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> AI that can replace humans at most tasks within a couple years of R&D hasn’t happened before. We've seen absolutely massive automation in manufacturing, and

> AI that can replace humans at most tasks within a couple years of R&D hasn’t happened before. We've seen absolutely massive automation in manufacturing, and as you noted even in farming. And no massive unemployment as a result. I just won't believe that AI will do anything more than hugely increase productivity until I see the unemployment. People have predicted massive unemployment with every new technology advance. They were wrong every time. > The ones unionizing are the labor producers, so not a valid analogy. They are also the consumers. How are the wealthy supposed to get that way or even stay that way with no consumers?

EGreg 3y ago
No massive unemployment? The Great Depression lasted quite a while! And we only got out of it by after a decade of building up the next job sector of things for people to work in (see three sector model in economics) Compare pictures of farms before and after automation and count the number of farmhands. Before automation, 20% of American jobs were farm-related! Read Grapes of Wrath and other books by John Steinbeck… you won’t say there was no unemployment after that. The Great Depression was largely caused by loss of farm jobs. As the farmhands migrated to the cities it took a decade to build up the manufacturing centers to give them all jobs. In the meantime, one third of the banks failed and the money supply they issued. The Fed didn’t bail them out and we got a depression. Oh, and the hugely increased productivity led farmers to be engaged in a race to the bottom, trying to make up for falling prices with ever-larger harvests. The land became depleted and this led to the Dust Bowl as it simply blew away in dust storms. Capitalism does this around the world. TODAY, one third of arable farmland has undergone desertification, likely due to similar economic factors. This is wayyy more pressing than global warming: https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/12/third-of-earths-soil-acutely-degraded-due-to-agriculture-study https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/12/third-of... > How are the wealthy supposed to get that way and stay that way with no consumers? The wealthy can get that way without needing to pay much to human PRODUCERS. That’s the point. If the only way an average person can get money and be a consumer is to sell their labor, then they will get less purchasing power over time. Yes things might get cheaper due to technology, but not everything (eg rent) and also the money supply could be inflated so prices could also rise due to that. The government COULD be giving all that money to people as a UBI but it usually exacerbates inequality by propping up stock markets etc. Also, if wealthy people control all the resources and infrastructure then they can easily extract rents from all kinds of ecosystems. But even if the people on the ground barely have any money, the wealthy can just pay corporations for their own needs (eg robots doing their work). The owners of the corporations are wealthy and they cover the cost of robots. We already see this in rising inequality … the wealthy didn’t need the poor to consume their products. Many of them could just have the middle class and wealthy consume them. (Look up Plutocracy.) Having said that… if the automation could be made accessible to all, then everyone would be increasingly a consumer of products made by robots. Tax the robots, and give the money to the people unconditionally, so they can consume more.
- tchaffee 3y ago
  > The Great Depression lasted quite a while! It wasn't caused by a big advance in technology. [1] "There is no consensus among economists and historians regarding the exact causes of the Great Depression. However, many scholars agree that at least the following four factors played a role." 1. The stock market crash of 1929. 2. Banking panics and monetary contraction. 3. The gold standard. 4. Decreased international lending and tariffs. Nowhere are technological advances mentioned. You can probably find an article that mentions it, but productivity increases as a cause are considered heterodox theory. > If the only way an average person can get money and be a consumer is to sell their labor, then they will get less purchasing power over time. Not if they are as organized and lawyer up like the folks they are negotiating with. And the numbers say you are wrong. Purchasing power has stayed about the same over the past 40 years. [2] The real problem is that workers increasingly negotiate as individuals against an organized management team who has the goal of extracting more profit for the owners, and less profit for the workers. Organized workers have far more negotiating power, but workers fail to join in and use this advantage. Who is to blame for that other than us workers ourselves? If workers had become more unionized over the past 40 years, they would have captured more of the profits and wealth gaps would be smaller. We can see exactly this with UPS announcing lower earnings for owners in the coming years due to unions winning higher salaries. > The wealthy can get that way without needing to pay much to human PRODUCERS. That’s the point. How? Where exactly is the money going to come from if the producers don't have any money to spend? From where does this money magically appear and who is buying the products that the wealthy are selling? [1] https://www.britannica.com/story/causes-of-the-great-depression https://www.britannica.com/story/causes-of-the-great-depress... [2] https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2018/08/07/for-most-us-workers-real-wages-have-barely-budged-for-decades/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2018/08/07/for-most-...
  - EGreg 3y ago
    It may be heterodox (like Einstein’s theory of relativity vs the luminiferous aether theories) but I think the facts are there. I follow more the thinking of Joe Stiglitz and the Three Sector Model of economics to arrive at that conclusion: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2012/01/stiglitz-depression-201201 https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2012/01/stiglitz-depression-...

EGreg 3y ago

No massive unemployment? The Great Depression lasted quite a while! And we only got out of it by after a decade of building up the next job sector of things for people to work in (see three sector model in economics) Compare pictures of farms before and after automation and count the number of farmhands. Before automation, 20% of American jobs were farm-related! Read Grapes of Wrath and other books by John Steinbeck… you won’t say there was no unemployment after that. The Great Depression was largely caused by loss of farm jobs. As the farmhands migrated to the cities it took a decade to build up the manufacturing centers to give them all jobs. In the meantime, one third of the banks failed and the money supply they issued. The Fed didn’t bail them out and we got a depression. Oh, and the hugely increased productivity led farmers to be engaged in a race to the bottom, trying to make up for falling prices with ever-larger harvests. The land became depleted and this led to the Dust Bowl as it simply blew away in dust storms. Capitalism does this around the world. TODAY, one third of arable farmland has undergone desertification, likely due to similar economic factors. This is wayyy more pressing than global warming: https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/12/third-of-earths-soil-acutely-degraded-due-to-agriculture-study https://amp.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/12/third-of... > How are the wealthy supposed to get that way and stay that way with no consumers? The wealthy can get that way without needing to pay much to human PRODUCERS. That’s the point. If the only way an average person can get money and be a consumer is to sell their labor, then they will get less purchasing power over time. Yes things might get cheaper due to technology, but not everything (eg rent) and also the money supply could be inflated so prices could also rise due to that. The government COULD be giving all that money to people as a UBI but it usually exacerbates inequality by propping up stock markets etc. Also, if wealthy people control all the resources and infrastructure then they can easily extract rents from all kinds of ecosystems. But even if the people on the ground barely have any money, the wealthy can just pay corporations for their own needs (eg robots doing their work). The owners of the corporations are wealthy and they cover the cost of robots. We already see this in rising inequality … the wealthy didn’t need the poor to consume their products. Many of them could just have the middle class and wealthy consume them. (Look up Plutocracy.) Having said that… if the automation could be made accessible to all, then everyone would be increasingly a consumer of products made by robots. Tax the robots, and give the money to the people unconditionally, so they can consume more.

tchaffee 3y ago
> The Great Depression lasted quite a while! It wasn't caused by a big advance in technology. [1] "There is no consensus among economists and historians regarding the exact causes of the Great Depression. However, many scholars agree that at least the following four factors played a role." 1. The stock market crash of 1929. 2. Banking panics and monetary contraction. 3. The gold standard. 4. Decreased international lending and tariffs. Nowhere are technological advances mentioned. You can probably find an article that mentions it, but productivity increases as a cause are considered heterodox theory. > If the only way an average person can get money and be a consumer is to sell their labor, then they will get less purchasing power over time. Not if they are as organized and lawyer up like the folks they are negotiating with. And the numbers say you are wrong. Purchasing power has stayed about the same over the past 40 years. [2] The real problem is that workers increasingly negotiate as individuals against an organized management team who has the goal of extracting more profit for the owners, and less profit for the workers. Organized workers have far more negotiating power, but workers fail to join in and use this advantage. Who is to blame for that other than us workers ourselves? If workers had become more unionized over the past 40 years, they would have captured more of the profits and wealth gaps would be smaller. We can see exactly this with UPS announcing lower earnings for owners in the coming years due to unions winning higher salaries. > The wealthy can get that way without needing to pay much to human PRODUCERS. That’s the point. How? Where exactly is the money going to come from if the producers don't have any money to spend? From where does this money magically appear and who is buying the products that the wealthy are selling? [1] https://www.britannica.com/story/causes-of-the-great-depression https://www.britannica.com/story/causes-of-the-great-depress... [2] https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2018/08/07/for-most-us-workers-real-wages-have-barely-budged-for-decades/ https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2018/08/07/for-most-...
- EGreg 3y ago
  It may be heterodox (like Einstein’s theory of relativity vs the luminiferous aether theories) but I think the facts are there. I follow more the thinking of Joe Stiglitz and the Three Sector Model of economics to arrive at that conclusion: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2012/01/stiglitz-depression-201201 https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2012/01/stiglitz-depression-...