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So my Girlfriend (Monica) is currently doing her Master's at UPENN in social-policy & data science. Her major area of research and focus is on the impact of tec

by alexc05 10y ago

So my Girlfriend (Monica) is currently doing her Master's at UPENN in social-policy & data science. Her major area of research and focus is on the impact of technological unemployment (which is an umbrella term which represents job loss due to robots and AI) (we're currently looking for an internship by the way, so if you're in this area, please feel free to reach out!) Some of the estimates of job-losses approach >50% which, for context, the great depression was 15% to 25% So we're looking at the rough equivalent of 2 to 3 great depressions in terms of unemployment, but productivity should be equal or higher. A lot of the solutions being looked at center around basic income, but there are some really interesting questions around BI like "how do we help people deal with the emotional impact of 'freeloading'?" or "how do we deal with 'life without purpose'?" She's thrown out some interesting solutions (I think). There is expected to be a lot of focus on subsidized training. One sort-of "out there" idea which I don't think I've heard anywhere was 'framing' the BI payments as a 'royalty' on the data they provide merely by existing. Since marketing, science and government with the help of big-data tracks everyone so deeply then turns around and re-sells that data, the people being reported on 'deserve a royalty' on the data they provide. (I'm paraphrasing and she is way smarter than me, so the way she put it was a lot more convincing). If you're looking for more information on the coming tsunami of technological unemployment there were some incredibly interesting whitepapers published by the white-house on the policy impact of this stuff. PREPARING FOR THE FUTURE OF ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE - oct 2016 https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/default/files/whitehouse_files/microsites/ostp/NSTC/preparing_for_the_future_of_ai.pdf https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/default/files/whi... Artificial Intelligence, Automation, and the Economy - dec 2016 https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/whitehouse.gov/files/documents/Artificial-Intelligence-Automation-Economy.PDF https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/whitehouse.gov/fi... Monica's papers really echoed those whitehouse ones, though she hasn't published any of them yet, but the professors seem interested in publishing with her on a few things. Anyways, this stuff really is a pretty big deal. You'll see Elon Musk talking about the 50% unemployment figure and the need for BI. Who knows where today's whitehouse is going to go on this stuff, but we're really going to have to be prepared. Ontario Canada is kicking off a project in this now and a few other countries around the world have pilots brewing.

massysett 10y ago
When I hear people talking about the mass unemployment, all I can do is yawn. Wind back the clock 100 years and replace "robot" with "tractor" or "factory machine" and people made the same claims. They didn't see the jobs that would replace the jobs eliminated by the tractor. Centuries ago most Americans worked (many involuntarily) in agriculture. Most of those jobs were eliminated and replaced with jobs that didn't exist years ago. Even years ago, people were leaving the farm while other jobs were being created...like telephone company lineman or operator. Certainly jobs will be eliminated by automation. That's easy to see. But new jobs are always being created. The problem is that we don't know which jobs will be created, while the jobs being destroyed are tangible and exist right now.
- tonyedgecombe 10y ago
  You can already see it is different this time, if you are unskilled then the opportunities are very thin and have been for some time.
- alexc05 10y ago
  I mean yes, to some extent you are right. People are generally resilient and society as a whole will undoubtedly bounce back over the course of the billions of people on the planet. With that said, there's nothing to say that we can't help manage the transition for the massive numbers of people who ARE expected to be effected by this. Consider the cost of retraining. Who would support going back to school? As a society we have the ability and resources to ensure people who do have their livelihoods automated aren't rendered homeless by a sudden unexpected loss of income. We see the job losses on the horizon and we can plan ahead for it. We can yawn "because tractors" or we can start building out the social safety net now so we get out ahead of it. New jobs will undoubtedly arise to take the role of those jobs being automated now, but the change isn't necessarily immediate, 1:1, or optimally geo-located. We need schemes in place in order to support the transition period. Retraining, mobility, nutrition, shelter could all need stop-gaps to prevent catastrophe for some populations. Much of Monica's research is finding that women, minorities and populations which are currently "at-risk" already are expected to be disproportionately affected by the coming wave of automation. Lower education & working poor are going to get hit badly by this. Consider for example Detroit, Consider "coal country" - the it's not as easy to say "because tractors" to the real people who are suddenly out of work in a city or state where the entire economy just dried up. Maybe they were already living paycheck-to-paycheck, maybe their nest-egg investment in their house suddenly became worthless because nobody needs to move to town anymore. Maybe after 30 or 40 years at the plant they're close to retirement, but have deeply specialized in something where they can't generalize their existing skills. And so on. "because tractors" is very little comfort to them. "People" will be fine in general, "these people" quite specifically will be devastated. Maybe there's a role for legislation that requires companies reducing workforce to support those former employees for longer?

by alexc05 10y ago

massysett 10y ago

When I hear people talking about the mass unemployment, all I can do is yawn. Wind back the clock 100 years and replace "robot" with "tractor" or "factory machine" and people made the same claims. They didn't see the jobs that would replace the jobs eliminated by the tractor. Centuries ago most Americans worked (many involuntarily) in agriculture. Most of those jobs were eliminated and replaced with jobs that didn't exist years ago. Even years ago, people were leaving the farm while other jobs were being created...like telephone company lineman or operator. Certainly jobs will be eliminated by automation. That's easy to see. But new jobs are always being created. The problem is that we don't know which jobs will be created, while the jobs being destroyed are tangible and exist right now.

tonyedgecombe 10y ago
You can already see it is different this time, if you are unskilled then the opportunities are very thin and have been for some time.
alexc05 10y ago
I mean yes, to some extent you are right. People are generally resilient and society as a whole will undoubtedly bounce back over the course of the billions of people on the planet. With that said, there's nothing to say that we can't help manage the transition for the massive numbers of people who ARE expected to be effected by this. Consider the cost of retraining. Who would support going back to school? As a society we have the ability and resources to ensure people who do have their livelihoods automated aren't rendered homeless by a sudden unexpected loss of income. We see the job losses on the horizon and we can plan ahead for it. We can yawn "because tractors" or we can start building out the social safety net now so we get out ahead of it. New jobs will undoubtedly arise to take the role of those jobs being automated now, but the change isn't necessarily immediate, 1:1, or optimally geo-located. We need schemes in place in order to support the transition period. Retraining, mobility, nutrition, shelter could all need stop-gaps to prevent catastrophe for some populations. Much of Monica's research is finding that women, minorities and populations which are currently "at-risk" already are expected to be disproportionately affected by the coming wave of automation. Lower education & working poor are going to get hit badly by this. Consider for example Detroit, Consider "coal country" - the it's not as easy to say "because tractors" to the real people who are suddenly out of work in a city or state where the entire economy just dried up. Maybe they were already living paycheck-to-paycheck, maybe their nest-egg investment in their house suddenly became worthless because nobody needs to move to town anymore. Maybe after 30 or 40 years at the plant they're close to retirement, but have deeply specialized in something where they can't generalize their existing skills. And so on. "because tractors" is very little comfort to them. "People" will be fine in general, "these people" quite specifically will be devastated. Maybe there's a role for legislation that requires companies reducing workforce to support those former employees for longer?