China’s Troubling Robot Revolution(nytimes.com)
nytimes.com
China’s Troubling Robot Revolution
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/11/opinion/chinas-troubling-robot-revolution.html
66 comments
> So perhaps the solution is something akin to the Alaska Permanent Fund fund; however, instead of being funded by mineral wealth, gets funded by wealth generated through (hw) automation and efficiencies brought on by software. This fund then gets redistributed based on a combination of need as well as a per-capita flat rate.
As a reasonable proxy for that kind of wealth generation, you can just tax income.
As a reasonable proxy for that kind of wealth generation, you can just tax income.
> According to one analysis, fully 43 percent of Chinese workers already consider themselves to be overeducated for their current positions.
The obvious conclusion is that there should be less education in China.
The obvious conclusion is that there should be less education in China.
All that computing power going to waste. IF only there's a way to harness that power, maybe for folding@home or bitcoin mining...
Martin Ford has one argument to make -- the robots are coming! :( -- and he makes it again and again in any context possible, even when that point is a rhetorical stretch. China has a lot of problems, many of them on a grander scale than any other country because of the size of its population. The robots are no where near the top of the list. The real issue here is that China has succeeded so well at manufacturing that it is no longer the center of low-cost labor that it once was. When wages rise, capital is substituted for labor; i.e. companies rely incrementally more on robots than humans. Not a lot new there.
It's going to be really weird if China's ruling 'socialist' party ends up being forced to become an actual neo-socialism with things like a guaranteed stipend because there are not enough actual jobs to do...
This whole automation revolution has really just begun to highlight the old problem that many people don't own any of the things that generate the fabulous, effort-free wealth. But now instead of people missing out on the dream of 3-day-work-weeks they were promised fifty years ago and having to work just as hard as before, they have no work at all. The body/mind they expected to be able to rent out has literally no value as an asset.
This whole automation revolution has really just begun to highlight the old problem that many people don't own any of the things that generate the fabulous, effort-free wealth. But now instead of people missing out on the dream of 3-day-work-weeks they were promised fifty years ago and having to work just as hard as before, they have no work at all. The body/mind they expected to be able to rent out has literally no value as an asset.
The body/mind is still valuable because it belongs to a human and humans like seeing other humans do shit for them. Makes them feel important. The future jobs lie in artisanal goods and various kinds of prostitution.
Automation won't decrease the total amount of jobs, but I'm worried about inequality.
Automation won't decrease the total amount of jobs, but I'm worried about inequality.
That's a great comment! I am in awe of the cynicism and misanthropy it contains. Machiavelli himself would go "Dang, that's dark dude".
- Man, Uber just perfected self driving cars and closed my account with them, what am I gonna do now? - I hear prostition is still around.
- Shit, some kid in Senegal just released a database server that can create a sensible schema from an excel sheet, even creating translation layers between the insanity the end user put in and the sensible internal representation! There are no DBA jobs left in the world, what am I gonna do? - I heard those rich actors in Hollywood have acquired a taste for their own "best boys" with strong "grip"...
- Man, Uber just perfected self driving cars and closed my account with them, what am I gonna do now? - I hear prostition is still around.
- Shit, some kid in Senegal just released a database server that can create a sensible schema from an excel sheet, even creating translation layers between the insanity the end user put in and the sensible internal representation! There are no DBA jobs left in the world, what am I gonna do? - I heard those rich actors in Hollywood have acquired a taste for their own "best boys" with strong "grip"...
I was using a slightly more encompassing definition of prostitution, though. Basically people whose primary job is to kiss ass for money, whether metaphorically, literally or both.
Greeters, for example, can't be replaced by machines. The economy has been shifting in this direction for decades.
Greeters, for example, can't be replaced by machines. The economy has been shifting in this direction for decades.
Capitalism "eating itself" by getting too efficient to continue to provide work for everyone was Marx central thesis for why a socialist revolution would be inevitable, so nothing "neo" about it.
yeah, and having real world socialism with vastly underperforming economy, forcing everybody to have a job, creating pointless jobs to to fill this criteria (and unleashing state terror on those who don't fit in).
if you think i'm joking, unfortunately no. had lived in socialist country and i can still see the damage on people 20 years after we switched to democracy. people went to jail if they refused to work. if they spoke against the regime, things might got worse. economy-wise - our neighbor Austria after WWII borrowed from us money to rebuild itself. after 40 years of socialism, when curtain fell, they were light years and more ahead of us, in everything, thank you central planning. i felt like a poor beggar coming there first time.
Sorry if my reaction offended anyone, i'm just too allergic of anything reeking of socialism. nothing beats first hand experience
if you think i'm joking, unfortunately no. had lived in socialist country and i can still see the damage on people 20 years after we switched to democracy. people went to jail if they refused to work. if they spoke against the regime, things might got worse. economy-wise - our neighbor Austria after WWII borrowed from us money to rebuild itself. after 40 years of socialism, when curtain fell, they were light years and more ahead of us, in everything, thank you central planning. i felt like a poor beggar coming there first time.
Sorry if my reaction offended anyone, i'm just too allergic of anything reeking of socialism. nothing beats first hand experience
These regimes were not much more representative of socialism, or Marxism, than North Korea is representative of democracy just because it has "democratic republic" in its name.
They violated the principles they claimed to be built on from day one.
They violated the principles they claimed to be built on from day one.
I, for one, wish we had more memoirs of those who lived behind the Iron Curtain and the philosophies espoused by those countries in practice. I have an uncomfortable feeling that knowledge is dying out. :-/
Thanks for your comment.
Thanks for your comment.
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Where did he predict that?
Various aspects of it is addressed throughout most of his works. The Communist Manifesto, chapter 1[1] is probably the easiest accessible, though maybe not the clearest exposition:
"A similar movement is going on before our own eyes. Modern bourgeois society, with its relations of production, of exchange and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells. For many a decade past the history of industry and commerce is but the history of the revolt of modern productive forces against modern conditions of production, against the property relations that are the conditions for the existence of the bourgeois and of its rule. It is enough to mention the commercial crises that by their periodical return put the existence of the entire bourgeois society on its trial, each time more threateningly. In these crises, a great part not only of the existing products, but also of the previously created productive forces, are periodically destroyed. In these crises, there breaks out an epidemic that, in all earlier epochs, would have seemed an absurdity — the epidemic of over-production. Society suddenly finds itself put back into a state of momentary barbarism; it appears as if a famine, a universal war of devastation, had cut off the supply of every means of subsistence; industry and commerce seem to be destroyed; and why? Because there is too much civilisation, too much means of subsistence, too much industry, too much commerce. The productive forces at the disposal of society no longer tend to further the development of the conditions of bourgeois property; on the contrary, they have become too powerful for these conditions, by which they are fettered, and so soon as they overcome these fetters, they bring disorder into the whole of bourgeois society, endanger the existence of bourgeois property. The conditions of bourgeois society are too narrow to comprise the wealth created by them. And how does the bourgeoisie get over these crises? On the one hand by enforced destruction of a mass of productive forces; on the other, by the conquest of new markets, and by the more thorough exploitation of the old ones. That is to say, by paving the way for more extensive and more destructive crises, and by diminishing the means whereby crises are prevented.
The weapons with which the bourgeoisie felled feudalism to the ground are now turned against the bourgeoisie itself.
But not only has the bourgeoisie forged the weapons that bring death to itself; it has also called into existence the men who are to wield those weapons — the modern working class — the proletarians.
In proportion as the bourgeoisie, i.e., capital, is developed, in the same proportion is the proletariat, the modern working class, developed — a class of labourers, who live only so long as they find work, and who find work only so long as their labour increases capital. These labourers, who must sell themselves piecemeal, are a commodity, like every other article of commerce, and are consequently exposed to all the vicissitudes of competition, to all the fluctuations of the market. "
[1] https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-m...
"A similar movement is going on before our own eyes. Modern bourgeois society, with its relations of production, of exchange and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells. For many a decade past the history of industry and commerce is but the history of the revolt of modern productive forces against modern conditions of production, against the property relations that are the conditions for the existence of the bourgeois and of its rule. It is enough to mention the commercial crises that by their periodical return put the existence of the entire bourgeois society on its trial, each time more threateningly. In these crises, a great part not only of the existing products, but also of the previously created productive forces, are periodically destroyed. In these crises, there breaks out an epidemic that, in all earlier epochs, would have seemed an absurdity — the epidemic of over-production. Society suddenly finds itself put back into a state of momentary barbarism; it appears as if a famine, a universal war of devastation, had cut off the supply of every means of subsistence; industry and commerce seem to be destroyed; and why? Because there is too much civilisation, too much means of subsistence, too much industry, too much commerce. The productive forces at the disposal of society no longer tend to further the development of the conditions of bourgeois property; on the contrary, they have become too powerful for these conditions, by which they are fettered, and so soon as they overcome these fetters, they bring disorder into the whole of bourgeois society, endanger the existence of bourgeois property. The conditions of bourgeois society are too narrow to comprise the wealth created by them. And how does the bourgeoisie get over these crises? On the one hand by enforced destruction of a mass of productive forces; on the other, by the conquest of new markets, and by the more thorough exploitation of the old ones. That is to say, by paving the way for more extensive and more destructive crises, and by diminishing the means whereby crises are prevented.
The weapons with which the bourgeoisie felled feudalism to the ground are now turned against the bourgeoisie itself.
But not only has the bourgeoisie forged the weapons that bring death to itself; it has also called into existence the men who are to wield those weapons — the modern working class — the proletarians.
In proportion as the bourgeoisie, i.e., capital, is developed, in the same proportion is the proletariat, the modern working class, developed — a class of labourers, who live only so long as they find work, and who find work only so long as their labour increases capital. These labourers, who must sell themselves piecemeal, are a commodity, like every other article of commerce, and are consequently exposed to all the vicissitudes of competition, to all the fluctuations of the market. "
[1] https://www.marxists.org/archive/marx/works/1848/communist-m...
In some vast waffly book no doubt but there is a summary of the argument here:
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2008/oct/21/creditcrunch...
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2008/oct/21/creditcrunch...
Inserting obligatory reference to Fully Automated Luxury Communism[0].
[0]http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/mar/18/...
[0]http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/mar/18/...
The body/mind they expected to be able to rent out has literally no value as an asset.
Agreed. I wonder if the concept of job makes sense anymore.
Agreed. I wonder if the concept of job makes sense anymore.
Job will still make sense for a while, but as society we need to prepare better for the future.
The world is changing and we're still debating if our youth should get less education and benefits or if we should let in more immigrant so we can compete on labor prices on the global market. That's so short sighted!
That train left long ago, and it was pointless to try to board anyway. If the ruling elite would stop for a second being such assholes toward anyone, treating everybody not up the chain as 'resources', maybe they could focus to be competitive in the world of tomorrow.
Most unskilled/unqualified job will just vanish overnight at some point in the near future, and then what? we're still under-educating our youths. industrial automation, robotics and artificial-x will be the field that will drive innovation in the next 20 years.
if your country is still not pushing for them to be in the curriculum of everyone, prepare to be facing loads unemployment problems down the road. avoidable problems, dare I say.
The world is changing and we're still debating if our youth should get less education and benefits or if we should let in more immigrant so we can compete on labor prices on the global market. That's so short sighted!
That train left long ago, and it was pointless to try to board anyway. If the ruling elite would stop for a second being such assholes toward anyone, treating everybody not up the chain as 'resources', maybe they could focus to be competitive in the world of tomorrow.
Most unskilled/unqualified job will just vanish overnight at some point in the near future, and then what? we're still under-educating our youths. industrial automation, robotics and artificial-x will be the field that will drive innovation in the next 20 years.
if your country is still not pushing for them to be in the curriculum of everyone, prepare to be facing loads unemployment problems down the road. avoidable problems, dare I say.
If you think structural unemployment due to automation will be a problem in the US, just wait until 500 million Chinese factory workers are put out of work. A generation ago they may have been content to remain in poverty and ignorance but now, like the sans-culottes of 18th century Paris, they know what else is out there. There's a reason many wealthy Chinese desperately want to expatriate and it's not because they see peace and tranquility in their homeland's future.
Maybe they will follow the lead of the US and create more positions in things like HR, Insurance Sales and Law. Or an ever expanding cadre of mid-level managers with the main job of playing politics against each other. If this isn't enough to attain full employment, they can then create a large number of professional meeting attender positions and mandate companies hold many more meetings.
The factory workers are as unlikely to be "out of work" as the female population post-the power loom replacing their daily work as thread spinners. Manufacturing is already moving out of China and into cheaper countries.
No economy is truly a zero sum game and China is no different. In 2 generations - even if there are some troubled waters in between - these factory workers' children will be white collar workers or even managers of American white collar workers ;)
Post-war Japan was a miserable place with mass starvation, homelessness and unemployment, today it is the third largest GDP in the world with first world standard of living. There was even a bubble complete with massive foreign investment (remember what the building in Die Hard was called?) with a 95% drop in property prices in between then and now. China is currently where Japan was in the 1960s, and back then it looked pretty much the same.
No economy is truly a zero sum game and China is no different. In 2 generations - even if there are some troubled waters in between - these factory workers' children will be white collar workers or even managers of American white collar workers ;)
Post-war Japan was a miserable place with mass starvation, homelessness and unemployment, today it is the third largest GDP in the world with first world standard of living. There was even a bubble complete with massive foreign investment (remember what the building in Die Hard was called?) with a 95% drop in property prices in between then and now. China is currently where Japan was in the 1960s, and back then it looked pretty much the same.
Have you taken a look at Japan recently?
They've been in recently for over a decade - probably close to 20 years now. As in, their economy has been going backwards, and shrinking.
That, and they also have deep-seated structural problems (e.g. aging population, incredibly high-saving rates with little spending - might be "good" for individuals, but not good for the overall economy is everybody does it/)
They've been in recently for over a decade - probably close to 20 years now. As in, their economy has been going backwards, and shrinking.
That, and they also have deep-seated structural problems (e.g. aging population, incredibly high-saving rates with little spending - might be "good" for individuals, but not good for the overall economy is everybody does it/)
Would you say the average Japanese today is worse off than in say, 1948?
This is what's in your average PRC citizen's mind, not what the rate of growth will be in 2040...
This is what's in your average PRC citizen's mind, not what the rate of growth will be in 2040...
Err, do you mean 3 years after they had two atomic bombs dropped on them, and a devastating 6-year war with nearly 3 million deaths? =)
That's hardly an apples to apples comparison.
I don't know if China necessarily aspires to follow Japan's trajectory - perhaps the rise, but certainly not the fall. Still, we'll see how things land.
That's hardly an apples to apples comparison.
I don't know if China necessarily aspires to follow Japan's trajectory - perhaps the rise, but certainly not the fall. Still, we'll see how things land.
China definitely had its own WWII moment, the Great Leap Forward alone probably killed 30-40 million citizen, they executed or chased all their intellectuals out of the country... it was the "price" to pay to ensure there was no foreign influence in running the country.
Both countries started from nothing, had an enormous increase in foreign direct investment (including several bubbles) which led them to pull themselves upwards at GDP growth rates of around 10% per annum for long enough to make a noticeable difference in the standard of living.
Both countries are run by centralised governments with a mandarin-style meritocratic civil service pulling the strings (in Japan the keiretsu system with the MOF on top, in China the Party), and setting financial policy including invisible taxation mechanisms on the population (setting the rate on domestic deposits in China, continuous yen devaluation, tariffs and keiretsu consumer goods price-setting in Japan). The difference is that China waited until Deng Xiao Ping before changing policy and accepting growth as a path to prosperity, Japan started earlier and had a smaller population.
Inspiration-wise, I'd say Lee Kuan Yew had more to do with the philosophy and strategy of what Deng Xiao Ping set in motion than any imitation of the Japanese system.
Both countries started from nothing, had an enormous increase in foreign direct investment (including several bubbles) which led them to pull themselves upwards at GDP growth rates of around 10% per annum for long enough to make a noticeable difference in the standard of living.
Both countries are run by centralised governments with a mandarin-style meritocratic civil service pulling the strings (in Japan the keiretsu system with the MOF on top, in China the Party), and setting financial policy including invisible taxation mechanisms on the population (setting the rate on domestic deposits in China, continuous yen devaluation, tariffs and keiretsu consumer goods price-setting in Japan). The difference is that China waited until Deng Xiao Ping before changing policy and accepting growth as a path to prosperity, Japan started earlier and had a smaller population.
Inspiration-wise, I'd say Lee Kuan Yew had more to do with the philosophy and strategy of what Deng Xiao Ping set in motion than any imitation of the Japanese system.
Their economy has been going backwards, but so has the amount of working-age adults. Productivity is up. Japan's economic problems are simply a result of its demographical problems, which in turn are the result of cultural issues. It's not at all given that the same will happen to China.
If you look at age structures, China is about 20 years behind Japan. Which doesn't bode well.
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Perhaps the technological singularity that we end up facing is not one of AI but one of nation-scale automation?
I would phrase it as mechanization becomes a better investment than human capital.
It's the tipping point where humans, more often than not, no longer provide value. I can't help but feel we are VERY close.
It's the tipping point where humans, more often than not, no longer provide value. I can't help but feel we are VERY close.
When this tipping is reached then society may reorganize itself around concepts like basic income and so forth. It seems like a safe bet that a single, cohesive society could survive this transition without a huge amount of chaos. But what happens when you have hundreds of countries with opposing interests who all hit this wall at about the same time?
Maybe, but I suspect the change will happen so fast that we won't be able to adjust in time. We've got a few new auto plants that were either just built or are soon to be built near where I live. First off, they are almost completely automated these days. Secondly, it only takes a couple of years to get one built. Most of that is politics and negotiations. When the new plant is built, the old one is mothballed. Point is, it happens VERY quickly.
Now, in the grand scheme of things, auto manufacturing is a relatively small industry in terms of labor force. What happens when this transition happens to the logistics industry, which is one of the top employers globally? Can we adapt quickly enough if land (including farming), sea, and possibly air are all automated within a decade? I'm not sure.
Now, in the grand scheme of things, auto manufacturing is a relatively small industry in terms of labor force. What happens when this transition happens to the logistics industry, which is one of the top employers globally? Can we adapt quickly enough if land (including farming), sea, and possibly air are all automated within a decade? I'm not sure.
I really doubt those reforms will be quick and or painless. It's easy to say society will reorganize around those concepts but you're probably talking decades of struggle to get those reforms.
China has had a rising middle class for a while now, and just like with the agricultural automation brought on by the combustion engine, their manufacturing laborers will shift into service, skilled, technical, and professional positions.
So 500 million unemployed people will suddenly become skilled, technical and professional without education? I don't think so.
I disagree. You can automate away factory jobs faster than you can train factory workers the news kills they need to prosper in the service economy, and automation is happening in the service sector as well.
Did you actually read the article? Here's the most relevant quote:
> The reality, however, is that China has struggled to create enough white-collar jobs for its soaring population of college graduates. In mid-2013, the Chinese government revealed that only about half of the country’s current crop of college graduates had been able to find jobs, while more than 20 percent of the previous year’s graduates remained unemployed.
> The reality, however, is that China has struggled to create enough white-collar jobs for its soaring population of college graduates. In mid-2013, the Chinese government revealed that only about half of the country’s current crop of college graduates had been able to find jobs, while more than 20 percent of the previous year’s graduates remained unemployed.
I think this statement is not completely accurate.
First, it doesn't factor in the expansion of higher education in the last 20 years. I don't have the statistics at hand, so I will just use my hometown as an example. Exactly 20 years ago, ~120 high school students from my hometown were enrolled into colleges (including both 4- and 3-years colleges). This year, approximately ~1400 will enter colleges this fall semester. That is more than 10 times. Note the total number of people of ~18 years old hasn't been increased. On the contrary, I think it is decreased, as a result of one-child policy.
Second, I think it has become common that countries, including USA, have been struggling to create enough white-collar jobs. I have both current and ex- colleagues who graduated from Ivy Leagues and are/working in customer service, support, marketing associates, etc. What they majored in colleges, like English, Classics, Psychology, etc. really doesn't help them much on looking for their first or second jobs. It is similar in China, but I wouldn't say it is worse or better there.
First, it doesn't factor in the expansion of higher education in the last 20 years. I don't have the statistics at hand, so I will just use my hometown as an example. Exactly 20 years ago, ~120 high school students from my hometown were enrolled into colleges (including both 4- and 3-years colleges). This year, approximately ~1400 will enter colleges this fall semester. That is more than 10 times. Note the total number of people of ~18 years old hasn't been increased. On the contrary, I think it is decreased, as a result of one-child policy.
Second, I think it has become common that countries, including USA, have been struggling to create enough white-collar jobs. I have both current and ex- colleagues who graduated from Ivy Leagues and are/working in customer service, support, marketing associates, etc. What they majored in colleges, like English, Classics, Psychology, etc. really doesn't help them much on looking for their first or second jobs. It is similar in China, but I wouldn't say it is worse or better there.
Nothing you wrote shows the parent as being "not completely accurate", and you don't refute objective statistics with "I think".
The keyword there is "white-collar" jobs. What parent was talking about includes other jobs.
I imagine displaced blue-collar workers are looking for jobs in areas quite a bit different from displaced college-educated white-collar workers. The problem with the job market facing college graduates seeking white-collar jobs seems to be a different issues from one of automation of factories.
Just like how in the US, the problems faced by liberal arts majors struggling to find work is going to be quite different from that of factory workers who lost their jobs when the production moved overseas.
Just like how in the US, the problems faced by liberal arts majors struggling to find work is going to be quite different from that of factory workers who lost their jobs when the production moved overseas.
That's in part due to China's recent expansion into higher education, which the article ignores. Also, the services and skilled trades are not traditionally college-graduate jobs.
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Peter Drucker forecasted this 30 years ago. Agriculture went from 50% -> 2% of the workforce. Same is happening with Manufacturing. The main issue is training.
HN discussion on this article from two weeks ago: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9697058
goddamn, yeah, how does this get posted twice
"This is clearly unsustainable. After all, there eventually has to be a return on all those investments. Factories have to produce goods that are profitably sold. "
Nope. In China loans go bad all the time and the government prints up some money to buy and resell the debt at a discount and things keep moving right along. They have a different system In China. This is so hard for anybody in America to get since economics is taught as if it's the physical structure of the world when it's really just a game with a bunch of rules that structure the society in a certain way.
Nope. In China loans go bad all the time and the government prints up some money to buy and resell the debt at a discount and things keep moving right along. They have a different system In China. This is so hard for anybody in America to get since economics is taught as if it's the physical structure of the world when it's really just a game with a bunch of rules that structure the society in a certain way.
Don't we do the same thing in the states? Except we loan money to huge banks at 0% who turn around and sell that money back to the people @ 5+%
Well as long as China is doing enough to import whatever it needs, it's fine. Most countries need certain imports, and that's the market discipline that limits what they can do. They want tourists, they want dollars, etc. If China was a completely closed system with no needs then yes, they could probably get away with a lot more.
the world needs more jobs of designing softwares to share photos with a time limit.
jeez man, I hate to ruin your day, but I just designed a program that designs programs to share photos with a time limit. better find a new niche, quick quick.
Have the workers own the robots, not the elite of company executives. Then redistribute the profits made by the robots to their new owners.
The idea of having the workers own the means of production is hardly new, it's just not very popular in the West. Not surprising that the NYTimes missed mentioning that entirely. It would be deliciously ironic if socialist China was the nation that would show the rest of the world how to deal with pervasive automation socially and economically.
The idea of having the workers own the means of production is hardly new, it's just not very popular in the West. Not surprising that the NYTimes missed mentioning that entirely. It would be deliciously ironic if socialist China was the nation that would show the rest of the world how to deal with pervasive automation socially and economically.
> Have the workers own the robots
I am pretty sure that workers are free to buy publically traded stock.
I also would probably not invest if I were in their position.
I also would probably not invest if I were in their position.
That was Karl Marx's whole solution. Make the workers own the factories.
We have a better way of socializing wealth. It's called the public stock market. Workers can buy shares of any corporation on it, not just their own, and they are protected by regulations.
Having said that, I think that we should tax the machines. We are building a cage for ourselves with machines empowering organizations to monitor and control us better. Like China making a rating for every citizen. Organizations aren't people and they use people to perpetuate themselves - those people who have other ideas (like "enviroentalism" or "concern for the elderly") have to acquiesce to the corporation's interests first. And with machines, the corporations will pursue profits ahead of loyalty to workers.
My point is, we should use our democratic governments to tax the corporations for benefiting from automation, and redistribute the money to the population as unconditional basic income. As machines replace people I won't need those taxi drivers and mcdonalds workers to do anything for me. I want them to have a check coming so they can educate themselves or just go consume things they need.
It would also be nice if countries would quit being in the mindset that every generation must be more numerous than the last - social security will be taken care of by increased automation, while overpopulation is not something you can take care of that easily.
Want everyone to be richer and better off? Have less kids.
We have a better way of socializing wealth. It's called the public stock market. Workers can buy shares of any corporation on it, not just their own, and they are protected by regulations.
Having said that, I think that we should tax the machines. We are building a cage for ourselves with machines empowering organizations to monitor and control us better. Like China making a rating for every citizen. Organizations aren't people and they use people to perpetuate themselves - those people who have other ideas (like "enviroentalism" or "concern for the elderly") have to acquiesce to the corporation's interests first. And with machines, the corporations will pursue profits ahead of loyalty to workers.
My point is, we should use our democratic governments to tax the corporations for benefiting from automation, and redistribute the money to the population as unconditional basic income. As machines replace people I won't need those taxi drivers and mcdonalds workers to do anything for me. I want them to have a check coming so they can educate themselves or just go consume things they need.
It would also be nice if countries would quit being in the mindset that every generation must be more numerous than the last - social security will be taken care of by increased automation, while overpopulation is not something you can take care of that easily.
Want everyone to be richer and better off? Have less kids.
"tax the corporations for benefiting from automation, and redistribute the money to the population as unconditional basic income."
I think you have nailed the critical dynamic as well as any can.
I think you have nailed the critical dynamic as well as any can.
not that i completely disagree with your vision of future, there are many +- lovely fantasy projections out there. but let's get back from utopia to this harsh real world we live in. People like you always point to just things that are wrong with this system (and let's agree on this, there are plenty) and come up with star trekkish almost perfect world where all is nice and super cool, without thinking a bit (or at least sharing with rest of us), HOW THE HECK DO YOU WANT TO GET THERE? FROM HERE?
I mean from this, current world, that is not only, but also thanx to US command-and-conquer approach burning, and that fire will hurt many of us for generations to come? Some iterative, realistic steps please, that could be voted through on various parts of this planet, by populations with vastly different mentality than yours (and mine).
> I want them to have a check coming so they can educate themselves or just go consume things they need.
How do you know that McDonald workers want just this and don't have higher aspirations? And btw I am not aware of any country that has McDonald franchise open that people are dying from hunger on streets, there are always options for survival. In many of those, people can reach practically all human knowledge with a tap on screen of a phone. What if they want a brand new ferrari and feel like they really need it? or "only" BMW? who will decide what is good or not? YOU??
Many doomsday stories here don't reflect fuildity of our existence - things really don't change overnight, more like over generation. politicians have a lot of power, and last time i checked they still got voted by humans. so for example why don't you consider this slight possibility, that when situation will come worse, something will change in our system and we won't continue same direction blindly? I for one have +- confidence that, with some oscilations, will move in proper direction, whatever that will be.
I mean from this, current world, that is not only, but also thanx to US command-and-conquer approach burning, and that fire will hurt many of us for generations to come? Some iterative, realistic steps please, that could be voted through on various parts of this planet, by populations with vastly different mentality than yours (and mine).
> I want them to have a check coming so they can educate themselves or just go consume things they need.
How do you know that McDonald workers want just this and don't have higher aspirations? And btw I am not aware of any country that has McDonald franchise open that people are dying from hunger on streets, there are always options for survival. In many of those, people can reach practically all human knowledge with a tap on screen of a phone. What if they want a brand new ferrari and feel like they really need it? or "only" BMW? who will decide what is good or not? YOU??
Many doomsday stories here don't reflect fuildity of our existence - things really don't change overnight, more like over generation. politicians have a lot of power, and last time i checked they still got voted by humans. so for example why don't you consider this slight possibility, that when situation will come worse, something will change in our system and we won't continue same direction blindly? I for one have +- confidence that, with some oscilations, will move in proper direction, whatever that will be.
We already have safety nets - automatic stabilizers, means tested welfare etc.
I say start supplementing them all with a basic income financed by an automation tax. The more automation, the more companies benefiting from it are taxed. They still get to keep 60% of the savings from automation but the other 40% would be taxed, say. The key is redistributing it to EVERYONE. At first it would be very small but it would be help cushion demand shocks in the economy.
We just need this wealth redistribution scheme in place. Have a formula. And on a related note I would have the nation be run by polling, not democracy. Representative democracy is super corrupt and political drama is wasteful. Direct democracy is bad because those who bother to vote can get one over on those who don't. Instead, the government should do randomized polling of the population and report the results, which would be verifiable by independent polling organizations. In fact we could just have publicly accountable polling organizations which make all their results available publicly. Several of these polling organizations would be enough basis for the government bureacrats (eventually replaced by mostly computers) to take the opinion of the public in various issues and just implement them.
How much redistribution should we have? Do polling every year. How much carbon tax? Polling etc. That is a real participatory democracy without the stupid waste of time going to a polling booth. If you want me to vote, GIVE ME AN APP as an option. If it's secure enough for my finances in a bank it's secure enough for my vote in an election. But better yet just do the work for us and POLL the public on what they want.
If you say represenative democracy is able to accomplish more and polls would just vascillate wildly between different positions, then I think you're too married to the current ideology. You can still have the executive branch take a firm direction every few years, or months. That and everything else can be changeable by polls instead of a legislative branch. Polls are better than referendums.
One legitimate fear is that polls can be falsified. That's why we need many independent organizations doing the pollin. Better than one organization doing the vote.
I say start supplementing them all with a basic income financed by an automation tax. The more automation, the more companies benefiting from it are taxed. They still get to keep 60% of the savings from automation but the other 40% would be taxed, say. The key is redistributing it to EVERYONE. At first it would be very small but it would be help cushion demand shocks in the economy.
We just need this wealth redistribution scheme in place. Have a formula. And on a related note I would have the nation be run by polling, not democracy. Representative democracy is super corrupt and political drama is wasteful. Direct democracy is bad because those who bother to vote can get one over on those who don't. Instead, the government should do randomized polling of the population and report the results, which would be verifiable by independent polling organizations. In fact we could just have publicly accountable polling organizations which make all their results available publicly. Several of these polling organizations would be enough basis for the government bureacrats (eventually replaced by mostly computers) to take the opinion of the public in various issues and just implement them.
How much redistribution should we have? Do polling every year. How much carbon tax? Polling etc. That is a real participatory democracy without the stupid waste of time going to a polling booth. If you want me to vote, GIVE ME AN APP as an option. If it's secure enough for my finances in a bank it's secure enough for my vote in an election. But better yet just do the work for us and POLL the public on what they want.
If you say represenative democracy is able to accomplish more and polls would just vascillate wildly between different positions, then I think you're too married to the current ideology. You can still have the executive branch take a firm direction every few years, or months. That and everything else can be changeable by polls instead of a legislative branch. Polls are better than referendums.
One legitimate fear is that polls can be falsified. That's why we need many independent organizations doing the pollin. Better than one organization doing the vote.
I disagree with your bald assertion that the stock market is either intended to or efficient at socializing wealth.
It'll be grimly ironic if, having dragged behind the rest of the industrialized world for decades, suffering with all the attendant poverty and problems that dogged pre-industrial societies, then rapidly caught up, China end up being one of the first countries to shoot right past it to a totally post-industrial society, with all the new problems that are predicted to accompany it.
They are going to hit this economic obstacle on a massive scale first --before the jobs even get to migrate to the interior where there are masses of impoverished and underemployed or underproductive workers.
Japan has not been able to age out of this problem, that's to say they have not figured a way to transfer the wealth generated by automation into the general population, so you get older people doing redundant jobs or menial jobs. In other words there isn't an "automation fund" which diverts wealth to the underemployed and those whose jobs have become redundant an unnecessary.
So perhaps the solution is something akin to the Alaska Permanent Fund fund; however, instead of being funded by mineral wealth, gets funded by wealth generated through (hw) automation and efficiencies brought on by software. This fund then gets redistributed based on a combination of need as well as a per-capita flat rate.