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You have to remember both sides of the balance sheet. AI can offer a path to reduced costs, threatening jobs, but it also offers a path to increased profitabil

You have to remember both sides of the balance sheet. AI can offer a path to reduced costs, threatening jobs, but it also offers a path to increased profitability, which creates jobs. It's hard to tell which force wins out on net, but there's always more work to do, no matter how good our tools are.

herbst 4y ago
Not sure if that is necessarily true, so if I use AI to generate more content (which I actually do) and earn more from that. I have less work and more money. No reason to create a job for anyone else here.
gls2ro 4y ago
what if history is not always a good predictor of the future? So what if AI will indeed increase profitability while also net reducing the number of jobs? Who will buy those high margin products? Imagine you could build with AI a new Amazon. It will take one person: you and then everything else is AI and AI robots. 90% margin on everything. a business running 24/7/365 every second, no need for rest. But then suddenly you have 1.5 million people without any job or income. So your market will be reduced by at least that. now imagine that just like you another rich capitalist builds a new Amazon to compete. the ssme process one person all AI down. how do you imagine this market? Profit will be a meaningless word. I think if AGI becomes reality only the first ones having it will profit. Then society as we know it will collapse (for better or worse) and we will need to find a new way to organize economical and political.
dogcomplex 4y ago
Too limited scope. It's entirely possible increased profitability will not create jobs if it outperforms most people. However, reduced costs and increased profitability do mean increased/easier quality of life. Even if robots are outperforming people in the business sphere, you're still gonna be seeing the externalities of incredible abundance at the local level. Hard to say how that wins out on net when people can't get jobs to pay for the (very cheap) goods and services though. This is typically where government/community should step in.

herbst 4y ago

Not sure if that is necessarily true, so if I use AI to generate more content (which I actually do) and earn more from that. I have less work and more money. No reason to create a job for anyone else here.

gls2ro 4y ago

what if history is not always a good predictor of the future? So what if AI will indeed increase profitability while also net reducing the number of jobs? Who will buy those high margin products? Imagine you could build with AI a new Amazon. It will take one person: you and then everything else is AI and AI robots. 90% margin on everything. a business running 24/7/365 every second, no need for rest. But then suddenly you have 1.5 million people without any job or income. So your market will be reduced by at least that. now imagine that just like you another rich capitalist builds a new Amazon to compete. the ssme process one person all AI down. how do you imagine this market? Profit will be a meaningless word. I think if AGI becomes reality only the first ones having it will profit. Then society as we know it will collapse (for better or worse) and we will need to find a new way to organize economical and political.

dogcomplex 4y ago

Too limited scope. It's entirely possible increased profitability will not create jobs if it outperforms most people. However, reduced costs and increased profitability do mean increased/easier quality of life. Even if robots are outperforming people in the business sphere, you're still gonna be seeing the externalities of incredible abundance at the local level. Hard to say how that wins out on net when people can't get jobs to pay for the (very cheap) goods and services though. This is typically where government/community should step in.