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Great essay. This part seems particularly astute: “Most work lives in the fat middle of a bell curve. ... Models feast on that part of the curve. ... The centr

by tkgally 11mo ago

Great essay. This part seems particularly astute: “Most work lives in the fat middle of a bell curve. ... Models feast on that part of the curve. ... The central question for future labour markets is not whether you are clever or diligent in some absolute sense. It is whether what you do is ordinary enough for a model to learn or strange enough to fall through the gaps. ... An out of distribution human, in my head, is someone whose job sits far enough in the tail of that curve that it does not currently compress into training data. ... [But T]hey are not safe; nothing is. They are simply late on the automation curve.”

rudedogg 11mo ago
All of this started before ChatGPT. There are graphics showing it, sorry I can’t remember the source. I guess I’m just annoyed that everyone in the comments is reaffirming the AI is stealing jobs narrative, but half the studies coming out say it’s actually wasting peoples time and they are poor judges of their own productivity. It just feels like AI is a convenient excuse for businesses to cut costs since the economy is crap, but no one wants to admit it for fear of driving their stock price down.
- tkgally 11mo ago
  The author's argument is framed more widely than just LLMs. He also discusses robots, teleoperation, and other areas where workers in the middle of the bell curve seem especially vulnerable to displacement. I accept, though, your point that economic factors not directly related to AI are also playing a role. Presumably economists are now trying to to pick apart the effect of each factor on the job market.
Animats 11mo ago
That is indeed a good insight. What's being hollowed out are jobs for the middle of the bell curve, which, of course, is where most of the people are. The author says that in several different ways, pointing out that a quiet, reliable long-term job is no longer something that's even a likely possibility. Then he says it's only a matter of time until the outliers are automated too. That's more speculative, but may not be wrong. It's only been three years since ChatGPT shipped. This is just getting started.
k1rd 11mo ago
yeah, but move the distribution a bit and your spot on the the tail disappears.

by tkgally 11mo ago

rudedogg 11mo ago

All of this started before ChatGPT. There are graphics showing it, sorry I can’t remember the source. I guess I’m just annoyed that everyone in the comments is reaffirming the AI is stealing jobs narrative, but half the studies coming out say it’s actually wasting peoples time and they are poor judges of their own productivity. It just feels like AI is a convenient excuse for businesses to cut costs since the economy is crap, but no one wants to admit it for fear of driving their stock price down.

tkgally 11mo ago
The author's argument is framed more widely than just LLMs. He also discusses robots, teleoperation, and other areas where workers in the middle of the bell curve seem especially vulnerable to displacement. I accept, though, your point that economic factors not directly related to AI are also playing a role. Presumably economists are now trying to to pick apart the effect of each factor on the job market.

Animats 11mo ago

That is indeed a good insight. What's being hollowed out are jobs for the middle of the bell curve, which, of course, is where most of the people are. The author says that in several different ways, pointing out that a quiet, reliable long-term job is no longer something that's even a likely possibility. Then he says it's only a matter of time until the outliers are automated too. That's more speculative, but may not be wrong. It's only been three years since ChatGPT shipped. This is just getting started.

k1rd 11mo ago

yeah, but move the distribution a bit and your spot on the the tail disappears.