The concern is that automated systems will become better-than-human at enough tasks of economic importance that involuntary joblessness will significantly incre

The concern is that automated systems will become better-than-human at enough tasks of economic importance that involuntary joblessness will significantly increase. The usual counter-argument is "human wants are infinite," implying that there will always be sufficient demand for new kinds of or additional quantities of paid human employment to counterbalance labor saving techniques. But that argument neglects time to reach a new equilibrium. It neglects that people displaced from old industries may not be able to fill newer jobs even if they had years to retrain. It neglects that a major human want is leisure time, and leisure time not spent consuming or producing does not contribute to paid employment.