for a while doing electro-mechanical assembly. I enjoyed it and got satisfaction out of creating a physical product. It was kind of fun, not too stressful, sometimes monotonous, but also not too difficult. And after 8 hours I went home and didn't have to think about it until the next day. I'm not saying that everyone enjoys that, or that we should keep those jobs around because I found it fun. But don't assume that just because a job seems menial to you that it must be horrible for everyone who's doing it.
    - jayajay 10y ago
      Our life force diffuses over the options we perceive as viable and available. Many years from now, when we are all gone, kids will look back and wonder how humans could have ever been doing such jobs. Much in the same way we look back and find it hard to imagine how humans could spend the entire day chasing down prey and running from lions. It's that much of a leap that is required.
      - dagw 10y ago
        Much in the same way we look back and find it hard to imagine how humans could spend the entire day chasing down prey Lots of humans today pay good money to get a chance to go out into the woods and spend an entire day chasing down prey.
        davidivadavid 10y ago
        For entertainment. Not because they'd die if they didn't.
        dagw 10y ago
        Sure. But I also know people who still romanticize the whole hunter-gatherer lifestyle and wish they could live that life (whether or not they'd actually want to keep living that life after first month is of course an open question). Who knows, in a couple of hundred years we might have people romanticizing spending all day in a cubicle working at a mid-sized accounting firm :)
  - mklim 10y ago
    >You could have made the same inane argument for all the uneducated factory laborers who have been replaced by machines. There's nothing inane about the argument. Have you ever been to Detroit? I've lived there for years. It's a horrible thing for these people to have been replaced by automation in their lifetimes. They didn't see the benefits in the increased productivity like their employers did, they just lost their livelihood and had to scramble for jobs that paid much less while simultaneously trying to retrain into other fields, if they were enterprising. The entire region is obviously devastated from the effects of it. Their prior automated work being "unfulfilling" and therefore terrible is a) debatable and b) nothing compared to the struggle of having no income at all. One guy I knew ended up homeless after he lost his job, then with a leg amputation because of frostbite from sleeping outside. When I met him he was making a living ticket scalping in his wheelchair all day. The short term consequences are real and terrible for these people.
    - artursapek 10y ago
      That is horrible, and I understand that it's a big socioeconomic challenge. I don't claim to know the answer, but I hope we find it as a species.
    - Chris2048 10y ago
      Doesn't this just outline the terrible dependence these workers had on their jobs? No compensation of duty of care exists from employers; any number of things could have caused the workers to lose their jobs, they were always at risk even when not struggling. as an analogy: Crack addicts going through withdrawal don't conclude from their pain that the drugs were a good thing. OP wasn't suggesting workers should suddenly have their jobs taken away, but that the whole situation is bad. Changing the situation, and how to do it, is an entirely different topic.
      - iamatworknow 10y ago
        Is this sarcasm of some kind or a legitimate point you're trying to make? >Doesn't this just outline the terrible dependence these workers had on their jobs? You're effectively saying people shouldn't rely on their jobs to support their livelihood. What other option do they (rather, we) have? Maybe factory workers should have had the foresight to see the industry changing toward automation, but even if they did, then what? Keep working to support your family 40 or more hours per week but learn an entirely new craft on top of that? Does that actually seem reasonable? >any number of things could have caused the workers to lose their jobs, they were always at risk even when not struggling. Yes, but the industry still existed. Say you worked for 10 years at Ford and got fired. Maybe GM or Chrysler has an opportunity for you, and they'd probably love your experience. Does that sound familiar at all? Say you work for 10 years at Google and get fired. Maybe Facebook or Amazon has an opportunity for you, and they'd probably love your experience. My point is that putting the blame on the employee shows a complete lack of empathy for someone because they "chose the wrong path in life". Does the employer have a duty to support the individual who became obsolete? No, but we should all collectively have a duty to make sure the lives of these people aren't completely destroyed, because as unlikely as it seems right now for those of us in the software world (and I'm sure it seemed unlikely in 1995 for those in the auto industry), we very well may be next.
- LordDragonfang 10y ago
  Having worked retail and customer service jobs firsthand, and having friends (and obviously coworkers) that have as well, I'd assure you that the statement you quoted is accurate for the majority of those workers. Most people leave for any other job the moment they can, and those who can't get old and bitter.
rolodato 10y ago
> There's nothing stimulating or fulfilling about these jobs. It's first world human misery. Tell that to the workers who actually depend on those jobs to live. It's easy to get rid of "unnecessary" jobs when they're not your job.
- artursapek 10y ago
  This is the stigma I'm talking about. My argument is that humanity in general needs to ascend and let machines take care of the dirty work. It's not a law of the universe that there must be people who depend on shitty jobs to live. But I'm one of the crazies who believes that in an ideal world, there would be no 9-5 norm and it would be possible for people to spend most of their time with their family and taking care of their own physical and mental health, rather than sacrificing their waking hours to keep the unemployment rate down. These people are already acting as fleshy machines.
  - rolodato 10y ago
    I'd like to live in the same world you describe. I work 9-5 and of course, I'd rather be doing whatever I please instead of going to work. But longing for the destruction of these jobs without a realistic alternative (e.g. basic income is still a pipe dream) is too near-sighted.
    - artursapek 10y ago
      Sorry, I never meant to imply that I hope we do it hastily and without an alternative. It's an economic challenge for the ages, all I'm saying is it's worth taking on.
    - _nalply 10y ago
      Strictly looking at everyone's selfish interests we will head to destruction of jobs which can be automated because it's the companies that decide which people to employ. If a law is passed that people must be employed, automation will happen elsewhere and companies from abroad will be more successful. In other words, it's inevitable.
snomad 10y ago
A few years ago, I worked at a California university where 5 people manually keyed in all transactions for the day. Something an export from the bank could do in minutes.
njharman 10y ago
I cannot fathom at all why anyone, other than top 10% or so whose wealth depends on everyone else's labor, is fighting automation. Or wants to keep a job. I would gladly let machines do the work so I can play fetch with my dog all day. Instead of converting productivity into less work we turned it into more profit. That's a bad trade.
- pbhjpbhj 10y ago
  When the machine does your work, and the bosses keep your wage for themselves. What are you going to eat, or indeed feed your dog, how well you past for it without a wage?
  - davidivadavid 10y ago
    Why wouldn't playing fetch with his (and other people's dogs) not become a perfectly viable job in a world where consumer goods are dirt cheap and human labor relatively scarcer?
    - Chris2048 10y ago
      Why would labor be cheap?
      - davidivadavid 10y ago
        I don't know. The premise was precisely that labor would become more expensive. The idea is that if we can automate "everything" (i.e. everything that can be automated), then we'll be left with human-only services. Since humans are scarce, and there will be rising demand from the income effect, people can still perfectly live off exchanging services. I'm not sure that makes macroeconomic sense, so if someone wants to clarify misunderstandings for me, I'd be happy to hear it.
        PeterisP 10y ago
        Well, what makes you think that humans are scarce? Unemployment is a thing already. For example, you can take a look at what e.g. waiters or Walmart greeters earn right now - that's a price set by supply&demand. Automation moving more people to such jobs means the supply of labor would increase, driving down the price for services. Assuming the jobless people will have less income than if they worked, and more time to do stuff themselves (some of the services industry is essentially something that you'd prefer to make yourself but you're paying to save yourself some time) demand for service jobs would decrease, again driving down the price for services lower than it is now.
losteverything 10y ago
<There's nothing stimulating or fulfilling about these jobs I object. I can't tell what someone else feels is satisfying and I believe you can't either. Have experiences and relationships with all types of people and jobs. I have and agree with Mike Rowe. The happiest group of people he ever worked with were those he filmed and performed dirty jobs with. After freeing myself from the stigma of a professional job I gained more happiness with much less responsibility and much more free time. Like those jobs you mentioned. If I had known that when I was on call awaiting for the next system to crash only to get interrupted time and time again I would have intentionally changed careers faster.
cr0sh 10y ago
> or guys hauling dusty insulation out of a demolition site and throwing it into the back of a truck while coughing up a fit Those guys/gals may actually enjoy manual labor - some people just can stand the thought of being cooped up behind a desk in a stuffy office (or at least that's how they may envision it). Though I will say that anyone dealing with insulation - especially in a place like NYC - who doesn't wear a minimum of safety equipment (goggles, gloves, respirator or dust mask) is just begging for asbestos-related health problems down the road (heck, even regular insulation can cause respiratory health problems over time).

djrogers 10y ago

> There's nothing stimulating or fulfilling about these jobs. It's first world human misery. That's really nice of you to make that determination for those miserables. They're probably so uneducated they don't even know how bad they have it. They are lucky that's people like you can come along to take away those horrible bill-paying, medicine buying, sources of personal satisfaction.

artursapek 10y ago
You could have made the same inane argument for all the uneducated factory laborers who have been replaced by machines. Nowhere did I suggest these people should be broke and without health care instead. And you can't argue with me that these people I mentioned genuinely, deep down, enjoy what they do for a living.
- swimfar 10y ago
  Why not? I worked on an electronics assembly line for a while doing electro-mechanical assembly. I enjoyed it and got satisfaction out of creating a physical product. It was kind of fun, not too stressful, sometimes monotonous, but also not too difficult. And after 8 hours I went home and didn't have to think about it until the next day. I'm not saying that everyone enjoys that, or that we should keep those jobs around because I found it fun. But don't assume that just because a job seems menial to you that it must be horrible for everyone who's doing it.
  - jayajay 10y ago
    Our life force diffuses over the options we perceive as viable and available. Many years from now, when we are all gone, kids will look back and wonder how humans could have ever been doing such jobs. Much in the same way we look back and find it hard to imagine how humans could spend the entire day chasing down prey and running from lions. It's that much of a leap that is required.
    - dagw 10y ago
      Much in the same way we look back and find it hard to imagine how humans could spend the entire day chasing down prey Lots of humans today pay good money to get a chance to go out into the woods and spend an entire day chasing down prey.
      - davidivadavid 10y ago
        For entertainment. Not because they'd die if they didn't.
        dagw 10y ago
        Sure. But I also know people who still romanticize the whole hunter-gatherer lifestyle and wish they could live that life (whether or not they'd actually want to keep living that life after first month is of course an open question). Who knows, in a couple of hundred years we might have people romanticizing spending all day in a cubicle working at a mid-sized accounting firm :)
- mklim 10y ago
  >You could have made the same inane argument for all the uneducated factory laborers who have been replaced by machines. There's nothing inane about the argument. Have you ever been to Detroit? I've lived there for years. It's a horrible thing for these people to have been replaced by automation in their lifetimes. They didn't see the benefits in the increased productivity like their employers did, they just lost their livelihood and had to scramble for jobs that paid much less while simultaneously trying to retrain into other fields, if they were enterprising. The entire region is obviously devastated from the effects of it. Their prior automated work being "unfulfilling" and therefore terrible is a) debatable and b) nothing compared to the struggle of having no income at all. One guy I knew ended up homeless after he lost his job, then with a leg amputation because of frostbite from sleeping outside. When I met him he was making a living ticket scalping in his wheelchair all day. The short term consequences are real and terrible for these people.
  - artursapek 10y ago
    That is horrible, and I understand that it's a big socioeconomic challenge. I don't claim to know the answer, but I hope we find it as a species.
  - Chris2048 10y ago
    Doesn't this just outline the terrible dependence these workers had on their jobs? No compensation of duty of care exists from employers; any number of things could have caused the workers to lose their jobs, they were always at risk even when not struggling. as an analogy: Crack addicts going through withdrawal don't conclude from their pain that the drugs were a good thing. OP wasn't suggesting workers should suddenly have their jobs taken away, but that the whole situation is bad. Changing the situation, and how to do it, is an entirely different topic.
    - iamatworknow 10y ago
      Is this sarcasm of some kind or a legitimate point you're trying to make? >Doesn't this just outline the terrible dependence these workers had on their jobs? You're effectively saying people shouldn't rely on their jobs to support their livelihood. What other option do they (rather, we) have? Maybe factory workers should have had the foresight to see the industry changing toward automation, but even if they did, then what? Keep working to support your family 40 or more hours per week but learn an entirely new craft on top of that? Does that actually seem reasonable? >any number of things could have caused the workers to lose their jobs, they were always at risk even when not struggling. Yes, but the industry still existed. Say you worked for 10 years at Ford and got fired. Maybe GM or Chrysler has an opportunity for you, and they'd probably love your experience. Does that sound familiar at all? Say you work for 10 years at Google and get fired. Maybe Facebook or Amazon has an opportunity for you, and they'd probably love your experience. My point is that putting the blame on the employee shows a complete lack of empathy for someone because they "chose the wrong path in life". Does the employer have a duty to support the individual who became obsolete? No, but we should all collectively have a duty to make sure the lives of these people aren't completely destroyed, because as unlikely as it seems right now for those of us in the software world (and I'm sure it seemed unlikely in 1995 for those in the auto industry), we very well may be next.
LordDragonfang 10y ago
Having worked retail and customer service jobs firsthand, and having friends (and obviously coworkers) that have as well, I'd assure you that the statement you quoted is accurate for the majority of those workers. Most people leave for any other job the moment they can, and those who can't get old and bitter.

rolodato 10y ago

> There's nothing stimulating or fulfilling about these jobs. It's first world human misery. Tell that to the workers who actually depend on those jobs to live. It's easy to get rid of "unnecessary" jobs when they're not your job.

artursapek 10y ago
This is the stigma I'm talking about. My argument is that humanity in general needs to ascend and let machines take care of the dirty work. It's not a law of the universe that there must be people who depend on shitty jobs to live. But I'm one of the crazies who believes that in an ideal world, there would be no 9-5 norm and it would be possible for people to spend most of their time with their family and taking care of their own physical and mental health, rather than sacrificing their waking hours to keep the unemployment rate down. These people are already acting as fleshy machines.
- rolodato 10y ago
  I'd like to live in the same world you describe. I work 9-5 and of course, I'd rather be doing whatever I please instead of going to work. But longing for the destruction of these jobs without a realistic alternative (e.g. basic income is still a pipe dream) is too near-sighted.
  - artursapek 10y ago
    Sorry, I never meant to imply that I hope we do it hastily and without an alternative. It's an economic challenge for the ages, all I'm saying is it's worth taking on.
  - _nalply 10y ago
    Strictly looking at everyone's selfish interests we will head to destruction of jobs which can be automated because it's the companies that decide which people to employ. If a law is passed that people must be employed, automation will happen elsewhere and companies from abroad will be more successful. In other words, it's inevitable.

snomad 10y ago

A few years ago, I worked at a California university where 5 people manually keyed in all transactions for the day. Something an export from the bank could do in minutes.

njharman 10y ago

I cannot fathom at all why anyone, other than top 10% or so whose wealth depends on everyone else's labor, is fighting automation. Or wants to keep a job. I would gladly let machines do the work so I can play fetch with my dog all day. Instead of converting productivity into less work we turned it into more profit. That's a bad trade.

pbhjpbhj 10y ago
When the machine does your work, and the bosses keep your wage for themselves. What are you going to eat, or indeed feed your dog, how well you past for it without a wage?
- davidivadavid 10y ago
  Why wouldn't playing fetch with his (and other people's dogs) not become a perfectly viable job in a world where consumer goods are dirt cheap and human labor relatively scarcer?
  - Chris2048 10y ago
    Why would labor be cheap?
    - davidivadavid 10y ago
      I don't know. The premise was precisely that labor would become more expensive. The idea is that if we can automate "everything" (i.e. everything that can be automated), then we'll be left with human-only services. Since humans are scarce, and there will be rising demand from the income effect, people can still perfectly live off exchanging services. I'm not sure that makes macroeconomic sense, so if someone wants to clarify misunderstandings for me, I'd be happy to hear it.
      - PeterisP 10y ago
        Well, what makes you think that humans are scarce? Unemployment is a thing already. For example, you can take a look at what e.g. waiters or Walmart greeters earn right now - that's a price set by supply&demand. Automation moving more people to such jobs means the supply of labor would increase, driving down the price for services. Assuming the jobless people will have less income than if they worked, and more time to do stuff themselves (some of the services industry is essentially something that you'd prefer to make yourself but you're paying to save yourself some time) demand for service jobs would decrease, again driving down the price for services lower than it is now.

losteverything 10y ago

<There's nothing stimulating or fulfilling about these jobs I object. I can't tell what someone else feels is satisfying and I believe you can't either. Have experiences and relationships with all types of people and jobs. I have and agree with Mike Rowe. The happiest group of people he ever worked with were those he filmed and performed dirty jobs with. After freeing myself from the stigma of a professional job I gained more happiness with much less responsibility and much more free time. Like those jobs you mentioned. If I had known that when I was on call awaiting for the next system to crash only to get interrupted time and time again I would have intentionally changed careers faster.

cr0sh 10y ago

> or guys hauling dusty insulation out of a demolition site and throwing it into the back of a truck while coughing up a fit Those guys/gals may actually enjoy manual labor - some people just can stand the thought of being cooped up behind a desk in a stuffy office (or at least that's how they may envision it). Though I will say that anyone dealing with insulation - especially in a place like NYC - who doesn't wear a minimum of safety equipment (goggles, gloves, respirator or dust mask) is just begging for asbestos-related health problems down the road (heck, even regular insulation can cause respiratory health problems over time).