A Thought Experiment

[Rattrap]

Here is a thought experiment, dumbed down to the simplest terms to fit into a forum post. That said, this can be fairly extrapolated to the real world, and is/will be soon enough.

Imagine a community with a McDonald's. It has 10 employees. Next to it is a Wal-Mart. It has 50. Across the street is a software development firm with 5. Standard 40-hour work weeks.

Automation rolls in. 7 of 10 McDonald's employees are made redundant. 40 of 50 Wal-Mart employees. Software firm's untouched.

A common talking point: There are now more high-end jobs, as the automation needs to be programmed and serviced. True - let's say 10 of the 47 redundant employees get retrained, 3-4 as programmers for the automation at the software firm, the rest to service the automation (presumably still by their previous employers).

Because the whole point of automation is to be much more efficient, these 10 effectively replace the 47. You now have 37 people without jobs and it doesn't matter if they also get retrained or not, because those jobs are full up. You can't move them to another community, as all communities are going through the same thing (maybe at offset times/speed, but eventually this will be everywhere).

What do you do with those 37 people? What do you do with the economy? What gives first?

 

[mongo18]

I spend a lot of time thinking about this. Automation is going to replace a lot of jobs in a very short amount of time in the very near future. The majority of jobs that disappear are not going to be replaced. It's not just unskilled jobs either, I saw one estimate that 40% of the financial sector could be redundant in a pretty short time.

I think mass poverty and underemployment are going to be normal in my children's lifetime, if not my own. Toss in the joys of the imminent destruction of the environment and ecosystem and you can add mass starvation to the pile.

One of the things I'm trying to teach my kids is to not have the expectation that their life will look like past generations (especially those fucking baby boomers who took everything and left nothing). They're going to have to get by and be able to find happiness with a lot less. And I think the younger generations are adapting to that quite nicely. They are fine taking the bus and not owning a car, and not just renting, but buying into shared houses (look up housing affordability in Australia, it's a nightmare. Unless you're a baby boomer who bought your house for 10k in the 80s and are selling it for 1.5 million now...).

Anyway, I have to go right now. But I am very much interested in this topic.

 

[bobjustbob]

I understand that you made this scenario simplistic but it really is more complicated than that. Business is to make money and one of those ways to make money is to grow. Investing in growth takes on many facets. Expanding or building another store takes materials and labor. They have to be designed and constructed. Land needs to be purchased or leased. Trucks need to be loaded and unloaded and logistically set up to build them and keep them stocked. Competition will roll in to grab their piece of the pie. Prices will come down too.

 

[Jagger69]

Interesting question. In addition to Bob's comments, I would also say that automation will create or preserve jobs for people who need to maintain and monitor the robotics. The airline industry is a great example. Modern jets can literally fly themselves (including robotic landings) but the need for pilots to be behind the controls will always be needed to adjust and monitor the automation as well as take over control in the event of malfunction. Plus, there will be factory and technician jobs to build and maintain the robotics. I understand that these may not be a 1-for-1 trade-off but they will be created nonetheless. Unfortunately, where you will see the biggest drop off is in low-skill job sector like your describe where not only will automation replace their function but, due to their lack of marketable skills, large groups of people on the lower end of the socio-economic scale will be unable to find work (much as it always has been). Building a traditional educational structure for high and low-tech jobs needs to be the priority to maximize employment potential due to creation of a larger pool of those who do possess marketable skills but, again, this is nothing new. Same problem, different conditons.

 

[mongo18]

Stephen Hawking - "the automation of factories has already decimated jobs in traditional manufacturing, and the rise of artificial intelligence is likely to extend this job destruction deep into the middle classes, with only the most caring, creative or supervisory roles remaining."

A report put out in February 2016 by Citibank in partnership with the University of Oxford predicted that 47% of US jobs are at risk of automation. In the UK, 35% are. In China, it's a whopping 77% — while across the OECD it's an average of 57%

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2016...ll-be-the-impact-of-automation-and-ai-on-jobs

There's also an interesting chart on that link showing how many jobs in various industries are likely to be lost to automation. In Australia, where student debt isn't a massive problem like in the US, and people have grown up told that they have to get a university degree to be successful, we have an oversupply of graduates in almost every field that can't find work. On average, university graduates starting out make less money than high school graduates. Just yesterday I heard a speech by the head of the Australian Medical Association saying that they expect an oversupply of medicine grads in the near future. Even software and automation developers are not safe. Software is unbelievably complex, and made by people it is shitty and buggy, I'm sure nobody will argue that. It's only a matter of time before software exists that can write new software that's better than anything humans could come up with. I've written code like that of limited size and scope, but there are people out there working on much bigger versions.

A 2013 study from the University of Oxford concluded that 47% of jobs in the US will likely be automated over the next two decades. - https://www.forbes.com/sites/olivie...tion-will-affect-you-and-the-us/#5cbd92283fd7

The idea that jobs in maintaining all this automation will make up for the massive job losses is some serious head-in-the-sand thinking.

What determines vulnerability to automation is not so much whether the work concerned is manual or white-collar but whether or not it is routine...a highly trained and specialised radiologist may now be in greater danger of being replaced by a machine than his own executive assistant - https://www.economist.com/news/spec...ause-mass-unemployment-automation-and-anxiety

 

[bobjustbob]

Jobs and people have always been replaced. If dad made his living installing telephones, his son is now selling or fixing iPhones. It's evolution. Building for the future. At some point in time the petroleum industry will be a dinosaur. Not a good prospect for those looking to work on an oil rig but if you can install a solar panel you're collecting a paycheck.

 

[Chopper3000]

I never got past the McDonald's bit. Their employees have been on 'automation' for 60 years. This thread is null and void.

 

[Rattrap]

I understand that you made this scenario simplistic but it really is more complicated than that. Business is to make money and one of those ways to make money is to grow. Investing in growth takes on many facets. Expanding or building another store takes materials and labor. They have to be designed and constructed. Land needs to be purchased or leased. Trucks need to be loaded and unloaded and logistically set up to build them and keep them stocked. Competition will roll in to grab their piece of the pie. Prices will come down too.

Interesting question. In addition to Bob's comments, I would also say that automation will create or preserve jobs for people who need to maintain and monitor the robotics. The airline industry is a great example. Modern jets can literally fly themselves (including robotic landings) but the need for pilots to be behind the controls will always be needed to adjust and monitor the automation as well as take over control in the event of malfunction. Plus, there will be factory and technician jobs to build and maintain the robotics. I understand that these may not be a 1-for-1 trade-off but they will be created nonetheless. Unfortunately, where you will see the biggest drop off is in low-skill job sector like your describe where not only will automation replace their function but, due to their lack of marketable skills, large groups of people on the lower end of the socio-economic scale will be unable to find work (much as it always has been). Building a traditional educational structure for high and low-tech jobs needs to be the priority to maximize employment potential due to creation of a larger pool of those who do possess marketable skills but, again, this is nothing new. Same problem, different conditons.

Jobs and people have always been replaced. If dad made his living installing telephones, his son is now selling or fixing iPhones. It's evolution. Building for the future. At some point in time the petroleum industry will be a dinosaur. Not a good prospect for those looking to work on an oil rig but if you can install a solar panel you're collecting a paycheck.

All true - but none of this counters the core of my overly simplistic experiment: With technology and automation, the amount of labor required to make everything that people could need or want will go down, while the population continues to go up. There will not be as many jobs as people, regardless of skill level. So what do we do as a society about that?

 

[Jagger69]

All true - but none of this counters the core of my overly simplistic experiment: With technology and automation, the amount of labor required to make everything that people could need or want will go down, while the population continues to go up. There will not be as many jobs as people, regardless of skill level. So what do we do as a society about that?

I think this ultimately evolves into either one of two things, RT. There will either be a worldwide revolution among the proletariat that will topple the present world order and establish a communist paradise (in their eyes at least) or, much more likely, some sort of guaranteed annual income will be put in place that will be just enough to assure survival and keep the general populace from revolting. I think given the two presented options, the latter is the obvious course of action that will be undertaken. How else will the present socio-economic power structure be able to assure its current level of dominance without violence?

 

[mongo18]

I think this ultimately evolves into either one of two things, RT. There will either be a worldwide revolution among the proletariat that will topple the present world order and establish a communist paradise (in their eyes at least) or, much more likely, some sort of guaranteed annual income will be put in place that will be just enough to assure survival and keep the general populace from revolting. I think given the two presented options, the latter is the obvious course of action that will be undertaken. How else will the present socio-economic power structure be able to assure its current level of dominance without violence?

I think the former is more likely. History is full of ruling classes that didn't know when to stop squeezing the masses. Do you think our current crop is any smarter?

 

[Jagger69]

I think the former is more likely. History is full of ruling classes that didn't know when to stop squeezing the masses. Do you think our current crop is any smarter?

No but they are a helluva lot richer.

 

[Supafly]

We need to integrate the effect of different countries with variopus payment level expectations into the picture. Let me explain:

One of my neighbours has what we in GHermany call a "Gesellenbrief" as a painter and laquerer. That is a degree that states you have mastered the first level of this profession. During his tie with the german army, he got some further add-on skills, so he can - in ideal circumstances - demand a rather higher payment than a basic painterman.

But the times are not ideal, and, he tiold me, he applied for a job for the company that rents our appartments. They are looking for repair and maintenance staff all the time. Well, all was good and well, then they offered him a starter payment of 1.700 monthly, before taxation. That is really little, but well over what he gets while jobless. He was offended, and said "No". He has some choice words for migrant workers who take such jobs, and let this and many other companies get away with it.

We are no isolated systems, and the job migration is causing quite a stir over here, too. Yet zero german workers want to work on the fields of our farmers, to bring in the masses of asparagus, when it's season, or other fruits and vegetables. Send home all of those migrants?

Drop all of those fruits and vegetables and drop those farms and the companies that take their products.

That shit ain't so easy to solve.

 

[Rattrap]

I think this ultimately evolves into either one of two things, RT. There will either be a worldwide revolution among the proletariat that will topple the present world order and establish a communist paradise (in their eyes at least) or, much more likely, some sort of guaranteed annual income will be put in place that will be just enough to assure survival and keep the general populace from revolting. I think given the two presented options, the latter is the obvious course of action that will be undertaken. How else will the present socio-economic power structure be able to assure its current level of dominance without violence?

I think the former is more likely. History is full of ruling classes that didn't know when to stop squeezing the masses. Do you think our current crop is any smarter?

You reckon? I know this is historically been the case, but I wonder if there's ever been as long a standing/successful propaganda compaign as has been waged in the USA over the last few decades. We have an entire political party basically dedicated to the worship of wealth and the wealthy, with any critiques against this class labeled with "envy" and "jealousy". The other political party is itself obsessed with the ideas of meritocracy, leaving us in a situation where, as far as wealth is concerned, most Americans appear to believe that possession = deserving.

Do you really think folks under that mindset are going to rise up?

We need to integrate the effect of different countries with variopus payment level expectations into the picture. Let me explain:

[...]

We are no isolated systems, and the job migration is causing quite a stir over here, too. Yet zero german workers want to work on the fields of our farmers, to bring in the masses of asparagus, when it's season, or other fruits and vegetables. Send home all of those migrants?

Drop all of those fruits and vegetables and drop those farms and the companies that take their products.

Also all true, though even produce-picking is going to automation. Very few job sectors won't, albeit some far more slowly than others.

Random aside: I remember the abundance of asparagus stands cycling from Mannheim to Hockenheim. Stuff was everywhere!

 

[sean miguel]

there is another option. It has to do with population control and reducing carbon footprints. two birds with one stone.

 

[Rattrap]

there is another option. It has to do with population control and reducing carbon footprints. two birds with one stone.

As we've seen lately, many of Trump supporters would totally be down with the Final Solution.

...that said, that doesn't address crux of this thread at all. Less jobs than people is a ratio problem, not an absolute numbers problem.

 

[sean miguel]

As we've seen lately, many of Trump supporters would totally be down with the Final Solution.

...that said, that doesn't address crux of this thread at all. Less jobs than people is a ratio problem, not an absolute numbers problem.

no, what I had in mind was a long-term leftist solution. And it doesn't have to be absolute. You can have just enough of the useless breathers for the system to be sustainable. that cold calculus.

 

[xfire]

Innovate. If you can't find an existing market, create one. Can't finance your idea? You're not looking hard enough.

 

[Rattrap]

no, what I had in mind was a long-term leftist solution. And it doesn't have to be absolute. You can have just enough of the useless breathers for the system to be sustainable. that cold calculus.

'K.

Innovate. If you can't find an existing market, create one. Can't finance your idea? You're not looking hard enough.

You really think the future millions made redundant by automation can simply innovate themselves out of joblessness? What do you propose to do with those who can't?

 

[xfire]

I think blacksmiths were replaced by mechanics.

 

[Rattrap]

I think blacksmiths were replaced by mechanics.

...who will be replaced by robots. And...?

Are you disagreeing with the original premise?