The Boy Who Cried Robot: A World Without Work

[Warspite]

Btw, in South Africa they have robots everywhere. What's their experience?

The traffic policemen are out of a job.

[Admiral Yi]

Because circumstances matter.

So do what the rest of us are doing: predict circumstances.

It can unless it doesn't.  But let's say it's true.  So?

So the secular trend could be replacement of labor with capital, masked in the short term by an economic uptick.

[Valmy]

I think there will be some sort of universal stipend and the jobs that are needed would be extremely prestigious.

[Tonitrus]

We should all get started on that career in robot maintenance so that we can service our overlords.

[Valmy]

We should all get started on that career in robot maintenance so that we can service our overlords. 

They will be the social elites of tomorrow.

[crazy canuck]

This poll needs a "the premise of the question is flawed" option.

[Iormlund]

We should all get started on that career in robot maintenance so that we can service our overlords.

Way ahead of all of you. 


Well, not really. However I can program them, integrate them in actual applications, and such things.

This poll needs a "the premise of the question is flawed" option.

It's really not. It is rather sloppily formulated, though.

It should read: "Most people are too dumb to do work that demands creativity". And they are. Which is why eventually a machine will be able to leave them out of a job.

[The Minsky Moment]

You may have a point with number one, however the data clearly shows to be wrong about number two. The percentage of women in the workforce peaked around 2000 and has declined from 59.9% to 57.7% since then. In that time the percentage of men in the workforce declined from 74.8% to 70.2%

The article talks about a trend with regard to male employment going back to the 1970s.   As the charts you helpfully posted indicate, that trend was accompanied by a large and sustained increase in female employment levels from around 44% to 58% today.  Thus, even taking into account the post-2000 dip in employment rates, total employment rates across both genders are considerably higher now than in the 1970s (much less the industrial era paradise of the 1950s . . .)

As for the post 2000 dip it isn't clear yet whether that is cyclical or enduring.  There are many explanations proffered, such as the impact of China, the aging out the baby boomers, the repeated extensions of unemployment benefits in the wake of the great recessions, increasing usage of disability benefits and others.  The articles doesn't address this, just males an assumption.

The third one is incredibly snarky dismissal of technology with no data to back it up.

The point deserves snarky dismissal - it's an empty assertion.
As for data, there is a famous saying from Solow that you can see computers everywhere except in the productivity numbers.  There was a period in the 90s where the productivity gains seemed to be clicking in, but that stopped over the dotcom crash.
Again - if low productivity workers are being systematically replaced by high performing technology, we shouldn't see declining productivity.

[The Minsky Moment]

Because circumstances matter.

So do what the rest of us are doing: predict circumstances.

I don't do fortune telling.

[The Minsky Moment]

The trouble with your commitment to arch-empiricism is that it'll take 50% U-3 unemployment for you to admit, "Oh, maybe I was wrong about automation."

Tell you what - let's get to 10% first and then we can reassess

[Eddie Teach]

Predicting the status quo will hold is still a prediction.

[Admiral Yi]

I don't do fortune telling.

I think you've made predictions, though i can't think of a specific one.

But regardless, you can still use your imagination.  Imagine a world in which labor has been rendered absolutely uncompetitive with capital, or rather, that the price labor would have to accept to be competitive with capital would be lower than subsistence.

Given that hypothetical, what would be the optimal policy response?

[The Minsky Moment]

On that hypothetical, the answer would depend on the technical structure of production, and on how capital is allocated.  Taking the hypothetical purely literally, then the task of allocating capital would itself be performed most efficiently by capital (Investment AIs) - thus we would have reached the end-point Marxian fantasy scenario and the optimal response would be socialism. 

If you modify the hypo to retain some positive human role for capital allocation (but why single out that?) then some residual need for capital ownership may remain, and thus there would be redistribution from capital taxation.

[The Minsky Moment]

Predicting the status quo will hold is still a prediction.

One thing I am sure of is that the status quo will NOT hold - it never does.

I can notice that one of the "hot" hypotheses in econ land these days is secular stagnation - which basically holds the opposite view: that economically relevant technological progress is declining and too slow.  The Robert Gordon variant is pretty persuasive and is a better fit to the facts.

It's all just speculation though.

[jimmy olsen]

Again - if low productivity workers are being systematically replaced by high performing technology, we shouldn't see declining productivity.

A machine doesn't have to be more productive than a person to replace them, just a reasonable facimile thereof and cheaper in the long run.