(Poll) So, why have none of the candidates addressed this issue?

[Goonie]

So within the next 30 years overs 50% of the population will be unemployed. As technology and AI automate and take over whole sections of the economy. For example self driving cars, trucks, trains etc remove the need for transportation jobs, factorys are fully automated etc.

How will the government deal with these 10's of millions of people with little to no chance of paid employment in their lifetime?
Does it let them starve?
Pay a living wage to everyone in some kind of socialist utopia?
Or are we talking workhouse with attached crematoria?
Or smash the machines?
http://www.theguardian.com/technolo...intelligence-ai-unemployment-jobs-moshe-vardi

Difficult question, what's your solution?

 

[NightHawkeye]

So within the next 30 years overs 50% of the population will be unemployed. As technology and AI automate and take over whole sections of the economy. For example self driving cars, trucks, trains etc remove the need for transportation jobs, factorys are fully automated etc.

How will the government deal with these 10's of millions of people with little to no chance of paid employment in their lifetime?
Does it let them starve?
Pay a living wage to everyone in some kind of socialist utopia?
Or are we talking workhouse with attached crematoria?
Or smash the machines?
http://www.theguardian.com/technolo...intelligence-ai-unemployment-jobs-moshe-vardi

Difficult question, what's your solution?

Why do you suppose that people will be unemployed?

Are there not enough jobs which cannot be automated? Are there not enough dirty jobs? Are there not enough software jobs? Are there not enough service sector jobs? Will people not be able to telecommute? Will we not have enough wars to minimize the surplus population?

Perhaps the standard work week will reduce from forty hours to twenty hours and people will enjoy more leisure time.

As a tangential related issue, I would propose that solid-state lighting will allow millions of people to live completely off-the-grid ... and never have to pay another electric bill. Have you considered that possibility? Remembering that the electric grid was originally established in order to provide power for incandescent lighting, it is not unreasonable to suppose that the advent of the low cost extremely low-power LED lighting which is now available might serve as a catalyst to allow those who are tired of paying a monthly electric bill to get off the grid completely using either wind or solar energy, both of which are quite capable of providing more than enough energy to keep LED lights shining brightly throughout the house.

 

[Goonie]

Why do you suppose that people will be unemployed?

Are there not enough jobs which cannot be automated? Are there not enough dirty jobs? Are there not enough software jobs? Are there not enough service sector jobs? Will people not be able to telecommute? Will we not have enough wars to minimize the surplus population?

Perhaps the standard work week will reduce from forty hours to twenty hours and people will enjoy more leisure time.

As a tangential related issue, I would propose that solid-state lighting will allow millions of people to live completely off-the-grid ... and never have to pay another electric bill. Have you considered that possibility? Remembering that the electric grid was originally established in order to provide power for incandescent lighting, it is not unreasonable to suppose that the advent of the low cost extremely low-power LED lighting which is now available might serve as a catalyst to allow those who are tired of paying a monthly electric bill to get off the grid completely using either wind or solar energy, both of which are quite capable of providing more than enough energy to keep LED lights shining brightly throughout the house.

The issue is that most jobs in the future can be done more cheaply by machines. and yes there might be jobs that cannot be automated but unfortunately that leaves 50% unemployment. The fact is that in a capitalist society if a company can reduce its overheads it will do, if you can produce the same product with just 200 staff where you used to employ 2000 this will happen. And those still in work will receive less pay, because guess what there will be 100s waiting in line, just as qualified wanting that job.

Yes there will be new businesses, but they will make full use of automation, and off cause with fewer people in paid employment there will be a massive downturn in demand for products, so even less people will be employed.

 

[Goonie]

Why do you suppose that people will be unemployed?

Are there not enough jobs which cannot be automated? Are there not enough dirty jobs? Are there not enough software jobs? Are there not enough service sector jobs? Will people not be able to telecommute? Will we not have enough wars to minimize the surplus population?

Perhaps the standard work week will reduce from forty hours to twenty hours and people will enjoy more leisure time.

As a tangential related issue, I would propose that solid-state lighting will allow millions of people to live completely off-the-grid ... and never have to pay another electric bill. Have you considered that possibility? Remembering that the electric grid was originally established in order to provide power for incandescent lighting, it is not unreasonable to suppose that the advent of the low cost extremely low-power LED lighting which is now available might serve as a catalyst to allow those who are tired of paying a monthly electric bill to get off the grid completely using either wind or solar energy, both of which are quite capable of providing more than enough energy to keep LED lights shining brightly throughout the house.

dirty jobs will be done by robots, they are already developing them, and millions of service sector jobs will cease to exist, think about self service tills at the supermarket, the use of improved ai in handing telephone calls, voice recognition etc. Within the next decade a large portion of jobs in accounting/bookkeeping are likely to be automated.

 

[Goonie]

An interesting article on jobs at risk of automation
http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/...veals-professions-likely-replaced-robots.html

 

[Willtor]

I voted for the universal stipend.

Yeah, I don't credit politicians with an over-abundance of brains. I'm guessing this has never occurred to most of them, and if they don't know, their corporate friends aren't going to tell them.

At some point (in my grand-childrens' time, I'd guess) human beings will no longer be necessary to the production of wealth. Robots and computers will all do it faster, better, cheaper, more creatively. More creatively?! What?! This is in its nascent form in my lab. Robots will maintain each other. Software will be written by computers. Art and music will be played more skillfully and soulfully than a human being can do.

This could be a utopia or dystopia, depending on the direction we take as a society, today. As things stand, I'm going to go with dystopia.

 

[BrianJK]

I'd like to think it would be a universal stipend, but I daresay some of the politicians of today would be glad to let the surplus population starve.

 

[Winken]

So within the next 30 years overs 50% of the population will be unemployed. As technology and AI automate and take over whole sections of the economy. For example self driving cars, trucks, trains etc remove the need for transportation jobs, factorys are fully automated etc.

How will the government deal with these 10's of millions of people with little to no chance of paid employment in their lifetime?
Does it let them starve?
Pay a living wage to everyone in some kind of socialist utopia?
Or are we talking workhouse with attached crematoria?
Or smash the machines?
http://www.theguardian.com/technolo...intelligence-ai-unemployment-jobs-moshe-vardi

Difficult question, what's your solution?

...........and TV network anchors / reporters will be gone, as drones report the news --- in 3D.

 

[super animator]

Hey maybe in 30 years we will finally have flying cars. Yea, sorry but I do not share the same optimism when it comes to the development of computer here.

 

[NightHawkeye]

The issue is that most jobs in the future can be done more cheaply by machines. and yes there might be jobs that cannot be automated but unfortunately that leaves 50% unemployment. The fact is that in a capitalist society if a company can reduce its overheads it will do, if you can produce the same product with just 200 staff where you used to employ 2000 this will happen. And those still in work will receive less pay, because guess what there will be 100s waiting in line, just as qualified wanting that job.

Well, if it makes you feel any better I thought the same thing half a century ago. I even believed it when Jimmy Carter was president, not realizing that it was his policies which caused the massive unemployment, high inflation and general economic malaise.

Funny thing happened though on the way to the 21st century. The forces of free enterprise were unleashed and prosperity reigned for another three decades before anyone could stifle it again.

Yes there will be new businesses, but they will make full use of automation, and off cause with fewer people in paid employment there will be a massive downturn in demand for products, so even less people will be employed.

Yes, that's what many people thought half a century ago, too. The thing is though, the world population has always been limited by the available food supply. All this automation and artificial intelligence you speak of will continue to increase the world's food supply and motivated people throughout the world will keep doing what they've always done ... they'll come up with new and ingenious ideas which perpetuate to the benefit of all mankind.

Oh ... and as to how well people survive, here's a little Biblical perspective ...

And they shall build houses, and inhabit them; and they shall plant vineyards, and eat the fruit of them.

They shall not build, and another inhabit; they shall not plant, and another eat: for as the days of a tree are the days of my people, and mine elect shall long enjoy the work of their hands.

They shall not labour in vain, nor bring forth for trouble; for they are the seed of the blessed of the LORD, and their offspring with them.

And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear. The wolf and the lamb shall feed together, and the lion shall eat straw like the bullock: and dust shall be the serpent's meat. They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain, saith the LORD.
​

But, hey, some would dismiss these words from a few thousand years ago. Not me though.

If nothing else, the internet has equalized many things which were unequal before ... and that trend has only been accelerating. The internet has also served to hold people accountable ... who were never held to account before.

 

[aieyiamfu]

I voted for the universal stipend.

Yeah, I don't credit politicians with an over-abundance of brains. I'm guessing this has never occurred to most of them, and if they don't know, their corporate friends aren't going to tell them.

At some point (in my grand-childrens' time, I'd guess) human beings will no longer be necessary to the production of wealth. Robots and computers will all do it faster, better, cheaper, more creatively. More creatively?! What?! This is in its nascent form in my lab. Robots will maintain each other. Software will be written by computers. Art and music will be played more skillfully and soulfully than a human being can do.

This could be a utopia or dystopia, depending on the direction we take as a society, today. As things stand, I'm going to go with dystopia.[/QUOTE?]
I also assume it will be dystopia. I figure those who have will in one way or another try to liquidate those who do not as a drain on society.

 

[Willtor]

Note: Check your formatting. You're missing a close ].

That's my concern as well. I heard a talk by Steven Pinker where he observed that there has been a steady trend of decreasing violence, and he attributed this to the fact that people increasingly perceive one another (even across societies) as useful. I'm glad for the decreasing violence, but the cause concerns me because even if it's a trend that has been true throughout recorded history, it need not be true for very much longer.

We need to value people by virtue of them being people; "made in the image of God," in biblical and traditional terms, but (in my experience) something apparent to some and not others with religiosity not being a good predictor.

 

[OldWiseGuy]

Our best hope is for emerging third world markets to indeed emerge. It will take generations to get them all to a decent standard of living. This will require the products and technology of the west. Every person is a 'market' for at least a basic level of goods and services. Providing them should keep us busy for the foreseeable future. As it is they make lots of stuff for us but little for themselves.