3 ms·
> Is it not economically rational to replace people with machines and concentrate wealth in the hands of the machine owners regardless of minimum wage policy?
by BirAdam 5y ago
> Is it not economically rational to replace people with machines and concentrate wealth in the hands of the machine owners regardless of minimum wage policy?
No. Automating a person's job away makes sense only if the cost to automate is equivalent to or less than the cost of a person, and also if the automaton does work of equal value or higher value. Otherwise, it is not worth it. There are also situations in which a automaton is never the correct answer. For example, a barista: the culture of a coffeehouse is such that a human is preferred. This is likewise true for a pub, and myriad other situations. The only way that these jobs get automated is if the economics of them becomes otherwise impossible.
- geofft 5y agoBut automation gets more efficient over time. Twenty years ago, an automaton that could drive you around city streets required a whole university research lab and barely worked. Today, it's very realistically possible. Twenty years from now, it's hard to imagine it being more expensive than a taxi driver. Twenty years ago, we had drip coffee makers and early Keurig machines. Today, we have latte art printers. Twenty years from now, vending machines that produce Instagram-worthy iced lattes with whipped cream and caramel drizzles will likely be commonplace. If your minimum wage plan is taking automation into account, your plan would have to be to slowly lower minimum wage over time so that, as robots get more efficient, humans are always paid a little less than them. That would be a coherent policy - for a few years. But eventually that leaves you with a minimum wage under a penny. What's your plan then?