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AdditionalPizza OP t1_itub71k wrote

Reply to comment by User1539 in With all the AI breakthroughs and IT advancements the past year, how do people react these days when you try to discuss the nearing automation and AGI revolution? by AdditionalPizza

That's my fear too. It's what I try to talk about, but get met with either people agreeing and having no idea if a solution (same boat), or people on the total end of the spectrum saying it isn't happening there will always be enough jobs.

I don't care about people's prediction of when they think it will happen, More about when it happens what will we do in that period of transition.

I made the askreddit thread to see what jobs people think won't be replaced. Some of the answers are good candidates for lasting a while on the physical side of their job, but most of them could be fully automated outside of the physical aspects. What's interesting is one person even supposing a robot existed, thinks firefighting will never be automated because you need a gut feeling and have hair stand up on the back of your neck. Another saying mixing music needs a human ear. It's a case of not understanding humans won't be the most intelligent thing on the planet for long, and our senses can be replicated and improved magnitudes over. Intuition isn't uniquely human, and it isn't magic.

I guess I have been asking the wrong question and should phrase it as a hypothetical more, like "if half of all jobs were automated, what would society do" or something.

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User1539 t1_ituha5e wrote

well, we already have a social security system. We've actually been through mass unemployment before, but in a time of mass wealth inequality and actual scarcity.

If we don't need workers, we probably won't just immediately fall into a dystopian nightmare.

We're also already talking about basic income, and early retirement is a concept we're generally familiar with.

So, it's likely we'll see social security pick up a lot of slack at first. People who can't work, like people with mental problems, are already provided for. We'll probably just lower the bar to 'people with no special skills'.

Then at the other end there's early retirement. If you're 50, and there just aren't enough jobs, you might be offered early retirement and a pension.

Eventually, work might be seen more like a tour of duty. You get through primary school, train for a job, do it for 4 years, and get a certain level above basic. Do another 4 years, and get another bump, etc ...

It works for the military.

We made it through the great depression, a period of sudden scarcity. I can't imagine we won't figure out a way to make it through a period of great abundance.

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AdditionalPizza OP t1_ituigzl wrote

I have no doubt we will make it, it's just a matter of how much foresight we have to reduce suffering among the people that don't make the decisions.

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User1539 t1_ituja10 wrote

I don't think it's a matter of foresight. We could tell the leader of every country 'Full automation will happen June 23, 2035', and they'd still do nothing about it. Humans are reaction based actors. We create the mess, then we clean it up. It's just in our nature.

Like I said, at least in America, we do actually already have systems for handling these things. All we'd need to do is raise taxes on the people not hiring workers, to pay for the social security they'd all be receiving.

More socialist countries will just keep doing what they're doing. There are already countries with raw materials that send a check to everyone every month. They'd increase those payments.

Then you have the countries with basically no infrastructure. At first I'm sure the excess resources would be hoarded, and of course there were no jobs there to begin with. But, eventually, there's just no benefit to hoarding things people need, if no one is ever going to buy that stuff off you anyway.

So, I really don't worry too much about it. Not everyone is working now, and it's really just a numbers game as they shift from 70% of a country having a job, to 50%, 30%, etc ...

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AdditionalPizza OP t1_itulozg wrote

>I don't think it's a matter of foresight.

What you describe thereafter is exactly foresight, just not on an individual scale. Governmental foresight with implementing security nets.

The US has mega rich corporations, but a lot of countries don't. However the US also has a pretty large population compared to other fully developed countries. Social security has been the target for stripping down over the years, and with the generation currently reaping its benefits, projections show younger generations will be with less. But that's more political than I care to dive into. And may not be the case in the US, I'm not from the states I'm north of the border.

I think cracks will form though, sure we have systems for unemployment, but those systems haven't been tested for crises levels of unemployment. It also begs the question of UBI being available, while some people continue to work.

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User1539 t1_itut0f2 wrote

> What you describe thereafter is exactly foresight, just not on an individual scale. Governmental foresight with implementing security nets.

Well, not foresight. Those safety nets are already in place from having reacted to other disturbances in employment.

We haven't really done a single thing to change those existing systems to better handle what's coming, and I don't think we will.

It's just not in our nature.

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