The future of jobs: The onrushing wave(economist.com)
economist.com
The future of jobs: The onrushing wave
http://www.economist.com/news/briefing/21594264-previous-technological-innovation-has-always-delivered-more-long-run-employment-not-less
140 comments
This shows me how myopic and out of touch these guys are - I already use the biggest loser on xbox kinect, and it's replaced both a gym and a trainer for me.
> and it's replaced both a gym and a trainer for me
In that case, the gym and trainer were not actually necessary in the first place. Below a specific level of fitness, it doesn't matter what exercise you do. There are safer and more efficient forms, but all that really matters is that you do it and you don't hurt yourself in the process. Those trainers, and gyms, were serving an artificial market that didn't actually need them (like some restaurant waiters, bank tellers, travel agents, etc).
Perhaps a better analysis of the whole situation is a collapse of existing artificial markets that businesses have used to expand beyond their current market.
In that case, the gym and trainer were not actually necessary in the first place. Below a specific level of fitness, it doesn't matter what exercise you do. There are safer and more efficient forms, but all that really matters is that you do it and you don't hurt yourself in the process. Those trainers, and gyms, were serving an artificial market that didn't actually need them (like some restaurant waiters, bank tellers, travel agents, etc).
Perhaps a better analysis of the whole situation is a collapse of existing artificial markets that businesses have used to expand beyond their current market.
"and it's replaced both a gym and a trainer for me"
Exactly
The game is enough for you (and for a lot of people)
And that's in the universe of people that do exercise currently.
But the game doesn't replace weights/equipment (as much as the bodyweight people want to convince it's not needed) or more advanced training techniques (and frankly, several "fitness trainers" are misguided)
But trainers and gyms etc are going to keep existing for people who want to go further, or want to socialize, do something different, have specific training requirements, etc
Exactly
The game is enough for you (and for a lot of people)
And that's in the universe of people that do exercise currently.
But the game doesn't replace weights/equipment (as much as the bodyweight people want to convince it's not needed) or more advanced training techniques (and frankly, several "fitness trainers" are misguided)
But trainers and gyms etc are going to keep existing for people who want to go further, or want to socialize, do something different, have specific training requirements, etc
Weights and equipment can't be emulated in software. And you need a gym to keep them in and provide hot showers after.
But I'd say that there's less need for a personal trainer than ever before. You can find the how-to use video on youtube, the community on reddit/r/fitness, the training calculator on your phone, etc. I don't see that trend reversing.
But I'd say that there's less need for a personal trainer than ever before. You can find the how-to use video on youtube, the community on reddit/r/fitness, the training calculator on your phone, etc. I don't see that trend reversing.
There is a chemical compound going through investigation currently that emulates exercise in your muscle tissue:
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/17/exercise-in-a-pill-...
What we can't emulate in software or robotics, shall be done in biology.
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2013/07/17/exercise-in-a-pill-...
What we can't emulate in software or robotics, shall be done in biology.
> "Weights and equipment can't be emulated in software. "
But if you have a friggin strong robo butler, it can provide all the resistance you need.
But if you have a friggin strong robo butler, it can provide all the resistance you need.
But then again, the intersection of people who would pay for a trainer and had it switched to a fitbit is not so huge
(Kind of similar to "lost sales due to piracy" given some limits)
(Kind of similar to "lost sales due to piracy" given some limits)
I recall seeing articles on what may be described as high tech long johns. They were covered in sensors that would give you a readout about every major muscle on your body. Hook that up to a stripped down Watson that can tell you exactly when and how you are doing wrong.
Yeah, the same chart lists a 17% chance that "firefighters" will be automated... I'm equally curious what then definition of "firefighter" is. If they are talking about woodland (or "forest") firefighting, then _maybe_ (I could see drones accomplish at least some of the tasks involved). But for structural firefighting? No way... Not in 20 years.
But this is exactly the right reading of the chart - the description says "chances that automation will lead to job losses", not "chance that all jobs will be replaced by automation". So, perhaps it will be drones assisting in wildfires that reduce the need to pay as many people to fight that type of fire, whilst structural firefighting remains the domain of humans - for now.
Why not? Is it the chaotic environment? The temperature extremes? The unpredictability of each situation?
All those are strong reasons TO automate firefighting. Machines can function better in heat/smoke/violent structural collapse situations. They can make objective analysis when their own mortality is not an issue.
Nobody made money betting against advances in computing.
All those are strong reasons TO automate firefighting. Machines can function better in heat/smoke/violent structural collapse situations. They can make objective analysis when their own mortality is not an issue.
Nobody made money betting against advances in computing.
I don't think that the general idea is replacing specific jobs with robots. Probably not very pragmatic most of the time. Rather it's jobs that simply become obsolete due to technological advances.
You could probably eliminate the need for most firefighters by installing more and smarter networked sprinkler systems, using different materials for building, building smarter oven's / toasters / whatevers, or any number of other innovations... but all of that costs. It seems less threatening when viewed this way, instead of a robot replacement, but the effect is the same.
Automation is also elitist. I'm betting that a building housing Google's servers has more fire prevention capabilities and far less need of human firefighters than say a sweat shop in Bangladesh.
You could probably eliminate the need for most firefighters by installing more and smarter networked sprinkler systems, using different materials for building, building smarter oven's / toasters / whatevers, or any number of other innovations... but all of that costs. It seems less threatening when viewed this way, instead of a robot replacement, but the effect is the same.
Automation is also elitist. I'm betting that a building housing Google's servers has more fire prevention capabilities and far less need of human firefighters than say a sweat shop in Bangladesh.
But to replace a fire fighter would require order of magnitude discoveries in several fields you would effectively need true AI and a self powered robot with as good strength and endurance as a human.
Don't assume that the robotic solution will look anything like the human solution. A fitbit does not look like a "robotic personal trainer" and a roomba does not look like a person with a broom.
I would speculate that the obvious next wins for fire-fighting are drones to visualise the scene from multiple angles, remote control or self-aiming hoses and extinguishers. And various hardened eyes and arms to reach into the fire. All with human oversight, but a reduction in the number of humans involved or in harm's way.
This reduction in manpower is the pattern - e.g. supermarket self-checkouts still have some human staff, but to troubleshoot and supervise.
I would speculate that the obvious next wins for fire-fighting are drones to visualise the scene from multiple angles, remote control or self-aiming hoses and extinguishers. And various hardened eyes and arms to reach into the fire. All with human oversight, but a reduction in the number of humans involved or in harm's way.
This reduction in manpower is the pattern - e.g. supermarket self-checkouts still have some human staff, but to troubleshoot and supervise.
I'm actually most of the way done with a prototype of a quadcopter that can be deployed on a scene that just orbits and streams video to a monitor in the chiefs vehicle. It's mostly off the shelf components, with a little bit of 'wrapper' that makes is easier to deploy.
The biggest issue I haven't sorted out yet is the batteries... LiPo batteries are great in terms of capacity/weight, but if you keep them fully charged all the time, you kill them pretty quickly...
The biggest issue I haven't sorted out yet is the batteries... LiPo batteries are great in terms of capacity/weight, but if you keep them fully charged all the time, you kill them pretty quickly...
Swarm them.
When one is approaching 20%, send one that's charged to replace it. Once the replacement has arrived, return the depleted one to the charging station and do not charge past 80% or so.
If you make the charger smart enough to not completely charge the battery, and you have a ..eh.. Battery of copters available, you've solved the problem
When one is approaching 20%, send one that's charged to replace it. Once the replacement has arrived, return the depleted one to the charging station and do not charge past 80% or so.
If you make the charger smart enough to not completely charge the battery, and you have a ..eh.. Battery of copters available, you've solved the problem
Could they be stored at a low temperature until there's an actual need to use the copter?
Right a robot that can perform as well as a fit human firefighter will be available any time now just like fusion, Hard AI is only 5 years away and have been for the last 50 years.
And for that matter, better fireproofing.
Those things are improving every week. Self-powered robots will exceed human strength and endurance in a few years with steadily improving battery power/kg (metal-air batteries are already better than gas-powered engines). AI for autonomous robots is the current Darpa challenge. And for firefighting, the automation doesn't have to extend as far as life-or-death decisions; those can be made remotely.
Though I'm not sure it needs to be completely automated. You don't see robots writing news articles, but a researcher and Google are more productive than several researchers.
I'm all for advances in technology making things safer and putting fewer people in harms way. I just don't think there is anything close to a 17% chance that it will happen in the next two decades. I say this as someone who has a foot in both worlds, so to speak... I work in technology, build UAV quadcopters (including playing with various sensors) as a hobbyist, and work at least one shift a week as a firefighter/paramedic.
Technological advances in recent years have made life much better in the fire service. Thermal imaging cameras have gotten lighter, with much larger thermal ranges. Gas detection has similarly lighter and more accurate. Breathing apparatus have gotten 'smarter' and lighter, allowing longer working times, less fatigue, and better insights for incident commanders on the status of their crews.
Research in fire development and behavior has led to significants advances in strategy and tactics. However, those tactical decisions are still well beyond the scope of what computers (and computer vision) are capable of. There is just too much variation in how homes are build and occupied (and modified).
Here are just a few of the issues I see:
-Moving an unconscious victim requires a fair amount of care, and I don't think robotics are there yet...
-'Reading' smoke coming from a structure gives a lot of insight into the design and occupancy of the structure. I think that's well beyond the current limits of computer vision and decision making.
-There are many activities performed by firefighters outside the scope of 'putting water on fire'. Responding to medical emergencies, technical rescue scenarios, etc... Extricating a victim of a car crash is a very delicate operation that employs equipment capable of exerting many thousands of pounds of force, and a few inches is the difference between freeing someone from a deformed care and crushing them to death...
Really the biggest issues I see have to do with tactical decision making based on a huge number of subtle variables (which would involve very sophisticated computer vision), and simply navigating in and around a structure. Designing a robot that can move autonomously through all areas of a house, into closets, under beds, etc, while still being strong enough to lift and move a disabled victim, or employee various tools seems like a pretty difficult problem to solve. How would you power it? Batteries aren't anywhere close to that point, and tethers would limit mobility too much.
Personally I think the next 20 years will see continued augmentation, rather than replacement of the men and women in the fire service. For instance, I would love to see an SCBA facepiece with an integrated heads up display providing an infrared image and levels of various gasses that are good indicators of air quality. Once we have that, I'd love the ability to switch between 'tank' air (which I carry a very limited amount of on my back) and 'filtered' air (which would just come from the environment, filtered for particulates, allowing me to save my bottle for when I need it).
I think there is also an opportunity for improved 'mapping' of structures as a firefighter moves through them (again, integrated on a HUD inside the facepiece). That would significantly reduce the number of deaths and injuries that occur when firefighters become disoriented and lost in zero-visibility situations.
This ended up being much longer than I expected it to be... TL;DR; The next 20 years will see augmentation, not replacement. Who knows what the 20 years after that will bring...
Technological advances in recent years have made life much better in the fire service. Thermal imaging cameras have gotten lighter, with much larger thermal ranges. Gas detection has similarly lighter and more accurate. Breathing apparatus have gotten 'smarter' and lighter, allowing longer working times, less fatigue, and better insights for incident commanders on the status of their crews.
Research in fire development and behavior has led to significants advances in strategy and tactics. However, those tactical decisions are still well beyond the scope of what computers (and computer vision) are capable of. There is just too much variation in how homes are build and occupied (and modified).
Here are just a few of the issues I see:
-Moving an unconscious victim requires a fair amount of care, and I don't think robotics are there yet...
-'Reading' smoke coming from a structure gives a lot of insight into the design and occupancy of the structure. I think that's well beyond the current limits of computer vision and decision making.
-There are many activities performed by firefighters outside the scope of 'putting water on fire'. Responding to medical emergencies, technical rescue scenarios, etc... Extricating a victim of a car crash is a very delicate operation that employs equipment capable of exerting many thousands of pounds of force, and a few inches is the difference between freeing someone from a deformed care and crushing them to death...
Really the biggest issues I see have to do with tactical decision making based on a huge number of subtle variables (which would involve very sophisticated computer vision), and simply navigating in and around a structure. Designing a robot that can move autonomously through all areas of a house, into closets, under beds, etc, while still being strong enough to lift and move a disabled victim, or employee various tools seems like a pretty difficult problem to solve. How would you power it? Batteries aren't anywhere close to that point, and tethers would limit mobility too much.
Personally I think the next 20 years will see continued augmentation, rather than replacement of the men and women in the fire service. For instance, I would love to see an SCBA facepiece with an integrated heads up display providing an infrared image and levels of various gasses that are good indicators of air quality. Once we have that, I'd love the ability to switch between 'tank' air (which I carry a very limited amount of on my back) and 'filtered' air (which would just come from the environment, filtered for particulates, allowing me to save my bottle for when I need it).
I think there is also an opportunity for improved 'mapping' of structures as a firefighter moves through them (again, integrated on a HUD inside the facepiece). That would significantly reduce the number of deaths and injuries that occur when firefighters become disoriented and lost in zero-visibility situations.
This ended up being much longer than I expected it to be... TL;DR; The next 20 years will see augmentation, not replacement. Who knows what the 20 years after that will bring...
It seems like you're stuck on the automaton aspect. Would not remote control robots decrease the number of firefighters necessary? If each building came equipped with remotely operated firefighting drones, response time would improve by orders of magnitude.
The same for car accident incidents: would a precisely controlled remote robot not be able to more aptly apply the jaws of life, especially in situations dangerous for a first responder?
Of course there are a bevy of situations where first responders are still absolutely necessary. But other things also work in tandem to improve the outcome: like civilian operated defibrillators. One could also interpret the 17% as "17% more effective, through automation, per person employed." This would, as a ratio of field employed to population, look less like jobs lost and more like additional jobs unnecessary.
The same for car accident incidents: would a precisely controlled remote robot not be able to more aptly apply the jaws of life, especially in situations dangerous for a first responder?
Of course there are a bevy of situations where first responders are still absolutely necessary. But other things also work in tandem to improve the outcome: like civilian operated defibrillators. One could also interpret the 17% as "17% more effective, through automation, per person employed." This would, as a ratio of field employed to population, look less like jobs lost and more like additional jobs unnecessary.
>Would not remote control robots decrease the number of firefighters necessary?
Perhaps, but I think the loss of situation awareness would be a big problem to overcome (certainly not insurmountable, just the first challenge I see).
I absolutely agree that this is the direction things are headed, I just think the timescale is a little optimistic.
Perhaps, but I think the loss of situation awareness would be a big problem to overcome (certainly not insurmountable, just the first challenge I see).
I absolutely agree that this is the direction things are headed, I just think the timescale is a little optimistic.
Sounds like you have a good grasp of the subject. One comment: as for batteries, they are almost there, not at all far away. Metal-air batteries are already capable of over a thousand watt-hours/kg.
As for reading smoke, a machine could be adapted to ready everything - heat, smoke, particle size, explosive residue, gas leak - and factor all that in. I don't mean to denigrate an experience firefighter's skills. But a machine can sense far beyond what eyes and nose can do.
The augmentation idea is very cool. Sensors are clearly an advantage. And soon (sooner than 20 years) the suit will be more powerful than the human. Hands as powerful as jaws of life! A back that can support a roof!
As for reading smoke, a machine could be adapted to ready everything - heat, smoke, particle size, explosive residue, gas leak - and factor all that in. I don't mean to denigrate an experience firefighter's skills. But a machine can sense far beyond what eyes and nose can do.
The augmentation idea is very cool. Sensors are clearly an advantage. And soon (sooner than 20 years) the suit will be more powerful than the human. Hands as powerful as jaws of life! A back that can support a roof!
I don't know much about metal-air batteries... Based on some quick reading, it seems most of them use water as the electrolyte solvent. Wouldn't they have issues with ambient temperatures north of 100˚C?
I was under the impression that more modern building construction and heating technologies have already made a large percentage of professional firefighters redundant - hence why they spend as much time responding to car accidents and working as EMTs as actually fighting fires.
The number of fires has indeed fallen dramatically. However, until the day when there is zero risk of there being a house fire (and we're a _long_ way from that), you still need to maintain a staffing level that can get the job done.
Last year, London announced plans to let go 10% of its firefighting force. This is despite booming population and construction. In 2004, there were 572,000 fires in the UK. In 2013, there were 193,000 reported fires. (https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachm...)
Sure, when you scale it up to the something the size of a city, then you can say "We want to be able to handle X major incidents at the same time over the entirety of the city."
My point is that X will continue to shrink (as has been the trend for decades), but never hit 0, and you can only consider a limited area before response times become an issue (even if you somehow got to the place where you were very confident there would never be more than one concurrent fire in the UK, obviously you couldn't reduce staffing to a single company).
My point is that X will continue to shrink (as has been the trend for decades), but never hit 0, and you can only consider a limited area before response times become an issue (even if you somehow got to the place where you were very confident there would never be more than one concurrent fire in the UK, obviously you couldn't reduce staffing to a single company).
Actually, that 17% doesn't mean that robots will replace firefighters -- it just means there will be 17% less need for human firefighters. This could take a number of forms -- we've already seen some of them, such as better electrical codes that have reduced the number of electrical fires.
Another recent trend is residential sprinkler systems. Now imagine a smart sprinkler, with thermal imaging cameras that can pinpoint the source of a fire before it spreads. Then activate a directed jet spray to that source, and you have a whole building fire that has been avoided.
Or, lets say if 17% of fires are caused by space heaters. What if the heaters were equipped with a thermal imaging sensor, so that it cuts power to itself if an object in front of it gets too close to ignition temperature?
Another recent trend is residential sprinkler systems. Now imagine a smart sprinkler, with thermal imaging cameras that can pinpoint the source of a fire before it spreads. Then activate a directed jet spray to that source, and you have a whole building fire that has been avoided.
Or, lets say if 17% of fires are caused by space heaters. What if the heaters were equipped with a thermal imaging sensor, so that it cuts power to itself if an object in front of it gets too close to ignition temperature?
Hmm... upon closer reading, I see the charts says that there is a 17% chance that there will be some degree of job losses due to computerization. I think that's a more reasonable thesis (though not for the reasons you mention).
Fire prevention will only take you so far. You still need to be able to deal with the inevitable fires that still occur, and you need to have the capacity to deal with them 24/7/365. You can only reduce staffing so much and still have the ability to put a single structure fire out, and many departments are at that point already.
I do see a potential for job losses due to augmentation technologies (exoskeltons, etc) that will enable one firefighter to do tasks that previously took two, etc...
Fire prevention will only take you so far. You still need to be able to deal with the inevitable fires that still occur, and you need to have the capacity to deal with them 24/7/365. You can only reduce staffing so much and still have the ability to put a single structure fire out, and many departments are at that point already.
I do see a potential for job losses due to augmentation technologies (exoskeltons, etc) that will enable one firefighter to do tasks that previously took two, etc...
So you're saying the future is in robotics.
The future is monitoring and surveillance. That's what these systems do. That and a few data-driven suggestions here and there.
To midnightreactor: You've been shadowbanned by the HN hivemind. Better luck next account. :(
There's a great 15 minute video by CGP Grey introducing the same set of concepts that technology will contribute to unemployment:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU
Its a bit pop-sciency, but its very approachable and well explained.
Its a bit pop-sciency, but its very approachable and well explained.
It sounds like the technology forecasts in the 50ies and 60ies but with a pessimistic instead of an optimistic undertone.
CGPGrey himself says the video is neither pessimistic nor optimistic: it's neutral. The video talks about something that has started happening and is almost certain to keep happening at ever faster paces.
It takes some effort to start thinking out of the box, seeing things from a much farther point of view and realize none of this is bad. The human race keeps advancing, progressing, and very often the leaps we make from decade to decade radically change the way our society functions. Cars changed society just as smartphones changed society. These changes force us to adapt and while sometimes it costs people their job, there just isn't that much room for these concerns, as cold as that may sound.
For example, digital distribution cost thousands of people their jobs in retail. Yet are we arguing digital distribution is a bad thing? Only those whose current income depends on the status quo not changing ever really make that point.
I haven't looked at the stats, but I'm certain that cars cost thousands of people in the horse industry their jobs as well.
This is very parallel to the "Would you sacrifice yourself to save 10 people?" moral question. In other words: "Would you sacrifice your own comfort to improve the lives of others?".
And I'm not judging. I've never been in the situation where I had to make the choice... but if I were, I would have very little actual input on the outcome. Nor should I.
It takes some effort to start thinking out of the box, seeing things from a much farther point of view and realize none of this is bad. The human race keeps advancing, progressing, and very often the leaps we make from decade to decade radically change the way our society functions. Cars changed society just as smartphones changed society. These changes force us to adapt and while sometimes it costs people their job, there just isn't that much room for these concerns, as cold as that may sound.
For example, digital distribution cost thousands of people their jobs in retail. Yet are we arguing digital distribution is a bad thing? Only those whose current income depends on the status quo not changing ever really make that point.
I haven't looked at the stats, but I'm certain that cars cost thousands of people in the horse industry their jobs as well.
This is very parallel to the "Would you sacrifice yourself to save 10 people?" moral question. In other words: "Would you sacrifice your own comfort to improve the lives of others?".
And I'm not judging. I've never been in the situation where I had to make the choice... but if I were, I would have very little actual input on the outcome. Nor should I.
In all fairness, most desk jobs that existed in the 50's and 60's are now heavily consolidated (it now takes one journalist and Google what it used to take 10 to do). And most factory work is either also heavily consolidated or moved overseas.
Would the words "service economy" even make sense back then?
Would the words "service economy" even make sense back then?
And now there are headlines about automating low tier jobs in the legal and medical professions. The old refrain about getting a degree being a ticket to a steady income is long gone.
Never mind that the latest in assembly line robotics are as flexible as humans in their movement, and can be programmed by demonstrating the basic movements a few times. You can pretty much tell Joe to walk away from his station, and roll this robot into the same place.
Never mind that the latest in assembly line robotics are as flexible as humans in their movement, and can be programmed by demonstrating the basic movements a few times. You can pretty much tell Joe to walk away from his station, and roll this robot into the same place.
Some simpler financial news articles are now written by zero journalists. A program just extracts numbers from data feeds and plugs them into a template.
Sports as well. You can't have journalists cover all lower league games, but an aide has to write a log about plays, which you can use to generate some metrics and generate something that fits roughly the right tone. (example that does advertise it: http://statsheet.com/ does this for basketball)
Pessimistic because we now live in an "I've got mine, screw you" society where the means justifies the end.
I'd be interested to see historical examples of any other kind. Human nature hasn't significantly changed over the past several millennia, as far as I can tell.
That was good, yes. And link-browsing from there led me to this feller's site, which so far is also relevant and interesting.
http://federicopistono.org/
http://federicopistono.org/
I am always stunned with statements like this:
"For those not in the elite, argues David Graeber, an anthropologist at the London School of Economics, much of modern labour consists of stultifying “bullshit jobs”—low- and mid-level screen-sitting that serves simply to occupy workers for whom the economy no longer has much use. Keeping them employed, Mr Graeber argues, is not an economic choice; it is something the ruling class does to keep control over the lives of others."
Yes, I, as an employer, keep my staff doing "bullshit jobs" because I want to "keep control over the lives of others." WTF?!?! Why would I do that? Why not fire the bullshit job person and use that money to take my family on vacation 4x a year?
It amazes me that some people think there is some ruling cabal in a dark castle somewhere, deciding how to keep the masses in line. Maybe the answer is less evil - I have the person doing the work because I can't afford to automate it yet, or it is not currently possible.
What does the author think of the maker movement? This "Capital Equipment" is now priced at a weeks wage for many US workers. Marx would love it - it puts the means of production in the hands of the common man. I sold capital equipment for years, and what I used to sell for $50,000 you can now do with a $5000 machine. Prices keep coming down, and the machines I sold are no longer made. My job was eaten by progress :)
People will keep re-inventing themselves. It's what humans do.
"For those not in the elite, argues David Graeber, an anthropologist at the London School of Economics, much of modern labour consists of stultifying “bullshit jobs”—low- and mid-level screen-sitting that serves simply to occupy workers for whom the economy no longer has much use. Keeping them employed, Mr Graeber argues, is not an economic choice; it is something the ruling class does to keep control over the lives of others."
Yes, I, as an employer, keep my staff doing "bullshit jobs" because I want to "keep control over the lives of others." WTF?!?! Why would I do that? Why not fire the bullshit job person and use that money to take my family on vacation 4x a year?
It amazes me that some people think there is some ruling cabal in a dark castle somewhere, deciding how to keep the masses in line. Maybe the answer is less evil - I have the person doing the work because I can't afford to automate it yet, or it is not currently possible.
What does the author think of the maker movement? This "Capital Equipment" is now priced at a weeks wage for many US workers. Marx would love it - it puts the means of production in the hands of the common man. I sold capital equipment for years, and what I used to sell for $50,000 you can now do with a $5000 machine. Prices keep coming down, and the machines I sold are no longer made. My job was eaten by progress :)
People will keep re-inventing themselves. It's what humans do.
Bullshit jobs arise in two ways. One is through the crazy inefficiencies of huge companies and governments. This is likely not you. Second is as an emergent property of red queens races in the economy, escalating complexity or overhead that does not actually increase overall macro productivity. The latter requires at least a casual familiarity with evolutionary game theory, but once comprehend cannot be un-comprehended. Most global military competition also falls into this category, and that's double digits of the economy in some countries.
I feel like these kinds of emergent pathologies are a species scale IQ test that so far we have utterly failed.
I feel like these kinds of emergent pathologies are a species scale IQ test that so far we have utterly failed.
Great comments from both you and OP. Thanks for this.
Utter failure would have been nuclear self-annihilation.
True. Guess we passed the first pop quiz.
But unfortunately pop quizzes take place literally every day :(
This should be higher.
Creating "bullshit jobs" doesn't need a coördinated cabal. The wrong incentives can manufacture such roles in a distributed fashion.
Consider our tax system. Government bureaucracies refine the tax code. The same bureaucracies that fight each year for their budget allocations from Congress. Districts reward Congressmen who bring jobs home. Increased staffing, cost, taxation and knock-on bureaucracy ensues across government. And complexity. That complexity keeps accountants and tax lawyers employed. They are not interested in having the complexity legislated away [1].
Thus a system generating more and more self-fulfilling (and -employing) complexity. To keep civil servants and tax professionals employed. Cabal-free bullshit jobs. (Consider the difficulty with which structural reforms are being introduced in Greece, Italy and Spain. Those countries' elites are being forced to retrench the bullshit. They will likely pay with their seats of power.)
[1] http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/04/15/303356915/sto...
Consider our tax system. Government bureaucracies refine the tax code. The same bureaucracies that fight each year for their budget allocations from Congress. Districts reward Congressmen who bring jobs home. Increased staffing, cost, taxation and knock-on bureaucracy ensues across government. And complexity. That complexity keeps accountants and tax lawyers employed. They are not interested in having the complexity legislated away [1].
Thus a system generating more and more self-fulfilling (and -employing) complexity. To keep civil servants and tax professionals employed. Cabal-free bullshit jobs. (Consider the difficulty with which structural reforms are being introduced in Greece, Italy and Spain. Those countries' elites are being forced to retrench the bullshit. They will likely pay with their seats of power.)
[1] http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2014/04/15/303356915/sto...
One example i recall Graeber using for such jobs are call center cold call marketing. Rooms filled with people who sit there all day calling number after number with the hope that whoever answers have any interest in their product.
But is that really a make-work job? I doubt they would pay people to do that if it doesn't make more money than it costs (or at least they believe it does.)
Most of people commenting like this ("'they' can't possibly pay for that unless it makes some kind of ROI") have not experienced business at scale.
Beyond a certain scale of business, sales and marketing management at those levels sometimes becomes very abstract, and relies as much upon suppositions as actual data. This is why brand marketing still exists, even though far more accurate and precise quantitative methods are available now.
Call center cold calling has a miserable return rate, but for some at scale businesses, it need not actually yield a measurable, tangible, positive return to justify its existence. For some businesses, simply the act of making the cold call itself is sufficient justification, because it puts the business' name "top of mind" in the public.
One of Graeber's points is that businesses engage in these activities because the management in decision-making positions at these businesses believe that if they do not engage in these activities, their competitor who does will gain a competitive edge. Most such activities are to generate some kind of constant, dim awareness of the brand name in the buying public.
Beyond a certain scale of business, sales and marketing management at those levels sometimes becomes very abstract, and relies as much upon suppositions as actual data. This is why brand marketing still exists, even though far more accurate and precise quantitative methods are available now.
Call center cold calling has a miserable return rate, but for some at scale businesses, it need not actually yield a measurable, tangible, positive return to justify its existence. For some businesses, simply the act of making the cold call itself is sufficient justification, because it puts the business' name "top of mind" in the public.
One of Graeber's points is that businesses engage in these activities because the management in decision-making positions at these businesses believe that if they do not engage in these activities, their competitor who does will gain a competitive edge. Most such activities are to generate some kind of constant, dim awareness of the brand name in the buying public.
I think it's more likely that you have not experienced competent marketing at scale. It is indeed carefully measured and managed according to its ROI.
Being so dismissive of brand marketing is a big hint that you might not fully understand it. Consider that even companies that are very savvy about data collection and analysis engage in brand marketing, like Google.
Being so dismissive of brand marketing is a big hint that you might not fully understand it. Consider that even companies that are very savvy about data collection and analysis engage in brand marketing, like Google.
There are certainly lots of companies doing competent marketing at scale, and they are certainly the norm for large SV businesses. That is not in question. But it's a big world out there, and there are a shockingly larger number of big businesses in the world that do throw big, big bucks at brand-establishing marketing initiatives, with very little to no quantifiable and precise marketing-to-sales-to-close-to-per-customer-support-cost metrics. I don't see where I'm dismissing brand marketing (and especially the newer data-driven brand marketing); please point it out so I can clarify with a follow up comment. I'm laying out (to those who might not have been exposed to it) the reasoning that goes on behind seemingly nonsensical activities (like the aforementioned call centers devoted to cold calling). Very rarely in big business do completely harebrained activities last terribly long; in hindsight some activities might have been ill-advised, but over the long run most decisions are made with the best intentions and very hazy decision-making data. I'm pretty excited to see what the data-driven marketing and sales future looks like, myself.
Competition traps lead to lots of things that are pointless for everyone to do but pointful for only one "defector" party to do.
You, as a rational individual who owns and operates a business, will not hire people to do bullshit jobs.
However, a company with professional managers and systems that are somewhat separated from ownership or the putative goals of the business itself will, in an unintended-consequences sort of way, end up creating a bunch of bullshit jobs. The company is too big for a single, rational, human owner to comprehensively supervise, and meanwhile there are legions of middle managers who want to increase their relative importance in the company by having more direct and indirect reports.
I don't think it's a conspiracy to keep control over the lives of others, although there are probably a lot of pathological managers who would be motivated by that that. I think it has more to do with unintended consequences. What Graeber is arguing is essentially a conspiracy theory, and it shares the same weakness of every conspiracy theory, which is that it underestimates just how bad things can get purely out of unintended consequences. Managing large organizations is hard. The difference between doing it right and doing it poorly is literally what creates and destroys most large fortunes. And even if you do it well, you're going to get some inefficiencies that smaller organizations just don't have. It's essentially a scaling problem.
Haven't you ever wondered why companies lay people off when they're in trouble? You'd think they wouldn't hire someone in the first place unless they were pretty sure that hiring that person would somehow contribute to improved profitability, and if it turned out that they didn't do so, they would just be fired in the normal course of their work. No, aside from redundancies created by merger and acquisitions, layoffs are a means of clearing out these backlogs of bullshit jobs.
However, a company with professional managers and systems that are somewhat separated from ownership or the putative goals of the business itself will, in an unintended-consequences sort of way, end up creating a bunch of bullshit jobs. The company is too big for a single, rational, human owner to comprehensively supervise, and meanwhile there are legions of middle managers who want to increase their relative importance in the company by having more direct and indirect reports.
I don't think it's a conspiracy to keep control over the lives of others, although there are probably a lot of pathological managers who would be motivated by that that. I think it has more to do with unintended consequences. What Graeber is arguing is essentially a conspiracy theory, and it shares the same weakness of every conspiracy theory, which is that it underestimates just how bad things can get purely out of unintended consequences. Managing large organizations is hard. The difference between doing it right and doing it poorly is literally what creates and destroys most large fortunes. And even if you do it well, you're going to get some inefficiencies that smaller organizations just don't have. It's essentially a scaling problem.
Haven't you ever wondered why companies lay people off when they're in trouble? You'd think they wouldn't hire someone in the first place unless they were pretty sure that hiring that person would somehow contribute to improved profitability, and if it turned out that they didn't do so, they would just be fired in the normal course of their work. No, aside from redundancies created by merger and acquisitions, layoffs are a means of clearing out these backlogs of bullshit jobs.
>Yes, I, as an employer, keep my staff doing "bullshit jobs" because I want to "keep control over the lives of others." WTF?!?! Why would I do that?
One reason bullshit jobs exist is because decisions are made by managers, not some ultimate rational owner who thinks only of profit. In many big companies a manager's status is based on the number of people they manage, if they invent more jobs for people they are more important and get promoted. The same problem exists with corporate budgets, the more money a manager spends/controls the more status that manager has, the faster they move up the ladder, thus managers are incentivized to get as much of the budget as possible and to claim that all the projects and things they purchased helped the company. This prevents the company from even understanding the level of waste which is occurring.
Same thing happens in governments or any hierarchical organisation above a particular size. It is an extension of Celine's second law[0].
For a deeper and much more cynical view of corporate dysfunction read the Gervais principal[1].
>Marx would love it - it puts the means of production in the hands of the common man.
Not sure Marx would love it as it could individualize production and thereby reduce the mechanization and discipline of the proletariat which he felt was necessary for the class to act effectively. I think Proudhon would love it as he was more in favor of individual freedom.
You might be interested to know that Mao tried a maker revolution[2]. It was a complete disaster because it was poorly planned and executed, but shows that Mao was at least open to ideas of radical decentralization.
[0]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celine%27s_laws#Celine.27s_Seco...
[1]: http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-o...
[2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backyard_furnace
One reason bullshit jobs exist is because decisions are made by managers, not some ultimate rational owner who thinks only of profit. In many big companies a manager's status is based on the number of people they manage, if they invent more jobs for people they are more important and get promoted. The same problem exists with corporate budgets, the more money a manager spends/controls the more status that manager has, the faster they move up the ladder, thus managers are incentivized to get as much of the budget as possible and to claim that all the projects and things they purchased helped the company. This prevents the company from even understanding the level of waste which is occurring.
Same thing happens in governments or any hierarchical organisation above a particular size. It is an extension of Celine's second law[0].
For a deeper and much more cynical view of corporate dysfunction read the Gervais principal[1].
>Marx would love it - it puts the means of production in the hands of the common man.
Not sure Marx would love it as it could individualize production and thereby reduce the mechanization and discipline of the proletariat which he felt was necessary for the class to act effectively. I think Proudhon would love it as he was more in favor of individual freedom.
You might be interested to know that Mao tried a maker revolution[2]. It was a complete disaster because it was poorly planned and executed, but shows that Mao was at least open to ideas of radical decentralization.
[0]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celine%27s_laws#Celine.27s_Seco...
[1]: http://www.ribbonfarm.com/2009/10/07/the-gervais-principle-o...
[2]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Backyard_furnace
Not to be pedantic but the wholesale culling of available iron during the great leap forward was not at all similar to the maker revolution. The goal was to pull resources (iron) from the population to be centralized for re-distribution so that the iron could be turned into communal tools like plows and railroad ties.
Arguably the inverse of a maker revolution.
Arguably the inverse of a maker revolution.
Somewhere, in the last few months -- alas, I don't recall where -- I read about a company that rates its managers on how much their teams accomplish, divided by the size of the team. They claimed, plausibly I think, that this system effectively discouraged such fiefdom-building.
That's an awful recipe for overworked employees within a short time, unless the formula was only one small part of how managers were ranked. Anonymous management satisfaction surveys getting factored in would be a good start.
I've always wondered if a very broad range of metrics gathered at all times, and a constantly changing formula picked at the last moment, coupled with an explicitly-written policy that if everyone hit the selected high mark then everyone would get rewarded Lake Woebegone-like, would avoid people working towards the formulae.
I've always wondered if a very broad range of metrics gathered at all times, and a constantly changing formula picked at the last moment, coupled with an explicitly-written policy that if everyone hit the selected high mark then everyone would get rewarded Lake Woebegone-like, would avoid people working towards the formulae.
That is an excellent idea, if you find the article send it my way.
More practical approach would be to simply calculate how profitable team is.
If adding new employee costs less than the overhead, then it could make sense for manager to do that.
If adding new employee costs less than the overhead, then it could make sense for manager to do that.
How does that work out for the person in charge of repelling cyber attacks? Not much profit in that.
Maybe the answer is less evil - I have the person doing the work because I can't afford to automate it yet, or it is not currently possible.
This, I think, is basically the situation -- yet the end result looks a lot like the Evil Ruling Cabal Theory of Crap Jobs.
In general, the decision to automate, outsource/contract, or employ is made according to whether (at a very high level), the ability to and cost of automation and/or outsourcing a job (technically and in terms of market expectations); the price of labor; and the number of employees engaged in a company.
Eventually (skipping over the model and proof), what you end up with are, in general, tiny numbers of expensive, high-value employees whose skills are critical to the company, rare and hard to automate; large numbers of cheap, low-value employees whose jobs are too trivial to automate or send elsewhere; and a small number of employees in the middle, who carry out important, hard-to-automate tasks but whose skills are relatively easy to replace. Good jobs are scarce, crap jobs are plentiful, and the traditional middle and upper-middle classes will reasonably fear that they could be replaced at any point by fungible labor.
As we have seen across the world, such conditions create a political and social drive towards correction, though the nature of such corrections are themselves the result of parochial political prejudices (resulting in the Tea Party, the Occupy Movement, "living wage" efforts, anti-immigration legislation, the invasion of Crimea, the Daily Express' circulation numbers, and so on).
Historically, such stagnation has also been corrected by the accessibility of new employment markets (physical frontiers, industrial and postindustrial revolutions or, more recently and on a very small and temporary scale, new petrochemical extraction methods), or the destruction and concomitant rebuilding of industry (such as the post-WW2 efforts in Europe). In the absence of either solution, it remains to be seen what will happen to our societies, but the histories of left- and right-wing revolutions are not encouraging.
This, I think, is basically the situation -- yet the end result looks a lot like the Evil Ruling Cabal Theory of Crap Jobs.
In general, the decision to automate, outsource/contract, or employ is made according to whether (at a very high level), the ability to and cost of automation and/or outsourcing a job (technically and in terms of market expectations); the price of labor; and the number of employees engaged in a company.
Eventually (skipping over the model and proof), what you end up with are, in general, tiny numbers of expensive, high-value employees whose skills are critical to the company, rare and hard to automate; large numbers of cheap, low-value employees whose jobs are too trivial to automate or send elsewhere; and a small number of employees in the middle, who carry out important, hard-to-automate tasks but whose skills are relatively easy to replace. Good jobs are scarce, crap jobs are plentiful, and the traditional middle and upper-middle classes will reasonably fear that they could be replaced at any point by fungible labor.
As we have seen across the world, such conditions create a political and social drive towards correction, though the nature of such corrections are themselves the result of parochial political prejudices (resulting in the Tea Party, the Occupy Movement, "living wage" efforts, anti-immigration legislation, the invasion of Crimea, the Daily Express' circulation numbers, and so on).
Historically, such stagnation has also been corrected by the accessibility of new employment markets (physical frontiers, industrial and postindustrial revolutions or, more recently and on a very small and temporary scale, new petrochemical extraction methods), or the destruction and concomitant rebuilding of industry (such as the post-WW2 efforts in Europe). In the absence of either solution, it remains to be seen what will happen to our societies, but the histories of left- and right-wing revolutions are not encouraging.
I've wrote down some thoughts on possible economics of "bullshit jobs" here: http://250bpm.com/blog:44
Here's the relevant part of it:
"Can we do the same trick here and stop thinking about competing firms and rather start thinking about competing individuals?
After all, firm isn't a person and can't really strive to maximise profits. Only people can.
And when you look at the problem from the point of view of a rational individual, the situation is pretty clear: I need to work to feed myself and my family. If only 50% of population is needed to do all the necessary work, I have to cope with that. I have to accept a meaningless work if that's all I can get. If it's necessary to keep the work, I have to pretend and lie and cheat and support the whole edifice of bullshit work. Damn, I even have to beg, bribe and blackmail others to create a new bullshit position for me, if I can't get an existing one.
So, in the end, large portion of the population, from CEOs to the lowliest interns, are trapped in bullshit jobs and none of them can really speak against it as they are all complicit and the only alternative they have is having no job and starving."
Here's the relevant part of it:
"Can we do the same trick here and stop thinking about competing firms and rather start thinking about competing individuals?
After all, firm isn't a person and can't really strive to maximise profits. Only people can.
And when you look at the problem from the point of view of a rational individual, the situation is pretty clear: I need to work to feed myself and my family. If only 50% of population is needed to do all the necessary work, I have to cope with that. I have to accept a meaningless work if that's all I can get. If it's necessary to keep the work, I have to pretend and lie and cheat and support the whole edifice of bullshit work. Damn, I even have to beg, bribe and blackmail others to create a new bullshit position for me, if I can't get an existing one.
So, in the end, large portion of the population, from CEOs to the lowliest interns, are trapped in bullshit jobs and none of them can really speak against it as they are all complicit and the only alternative they have is having no job and starving."
To some extent, bullshit jobs, given however slight of a start, make and propagate themselves.
People jealously guard their career territory through legislative or other means and seek to expand it, even though what they are doing is ultimately of little (or even negative) value. Anyone who has spent any time in an organization of any size has no doubt seen micro examples of this. No dark cabal needed.
People jealously guard their career territory through legislative or other means and seek to expand it, even though what they are doing is ultimately of little (or even negative) value. Anyone who has spent any time in an organization of any size has no doubt seen micro examples of this. No dark cabal needed.
Have you not watched "The Office"? Or seen the "Dilbert"?
Very interesting analysis. But they don't consider at all one very relevant change that happened during the last 30 years in most wealthy economies, especially the USA: That the taxation of the rich and the highest-earners in general was massively lowered. This contributed a lot to the concentration of wealth and capital in fewer hands.
Taxation for the purpose of running a government and providing basic services seems to be long gone. Most of the discussions these days are more about what the 'right' and 'fair' level of redistribution should be.
But, the rates of taxation are so arbitrary. Legislators get together to determine fixed rates and tiers of taxation.
Aside from the complexities of accounting (which should be simpler with computers), couldn't it make more sense to tie tax rates to real mean wages? Then, the very rich would have incentive to increase jobs and increase mean wages.
But, the rates of taxation are so arbitrary. Legislators get together to determine fixed rates and tiers of taxation.
Aside from the complexities of accounting (which should be simpler with computers), couldn't it make more sense to tie tax rates to real mean wages? Then, the very rich would have incentive to increase jobs and increase mean wages.
As much as I like this idea, there's an equally strong incentive, for those who can afford to do so, to engage in "tax optimization".
>couldn't it make more sense to tie tax rates to real mean wages?
How would that work in practice?
How would that work in practice?
Your point has one tacit component that you failed to mention. If what you say is true, then before "taxation of the rich and the highest-earners in general was massively lowered" occurred, the concentration of wealth stayed constant. So, if we've now reduced the transfer from the rich to the power a-la the taxes you mention, then that must mean that before, and now after, wealth has always been naturally (if you want to use that term) flowing towards the already rich.
> If what you say is true, then before "taxation of the rich and the highest-earners in general was massively lowered" occurred, the concentration of wealth stayed constant
Actually, it only means that with that taxation system, the concentration of wealth was slower than without that taxation system.
Regarding the wealth "naturally flowing towards the already rich", define "naturally".
Actually, it only means that with that taxation system, the concentration of wealth was slower than without that taxation system.
Regarding the wealth "naturally flowing towards the already rich", define "naturally".
The UK in the 70s had a tax rate of 95% thus encouraging payment of much higher salaries to make it worthwhile for talented staff. If the tax rate is thereafter lowered to something sensible then the differentials are going to be significant. Quite a number of higher earners now have an effective tax rate of 60% which is not exactly low - but that's in the UK.
95% is crazy, but today there are lots of multi-millionaire CEOs who as a percentage of their income pay less taxes than their secretaries...
I see no problem with that, that looks perfectly legal. Democracy and legislation has decided that certain forms of income are to be taxed at a lower rate than others. And the CEO does lots of that "other" form of income, hence the lower rate.
Why, what problem do you have with Democracy, err, I mean this tax-rate?
Why, what problem do you have with Democracy, err, I mean this tax-rate?
s/Democracy and legislation/vested interests and cronyism/
I beg to differ, democracy and legislation allowed vested interests and cronyism to occur/take place/take hold. So it is also to blame for what most, including you, blame on "vested interests and cronyism".
Of course, this sort of thing would never happen in a "True Democracy". Maybe they have it in Scotland, run by the Scots, perhaps?
Of course, this sort of thing would never happen in a "True Democracy". Maybe they have it in Scotland, run by the Scots, perhaps?
I wasn't really invoking that fallacy, but congratulations for being aware of it and showing us how smart you are!
Ostensibly, representatives and senators decided to modify the tax code in this way. Unfortunately, the commercial entities that wanted it really didn't give them a choice in the matter - so it was no decision at all (reduce them: get re-elected; don't reduce them: don't get re-elected).
It all comes down to who holds the purse strings ... on campaigns.
Ostensibly, representatives and senators decided to modify the tax code in this way. Unfortunately, the commercial entities that wanted it really didn't give them a choice in the matter - so it was no decision at all (reduce them: get re-elected; don't reduce them: don't get re-elected).
It all comes down to who holds the purse strings ... on campaigns.
The chart claims that economists have a 43% chance of being replaced by automation.
If they're wrong, then they'll be replaced by algorithms that are better at predicting economic trends than they are.
If they're right, then...
If they're wrong, then they'll be replaced by algorithms that are better at predicting economic trends than they are.
If they're right, then...
I've pointed this out elsewhere in this thread: That's not what the chart is saying. The description reads "Probability that computerisation will lead to job losses in the next two decades", not "probability that computerisation will completely replace this job".
For example, in economics, there might be a need for fewer economists because computers are able to do some of the work that previously had to be done by humans. But they're not suggesting that there's a 43% chance that there will be no human economists in 20 years, or that there will be such a thing as a computerised economist - it'll be aspects of the work that are automated (at least initially), not the whole job.
For example, in economics, there might be a need for fewer economists because computers are able to do some of the work that previously had to be done by humans. But they're not suggesting that there's a 43% chance that there will be no human economists in 20 years, or that there will be such a thing as a computerised economist - it'll be aspects of the work that are automated (at least initially), not the whole job.
If unemployment ever becomes a problem we can simply outlaw the wheat combine, which will open up hundreds of thousands of jobs harvesting grain manually.
I hope you were being sarcastic... but in case you weren't, why would we ever create meaningless work instead of just giving people money for pursuing whatever makes them happy? A basic income guarantee seems like a much more reasonable solution than "put everyone to work digging holes and filling them in again".
OP likely was sarcastic, and I agree with you that basic income appears to provide a better solution. That said, they're also extrapolating from existing trends. An inordinate amount of office work today (including a lot of software development) exists solely to keep people busy.
While that might sound absurd, consider the following:
* Companies, particularly large ones, need to have staff on hand for when heavy work hits, but can't just fire them in their off season, not without destroying morale.
* Classic hiring practices are terrible at selecting for actual technical ability, and no one wants to trust the demonstrably valuable work to "the new person." Busy-work provides a way to test their proficiency without ruining the business in the process.
* Management prestige (and pay) is often tied to one's direct report head-count. Worse, stack rankings and similar systems tie career survival to extraneous, buffer head-count.
* Firing someone is surprisingly hard in most companies. A single lawsuit or a few days of outage from a legacy system maintained by only one curmudgeon can wipe out all the (on-paper) savings from firing an ineffective or even counter-productive person.
* Some managers genuinely care about their employees, and want to shield them from the existential and health threats of losing their job and insurance.
While that might sound absurd, consider the following:
* Companies, particularly large ones, need to have staff on hand for when heavy work hits, but can't just fire them in their off season, not without destroying morale.
* Classic hiring practices are terrible at selecting for actual technical ability, and no one wants to trust the demonstrably valuable work to "the new person." Busy-work provides a way to test their proficiency without ruining the business in the process.
* Management prestige (and pay) is often tied to one's direct report head-count. Worse, stack rankings and similar systems tie career survival to extraneous, buffer head-count.
* Firing someone is surprisingly hard in most companies. A single lawsuit or a few days of outage from a legacy system maintained by only one curmudgeon can wipe out all the (on-paper) savings from firing an ineffective or even counter-productive person.
* Some managers genuinely care about their employees, and want to shield them from the existential and health threats of losing their job and insurance.
No doubt GP is being sarcastically cynical.
But the cynicism is well-founded. We might create meaningless work because it would protect the income of the richest (the most politically influential). There is a strong historical precedence for this. It's socially accepted to some degree, due to our widespread belief in the cargo cult of "jobs".
But the cynicism is well-founded. We might create meaningless work because it would protect the income of the richest (the most politically influential). There is a strong historical precedence for this. It's socially accepted to some degree, due to our widespread belief in the cargo cult of "jobs".
I think the "bread and circuses" maxim could be expanded to "bread and circuses and hammers" (i.e. work).
>>just giving people money for pursuing whatever makes them happy? A basic income guarantee seems like a much more reasonable solution
Because recent history suggests, when offered money/stuff/income gurantee for free:
a. In the eyes of the individual receiving money, the value, importance and the perceived hard work that had to be done to earn it, as time passes, tends to zero.
b. A vast majority of people tend just take the money and chill doing nothing, while wanting others to work and make more free stuff/money for them.
c. Because a few people tend to do nothing and keep the status quo going, other people who like to break the norm and make value/money are immediately perceived as heretics who break the 'equal misery for all' norm and are perceived as evil.
d. Brilliant, hard working and creative people like to work with people of their own kind and generally go and live at places where they can find them. And such places always exist.
e. 'Right to free stuff' generally becomes the norm after a while and people who the real work are expected to make over the skies sacrifices and offer bulk of what they do 'for greater good of society'.
f. Equality for all in general tends toward, equal misery for all. Over big periods of time.
Because recent history suggests, when offered money/stuff/income gurantee for free:
a. In the eyes of the individual receiving money, the value, importance and the perceived hard work that had to be done to earn it, as time passes, tends to zero.
b. A vast majority of people tend just take the money and chill doing nothing, while wanting others to work and make more free stuff/money for them.
c. Because a few people tend to do nothing and keep the status quo going, other people who like to break the norm and make value/money are immediately perceived as heretics who break the 'equal misery for all' norm and are perceived as evil.
d. Brilliant, hard working and creative people like to work with people of their own kind and generally go and live at places where they can find them. And such places always exist.
e. 'Right to free stuff' generally becomes the norm after a while and people who the real work are expected to make over the skies sacrifices and offer bulk of what they do 'for greater good of society'.
f. Equality for all in general tends toward, equal misery for all. Over big periods of time.
Aside from being generally inaccurate, your points completely ignore the fact that we are talking about the future, not the present. Specifically, we are talking about a future in which there is simply no useful "work" for most people to do.
You can read more about the idea here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income
There is also:
http://isa-global-dialogue.net/indias-great-experiment-the-t...
and
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mincome
You can read more about the idea here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income
There is also:
http://isa-global-dialogue.net/indias-great-experiment-the-t...
and
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mincome
> recent history suggests
Could you be a little more specific? What "recent history" are you talking about? As far as I am aware some basic income experiments proved to be successful. See Mincome for example.
Could you be a little more specific? What "recent history" are you talking about? As far as I am aware some basic income experiments proved to be successful. See Mincome for example.
Many people, for some strange reason, believe they would rather see the end of the world than the end of capitalism.
My point was that employment is not something to be overly focused on. The idea of creating millions of jobs by outlawing the combine is absurd to most people, as should be the idea of ever trying to "create jobs" via policy.
In a dynamic economy there will always be lots of demand for labor. At the margins, some labor is priced very low, which is a separate social issue for which I favor some kind of welfare system.
We should be wary of the idea that anyone "deserves" a job or a particular wage, since the next thing we know we are all being required to pay for something we don't want or need. Imagine how much a loaf of bread would cost if we outlawed the combine and required all the workers to be paid minimum wage.
I strongly support a social welfare system to help people adapt to changing economic conditions, but in my opinion it does not make sense to try to pretend that the economy is something it is not. Just because we may nostalgically want manual wheat harvesters working on honest day for an honest wage, someone will come along and invent a combine that drastically increases society's productivity because it frees up that labor for some more productive purpose, benefitting us all.
Some of us in the course of our careers will be forced to find another line of work b/c someone invents a "combine" for our industry. There is nothing noble about holding a job that exists only because some politician outlawed that combine.
Fearmongering about massive economic shifts is particularly silly b/c never before in history has it been so easy to learn new skills, and never before have there been so many low cost ways to obtain education.
In a dynamic economy there will always be lots of demand for labor. At the margins, some labor is priced very low, which is a separate social issue for which I favor some kind of welfare system.
We should be wary of the idea that anyone "deserves" a job or a particular wage, since the next thing we know we are all being required to pay for something we don't want or need. Imagine how much a loaf of bread would cost if we outlawed the combine and required all the workers to be paid minimum wage.
I strongly support a social welfare system to help people adapt to changing economic conditions, but in my opinion it does not make sense to try to pretend that the economy is something it is not. Just because we may nostalgically want manual wheat harvesters working on honest day for an honest wage, someone will come along and invent a combine that drastically increases society's productivity because it frees up that labor for some more productive purpose, benefitting us all.
Some of us in the course of our careers will be forced to find another line of work b/c someone invents a "combine" for our industry. There is nothing noble about holding a job that exists only because some politician outlawed that combine.
Fearmongering about massive economic shifts is particularly silly b/c never before in history has it been so easy to learn new skills, and never before have there been so many low cost ways to obtain education.
But why on Earth would there be any such things as jobs when algorithms can do almost all economically necessary work and people don't like working?
Well, someone needs to write the algorithms, and someone needs to play-test the behavioral wealth transfer mechanisms.
or we could have a national slingshot gift to all children. Window jobs for everyone, and a few eye doctors too.
The interesting thing is that a wave of redundancy due to automation or unprecedented efficiency contains problems that those made redundant might be able to work on.
Eg. Joe can't afford X due to lack of employment, and Bob can't afford Y for the same reason. Assuming Bob can supply X and Joe can supply Y (or some more complicated network of bartering), it seems like should be possible for an economy to arise.
Eg. Joe can't afford X due to lack of employment, and Bob can't afford Y for the same reason. Assuming Bob can supply X and Joe can supply Y (or some more complicated network of bartering), it seems like should be possible for an economy to arise.
While commerce and trade are important, the basis of our existence is physical. We are physical beings with physical needs. Physical resources (energy, land, lumber, food, water, etc.) all have owners in the real economy. Joe and Bob are unemployed, thus have no resources, thus have nothing to trade. The best they can do in your scenario is called dumpster diving, assuming recycling tech is not making garbage valuable to the real economy as well. Mass dumpster diving, that's your dystopia right there.
Specifically, Bob and Joe need oil (energy) to produce anything and it's expensive. If they create less value than oil they spent, they're a net loss for society.
This relies on the assumption that there are things Joe wants that Bob can supply and vice versa. But as we climb higher and higher up the hierarchy of needs that may not be the case.
We are already very effective at keeping people alive and mildly entertained indefinitely. (Although we currently look down on these people as trash for not contributing to society). But I can envisage a time when meeting all my material needs requires almost no human input and meeting my emotional needs cannot be monetised.
We are already very effective at keeping people alive and mildly entertained indefinitely. (Although we currently look down on these people as trash for not contributing to society). But I can envisage a time when meeting all my material needs requires almost no human input and meeting my emotional needs cannot be monetised.
That's a big assumption. In fact, that's the only thing that may be different this time.
If machines are more productive than humans at everything, it break down. If the most productive infrastructure relies on big capital, it breaks down. If Bob and Joe become too poor, it breaks down.
If machines are more productive than humans at everything, it break down. If the most productive infrastructure relies on big capital, it breaks down. If Bob and Joe become too poor, it breaks down.
"However, society may find itself sorely tested if, as seems possible, growth and innovation deliver handsome gains to the skilled, while the rest cling to dwindling employment opportunities at stagnant wages."
As insurmountable as it may seem, people living in and affected by these innovative societies just need to adapt accordingly. It is in our innate nature to do so rather than remain stagnant and perpetuate mediocre jobs that were created as a result of the industrial revolution. People can acquire new skills and leverage themselves to appropriate some of the "handsome gains". Also, globalization would only exacerbate the issue of "dwindling employment opportunities". Nowadays, more and more corporations seek to outsource jobs to other countries due to cheap labor costs. For most people, it'll be a paradigmatic shift in thinking and seeking ways to contribute to society. Machine learning and artificial intelligence will only serve those who can transcend the repressive jobs which are inherently repetitive and meant for a machine to accomplish as they are the jobs most susceptible to computerization.
As insurmountable as it may seem, people living in and affected by these innovative societies just need to adapt accordingly. It is in our innate nature to do so rather than remain stagnant and perpetuate mediocre jobs that were created as a result of the industrial revolution. People can acquire new skills and leverage themselves to appropriate some of the "handsome gains". Also, globalization would only exacerbate the issue of "dwindling employment opportunities". Nowadays, more and more corporations seek to outsource jobs to other countries due to cheap labor costs. For most people, it'll be a paradigmatic shift in thinking and seeking ways to contribute to society. Machine learning and artificial intelligence will only serve those who can transcend the repressive jobs which are inherently repetitive and meant for a machine to accomplish as they are the jobs most susceptible to computerization.
Of course, the other side of the coin says that there are too many people.
For the planet, sure. But for economic analysis its irrelevant. All metrics are per-capita.
> For the planet, sure. But for economic analysis its irrelevant.
No, for economic analysis overpopulation is very relevant. Maybe not in the extremely short term, but in the long term when overpopulation strains the finite supply of goods like energy and raw material, this becomes very relevant. In addition to the fact the reversing man-made climate change would also take incredible capital and resources to pull off, it's actually probably one of the biggest things to be seen in economic analysis.
No, for economic analysis overpopulation is very relevant. Maybe not in the extremely short term, but in the long term when overpopulation strains the finite supply of goods like energy and raw material, this becomes very relevant. In addition to the fact the reversing man-made climate change would also take incredible capital and resources to pull off, it's actually probably one of the biggest things to be seen in economic analysis.
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This makes me think : what are good ways to try and protect myself against this? How can I, as a software developer and entrepreneur leverage this to my advantage? What does this tell me about where the big opportunities will be in 3,5 and 10 years so I can begin positioning myself there?
I see the dateline of this interesting submission (which looked familiar) is "Jan 18th 2014 | From the print edition." There seems to be a whole spate of year-old submissions to Hacker News this weekend. Are we trying to do a year in review, to see which predictions of 2014 turned out in reality?
As for the substance of this interesting submitted article, the historical facts are reviewed in a key paragraph before the article goes off into speculation about the future: "For much of the 20th century, those arguing that technology brought ever more jobs and prosperity looked to have the better of the debate. Real incomes in Britain scarcely doubled between the beginning of the common era and 1570. They then tripled from 1570 to 1875. And they more than tripled from 1875 to 1975. Industrialisation did not end up eliminating the need for human workers. On the contrary, it created employment opportunities sufficient to soak up the 20th century’s exploding population. Keynes’s vision of everyone in the 2030s being a lot richer is largely achieved. His belief they would work just 15 hours or so a week has not come to pass." The nub of the article's argument is that new forms of technological change might not leave us with any new forms of gainful employment.
After its interesting text discussion and chart predicting what kinds of employment are least likely to be automated out of existence, the article points out one difference between the world of the past and the world of today: "Another way in which previous adaptation is not necessarily a good guide to future employment is the existence of welfare. The alternative to joining the 19th-century industrial proletariat was malnourished deprivation. Today, because of measures introduced in response to, and to some extent on the proceeds of, industrialisation, people in the developed world are provided with unemployment benefits, disability allowances and other forms of welfare. They are also much more likely than a bygone peasant to have savings. This means that the 'reservation wage'—the wage below which a worker will not accept a job—is now high in historical terms. If governments refuse to allow jobless workers to fall too far below the average standard of living, then this reservation wage will rise steadily, and ever more workers may find work unattractive. And the higher it rises, the greater the incentive to invest in capital that replaces labour." Indeed, it may be that the funding of governmental benefits will become secure enough through rising productivity that many current workers will have children who do not need a job at all.
As for the substance of this interesting submitted article, the historical facts are reviewed in a key paragraph before the article goes off into speculation about the future: "For much of the 20th century, those arguing that technology brought ever more jobs and prosperity looked to have the better of the debate. Real incomes in Britain scarcely doubled between the beginning of the common era and 1570. They then tripled from 1570 to 1875. And they more than tripled from 1875 to 1975. Industrialisation did not end up eliminating the need for human workers. On the contrary, it created employment opportunities sufficient to soak up the 20th century’s exploding population. Keynes’s vision of everyone in the 2030s being a lot richer is largely achieved. His belief they would work just 15 hours or so a week has not come to pass." The nub of the article's argument is that new forms of technological change might not leave us with any new forms of gainful employment.
After its interesting text discussion and chart predicting what kinds of employment are least likely to be automated out of existence, the article points out one difference between the world of the past and the world of today: "Another way in which previous adaptation is not necessarily a good guide to future employment is the existence of welfare. The alternative to joining the 19th-century industrial proletariat was malnourished deprivation. Today, because of measures introduced in response to, and to some extent on the proceeds of, industrialisation, people in the developed world are provided with unemployment benefits, disability allowances and other forms of welfare. They are also much more likely than a bygone peasant to have savings. This means that the 'reservation wage'—the wage below which a worker will not accept a job—is now high in historical terms. If governments refuse to allow jobless workers to fall too far below the average standard of living, then this reservation wage will rise steadily, and ever more workers may find work unattractive. And the higher it rises, the greater the incentive to invest in capital that replaces labour." Indeed, it may be that the funding of governmental benefits will become secure enough through rising productivity that many current workers will have children who do not need a job at all.
Decent sci-fi reading list in the sub-headings.
Good catch, thanks for pointing it out.
The article refers to a 2013 paper by David Autor of MIT... http://economics.mit.edu/files/9014
The Nissan anecdote starts on page 3.
The Nissan anecdote starts on page 3.
A table in the article says Technical Writers have an 89% chance of losing their jobs. But it's only 6% for editors.
Why? Will technical instructions be automatically generated? How?
Why? Will technical instructions be automatically generated? How?
Science is by definition the creation of causal chains. If I do X in this system, Y will result. Hence the importance of falsifiability and reproducibility.
This is yet another in a series of economic articles that sound much more like a typical op-ed column than an observation, hypothesis, or proof.
This is yet another in a series of economic articles that sound much more like a typical op-ed column than an observation, hypothesis, or proof.
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If it does turn out to be different this time, it will be because Turing complete automation is qualitatively different from single purpose machine automation.
I'd recommend reading Economics in One Lesson http://mises.org/library/economics-one-lesson
the domain of computer science that seems to have a bright future is machine learning.
I don't blame technology for the stagnation of the American middle class. I blame poor leadership, but I think there's something else going on that isn't getting a lot of press: latency skew.
Instead of waiting two to three days for a piece of postal mail, we're annoyed if that email takes two minutes. I'm not going to moralize about "instant gratification" as if it were wrong, because it's mostly not conscious and it's not a moral issue; we're just being neurologically retrained to resist delays. From a website, 10 seconds means "never": it's down, or in an unusable state. We're also (some of us, at least) at a ridiculous level of comfort; we have people who program their garages to heat up 30 minutes before they leave for work, because they can't stand the thought of 45 seconds' exposure to winter cold.
What's not becoming instant is human learning. If something can be learned quickly and will become rote, we can now program a computer to do it. So the things that we need humans for tend to be those that require subtlety or experience. That hasn't gotten faster. It still takes 6+ months before someone is good at his job. That's not a new problem. It's just less tolerated because people are more primed to expect instant results. So we're seeing an aversion to training people up into the better, more complex jobs that technology creates.
Instead of waiting two to three days for a piece of postal mail, we're annoyed if that email takes two minutes. I'm not going to moralize about "instant gratification" as if it were wrong, because it's mostly not conscious and it's not a moral issue; we're just being neurologically retrained to resist delays. From a website, 10 seconds means "never": it's down, or in an unusable state. We're also (some of us, at least) at a ridiculous level of comfort; we have people who program their garages to heat up 30 minutes before they leave for work, because they can't stand the thought of 45 seconds' exposure to winter cold.
What's not becoming instant is human learning. If something can be learned quickly and will become rote, we can now program a computer to do it. So the things that we need humans for tend to be those that require subtlety or experience. That hasn't gotten faster. It still takes 6+ months before someone is good at his job. That's not a new problem. It's just less tolerated because people are more primed to expect instant results. So we're seeing an aversion to training people up into the better, more complex jobs that technology creates.
Ftee trade destroys wages, of this there is no secret.
De-regulation subverts democracy.
Time to revisit the relationship between capital and well-being. Ricardian theories of comparative advantage drive wealth into the hands of those who control capital, not into the calloused hands of the poor suckers who sweat.
De-regulation subverts democracy.
Time to revisit the relationship between capital and well-being. Ricardian theories of comparative advantage drive wealth into the hands of those who control capital, not into the calloused hands of the poor suckers who sweat.
Automation destroys far more jobs than free trade. If anything we should ban automation.
It wasn't automation that destroyed US manufacturing
Manufacturing only became the major source of employment after all the farm laborers had become unemployed due to automation. As another comment mentioned, just banning wheat harvesters alone would create thousands of jobs. If creating jobs was our only goal.
Farm labourers became unemployed as a result of govt. policy to undermine farm worker political power.
More labour intensive farming would be a good thing. At the moment the US uses 10cals of energy to produce 1cal of food. Pre "get big or get out" it was 1 in 2 out.
Back to manufacturing, it is free trade that has gutted US manufacturing capability. Just look at the trade deficit, the rest of the world benefits greatly, capitalists get great returns on their free movement of money. The US loses taxes, jobs, and wealth and is eroding its long term economy while the short term policy makers make hay.
More labour intensive farming would be a good thing. At the moment the US uses 10cals of energy to produce 1cal of food. Pre "get big or get out" it was 1 in 2 out.
Back to manufacturing, it is free trade that has gutted US manufacturing capability. Just look at the trade deficit, the rest of the world benefits greatly, capitalists get great returns on their free movement of money. The US loses taxes, jobs, and wealth and is eroding its long term economy while the short term policy makers make hay.
>Farm labourers became unemployed as a result of govt. policy to undermine farm worker political power.
No, in the last 2 centuries we have simple automated the vast majority of farm labor.
>More labour intensive farming would be a good thing. At the moment the US uses 10cals of energy to produce 1cal of food. Pre "get big or get out" it was 1 in 2 out.
This is an entirely meaningless metric.
>Back to manufacturing, it is free trade that has gutted US manufacturing capability.
Yes but my point was that banning automation would be more effective at creating jobs than banning trade. They are economically equivalent. A port is essentially a machine that produces stuff with less (local) labor.
No, in the last 2 centuries we have simple automated the vast majority of farm labor.
>More labour intensive farming would be a good thing. At the moment the US uses 10cals of energy to produce 1cal of food. Pre "get big or get out" it was 1 in 2 out.
This is an entirely meaningless metric.
>Back to manufacturing, it is free trade that has gutted US manufacturing capability.
Yes but my point was that banning automation would be more effective at creating jobs than banning trade. They are economically equivalent. A port is essentially a machine that produces stuff with less (local) labor.
it's hard to know exactly what they class as "Athletic trainers". For Olympic athletes, there will always be staff. For the rest of us, what would that "unlikely" automation of the coach look like? Perhaps it would start with a movement sensor on the wrist? A smartphone app to track and recommend exercise?
That's not looking unlikely to me, it's looking like it's already here in plain sight:
http://www.fitbit.com/
http://www.microsoft.com/microsoft-band/en-us
https://play.google.com/store/apps/category/HEALTH_AND_FITNE...