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I’m very on the pro-ai side (check my comment history for proof), but this “ai will give us more free time” logic is seeming more and more patronizing (to be cl

I’m very on the pro-ai side (check my comment history for proof), but this “ai will give us more free time” logic is seeming more and more patronizing (to be clear, I understand that you are being sarcastic haha). I was listening to a podcast a couple days ago and Brad Gerstner was on and mentioned that with how AI is boosting productivity that perhaps one member of a household would be able to start staying home from work if they wanted. I shut off the podcast after that (to be fair, the podcast just seemed to be one massive SpaceX IPO pump). It’s just so divorced from reality and every new advancement is just making *higher expectations for doing more work*. The unfortunate reality is: Companies that are selling ai will sell that ai will make life easier. Companies that are buying ai will demand more from employees using ai (why else would they buy it?).

__s 4mo ago
Yep. With ai tooling I can keep prompting at 3am while sleep deprived. As a result I have mountains of slop plans / code to review. Hours of work which can't be matched by anyone who thinks they can poke a prompt for the day & go
- 9cb14c1ec0 4mo ago
  It turns out the demand for software is so great that even when it can be produced instantly at zero cost demand still far outstrips supply.
chrisandchris 4mo ago
Just as happened with the horse, with the car, with the steam machine, with the industrialization in general, ... oh wait, we still have to work 8-10 hours 5 days a week, times two, to make enough for a living. So when exactly is this productivity going to hit that doubles my income?
- theobreuerweil 4mo ago
  I guess the argument would go that your income is significantly higher in the sense that the quantity and complexity of stuff that you can afford now is vastly greater than 100 years ago (e.g. washing machines, cars, clothes, computers). I’m not that saying it’s making anyone happier, mind you
  - philistine 4mo ago
    It's all a matter of perspective. 100 years ago, the middle class' purchasing power is far bigger. Compared to 50 years ago, the middle class is getting poorer.
    - SpicyLemonZest 4mo ago
      The typical middle class family 50 years ago lived in a house you’d consider small and dingy, ate food you’d consider poverty meals, and drove a car you’d consider a poorly assembled death trap. Ask your parents or grandparents how often they got to have real butter growing up.
      - lanstin 4mo ago
        Or fresh oranges.
      - fl4regun 4mo ago
        This is a truth very few people are willing to confront. My grandmother lived in a village, on a farm, growing her own food and slaughtering her own animals, with no working plumbing, using a well for water. Of course a lot of that changed even just moving up to the 70s, but at that point there still wasn't quite the consumerist "buy whatever you want from wherever and whomever you want and have it almost immediately" environment. I can go to a grocery store here in Canada, buy tropical fruits year round that grow nowhere near me. I never have to concern myself with "this ingredient won't be here because it is seasonal", it'll be there, it'll just be more expensive out of season, worst case I just have to go a bit farther out to a different grocer than I usually go to.
        antasvara 4mo ago
        This point is valid. However, lifestyle improvement rate is something that's slowing over time because of physical constraints. For example, the vehicle mortality rate is 1.44 per 100 million miles driven. That's down 17% from 2000 (so 25 years ago). However, the change from 1975 to 2000 was 53%. That's because as we get closer to 0, it gets harder and harder to improve those rates. On this metric at least, I don't think another 25 years will result in a noticeable amount of improvement? In the other direction, some things will become scarcer (and therefore cost more). Real estate is the obvious one; we can't create more land, and we keep having more people. Easily accessible drinking water is another; desalination is getting cheaper, but it's still way more expensive than pumping aquifer water. And some improvements are necessarily 1 time things. You can get tropical fruits year round, but that's been widely available since the 80-90's from what I can tell. So come 20 years from now, what will people be able to buy in a grocery store that I can't buy right now?
- missedthecue 4mo ago
  you can live an 1880's lifestyle working about 5 hours a week. Outdoor toilets, no plumbing, uninsulated housing. Essentially zero healthcare. No lighting after the sun goes down or before it comes up. Little variation in diet and enough calories and nutrition to make you a strapping 130 lbs five foot four. You just don't want that.
dheera 4mo ago
Capitalism, by nature, will want to force everything to the limit. It's the same thing that happens to housing. People complain housing gets expensive because of "tech workers". No. The reality is greedy landlords can charge 20% more so they charge 20% more. They could be happy with what they make now, but no, they'd rather have the extra 20%. And so housing prices go up 20%. The thing is, it's not just landlords that are greedy. Everyone is greedy. Companies are greedy. Yeah, you can get the same amount of work done in 1/5 the hours per day. But why not do 5x the work instead?

__s 4mo ago

Yep. With ai tooling I can keep prompting at 3am while sleep deprived. As a result I have mountains of slop plans / code to review. Hours of work which can't be matched by anyone who thinks they can poke a prompt for the day & go

9cb14c1ec0 4mo ago
It turns out the demand for software is so great that even when it can be produced instantly at zero cost demand still far outstrips supply.

chrisandchris 4mo ago

Just as happened with the horse, with the car, with the steam machine, with the industrialization in general, ... oh wait, we still have to work 8-10 hours 5 days a week, times two, to make enough for a living. So when exactly is this productivity going to hit that doubles my income?

theobreuerweil 4mo ago
I guess the argument would go that your income is significantly higher in the sense that the quantity and complexity of stuff that you can afford now is vastly greater than 100 years ago (e.g. washing machines, cars, clothes, computers). I’m not that saying it’s making anyone happier, mind you
- philistine 4mo ago
  It's all a matter of perspective. 100 years ago, the middle class' purchasing power is far bigger. Compared to 50 years ago, the middle class is getting poorer.
  - SpicyLemonZest 4mo ago
    The typical middle class family 50 years ago lived in a house you’d consider small and dingy, ate food you’d consider poverty meals, and drove a car you’d consider a poorly assembled death trap. Ask your parents or grandparents how often they got to have real butter growing up.
    - lanstin 4mo ago
      Or fresh oranges.
    - fl4regun 4mo ago
      This is a truth very few people are willing to confront. My grandmother lived in a village, on a farm, growing her own food and slaughtering her own animals, with no working plumbing, using a well for water. Of course a lot of that changed even just moving up to the 70s, but at that point there still wasn't quite the consumerist "buy whatever you want from wherever and whomever you want and have it almost immediately" environment. I can go to a grocery store here in Canada, buy tropical fruits year round that grow nowhere near me. I never have to concern myself with "this ingredient won't be here because it is seasonal", it'll be there, it'll just be more expensive out of season, worst case I just have to go a bit farther out to a different grocer than I usually go to.
      - antasvara 4mo ago
        This point is valid. However, lifestyle improvement rate is something that's slowing over time because of physical constraints. For example, the vehicle mortality rate is 1.44 per 100 million miles driven. That's down 17% from 2000 (so 25 years ago). However, the change from 1975 to 2000 was 53%. That's because as we get closer to 0, it gets harder and harder to improve those rates. On this metric at least, I don't think another 25 years will result in a noticeable amount of improvement? In the other direction, some things will become scarcer (and therefore cost more). Real estate is the obvious one; we can't create more land, and we keep having more people. Easily accessible drinking water is another; desalination is getting cheaper, but it's still way more expensive than pumping aquifer water. And some improvements are necessarily 1 time things. You can get tropical fruits year round, but that's been widely available since the 80-90's from what I can tell. So come 20 years from now, what will people be able to buy in a grocery store that I can't buy right now?
missedthecue 4mo ago
you can live an 1880's lifestyle working about 5 hours a week. Outdoor toilets, no plumbing, uninsulated housing. Essentially zero healthcare. No lighting after the sun goes down or before it comes up. Little variation in diet and enough calories and nutrition to make you a strapping 130 lbs five foot four. You just don't want that.

dheera 4mo ago

Capitalism, by nature, will want to force everything to the limit. It's the same thing that happens to housing. People complain housing gets expensive because of "tech workers". No. The reality is greedy landlords can charge 20% more so they charge 20% more. They could be happy with what they make now, but no, they'd rather have the extra 20%. And so housing prices go up 20%. The thing is, it's not just landlords that are greedy. Everyone is greedy. Companies are greedy. Yeah, you can get the same amount of work done in 1/5 the hours per day. But why not do 5x the work instead?