Technological unemployment is (almost) here

[Bit N Roll]

Is freelance online jobs included in Technological jobs?

[Gronthaing]

Technologist =/= economist. If things indeed get more and more efficient, that by definition means they will be cheaper to make and cheaper to produce. So a family will be able to survive on the salary of only one person, again. Don't forget that we used to have less than 50% of the population employed in the past, and we did fine.

The quality of life was also much lower then. Also, regardless of how cheap things get, if you don't have money because you don't have a job, how are you going to pay? Not to mention some resources are limited, so there is always a bottom price. And then, even with the current disparity between production and how much people get paid, you have people working two and three jobs and barely surviving. What makes you think that will change in the future? That is, that the money associated with increased productivity won't simply continue to be siphoned by those in charge?

[Gronthaing]

Technologist =/= economist. If things indeed get more and more efficient, that by definition means they will be cheaper to make and cheaper to produce. So a family will be able to survive on the salary of only one person, again. Don't forget that we used to have less than 50% of the population employed in the past, and we did fine.

The quality of life was also much lower then. Also, regardless of how cheap things get, if you don't have money because you don't have a job, how are you going to pay? Not to mention some resources are limited, so there is always a bottom price. And then, even with the current disparity between production and how much people get paid, you have people working two and three jobs and barely surviving. What makes you think that will change in the future? That is, that the money associated with increased productivity won't simply continue to be siphoned by those in charge?

What makes you think this is not what we have already?  Even statistics say like 75% of discretionary spending is held by people over the age of 55.  Increasing education and skillsets isn't making things any better for younger persons..  on the contrary, increasing productivity often translates to more young people being out of work.
 

Although the robots would probably be made by people under the age of 40 (probably new graduates on a students' income), it would likely be the same demographic of people age 55+ who would be reaping all the benefits of automation.  Not promoting generational warfare at all but such as it is.


The quality of life back then may had been less but at least a hundred years ago people had land.  In this contemporary age, practically no young people have land and thus are completely reliant on a system which is largely geared to disenfranchise and rob them of the wealth produced from their labor.

And I completely agree with you. We're already down this path. What I was doing was criticizing him for believing that continuing down it would somehow make things alright again.

edit: eh? where did you go?

[Rassah]

We had that system of about 50% employment for the centuries when men worked and women stayed home.

Yes, there will always be disparity, but the lowest income level has been improving in quality of life, and will likely continue to do so. Poor people still get the benefits of a house, running water, sanitation, electricity, and communications like cell phones and Internet, which they couldn't even dream of 100 years ago.

People having land doesn't matter. Land is just some dirt you can do stuff with. What matters is what's between your ears. You can use that in combination with land to grow food, build a house, or run a business, or you can use that without land to make money,  run a business, rent an apartment, and live anywhere. The main mistake poor people make is that they never accumulate any assets, instead spending all their money as soon as they get it. And those assets don't have to be land.  Even some stocks and binds, or just some cash in savings would do to start with.

[jubalix]

We had that system of about 50% employment for the centuries when men worked and women stayed home.

Yes, there will always be disparity, but the lowest income level has been improving in quality of life, and will likely continue to do so. Poor people still get the benefits of a house, running water, sanitation, electricity, and communications like cell phones and Internet, which they couldn't even dream of 100 years ago.

People having land doesn't matter. Land is just some dirt you can do stuff with. What matters is what's between your ears. You can use that in combination with land to grow food, build a house, or run a business, or you can use that without land to make money,  run a business, rent an apartment, and live anywhere. The main mistake poor people make is that they never accumulate any assets, instead spending all their money as soon as they get it. And those assets don't have to be land.  Even some stocks and binds, or just some cash in savings would do to start with.

Your kidding right. Land is all that matters. No matter if you dont have land you have nothing. I can charge you every cent you make to live on what you don't own.

[RepublicSpace]

We had that system of about 50% employment for the centuries when men worked and women stayed home.

Yes, there will always be disparity, but the lowest income level has been improving in quality of life, and will likely continue to do so. Poor people still get the benefits of a house, running water, sanitation, electricity, and communications like cell phones and Internet, which they couldn't even dream of 100 years ago.

People having land doesn't matter. Land is just some dirt you can do stuff with. What matters is what's between your ears. You can use that in combination with land to grow food, build a house, or run a business, or you can use that without land to make money,  run a business, rent an apartment, and live anywhere. The main mistake poor people make is that they never accumulate any assets, instead spending all their money as soon as they get it. And those assets don't have to be land.  Even some stocks and binds, or just some cash in savings would do to start with.

Your kidding right. Land is all that matters. No matter if you dont have land you have nothing. I can charge you every cent you make to live on what you don't own.

Good point. It is nice to own at least a little piece of land.

[Arriemoller]

I own a little piece of land, and it is nice, I don't have to pay someone else to live, the small cottage and the patch of land that comes with it is mine, and that makes my cost of living a lot smaller.
Next to me is a castle, in it resides the local (rich) count, and he owns a heluvalot more land than I ever will. And so has his house for generations and generations. And they most likely will for generations to come. So, yes, land still matters. There are other ways to become and stay rich, but land is always a sure thing.
And banking, the Jews were, historically, usually banned from owning land in European and other countries, that made them go in to money lending, and that too turned out to be a sure thing. As the Yiddish proverb says "Interest on debt grows without rain".

Yes there actually is a castle with a real live count in it. Skabersjö castle has been owned by the house of Thott since 1600.

http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skabersj%C3%B6_slott

The house of Thott http://sv.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tott

[Rassah]

Your kidding right. Land is all that matters. No matter if you dont have land you have nothing. I can charge you every cent you make to live on what you don't own.

No, you can give me any price you want, but I don't have to accept your price, and just go live with someone cheaper. I don't think it's even possible for a single person or entity to have a monopoly on all the land on the entire planet.

As a count, I'm tempted to get a bit of land and a castle too, but in an increasingly hostile world, land is an asset that is easiest to track, and thus easiest to take away by force. So, to me, owning more portable and liquid assets, like bitcoin, seems way safer than owning land.

[Arriemoller]

And that's why the counts in the old days had their own small armies.
But you have to remember that bitcoin is the capital. It may become more valuable in the near future, but at some point that increase in value will stagnate, and if you use your bitcoins for buying goods that doesn't generate income you will eventually run out of bitcoins. Land generates income, so does rent on money lent.

[Arriemoller]

Besides, the world is not increasingly hostile, it's in fact the very opposite. We have never lived in a more peaceful time, ever.

http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_pinker_on_the_myth_of_violence

http://www.npr.org/2011/12/07/143285836/war-and-violence-on-the-decline-in-modern-times

[johny08]

Unemployment is happening, because there are people, which can not be used for work, they can do. Technology is changing all the time. Therefor you have unemployment in the technology sector. There are more and more machines used.

Normally you can produce more different products with better machines.

Normally you can produce cheaper products with better machines.

Why should it be now different as in the last 200 years. Because you are saying?

No.

[hasherr]

I dont see a problem. Humans will always reach for more and more progress and therefore other humans will be needed. I dont see a position in future where one could really say - thats it, no more progress possible, we can all sit on our asses for rest of existence. Also human count on this planet will adjust as neccessary. If we can sustain more ppl, more ppl will be produced. And vice versa. Mybe in futere there will be only 1 bil ppl on this planet, with way better living standards than today. Why not?

[snarlpill]

I read the first page of this thread and am very into it, but have no time currently to read too much more. The reason I have no time is because I am currently working ~72 hours a week in a North American manufacturing factory. I have worked in several over the past few years, and most in my area produce parts for cars, usually something very specific; like nuts or bolts, mufflers, etc. They are working my department like dogs at the moment; they'll sell large orders or make big deals and then the plebs must spend their lives there busting their asses to make the owners rich.

I see OP's post as a very large possibility of happening, and sooner than one would think probably. Machines already do most all of the work, but the humans must operate these and do mostly simple operations like loading/unloading them, clearing jams that may occur along the process, monitoring numbers, etc. The owners and select few at the top make millions. Promises about weekends off work and other cheerful thoughts are dismissed with authority whenever production must be met.

Point Blank: If the owners and associated elite at the top Can do it for cheaper, longer, better, etc., they will. And the top tech companies that come to the best automation first will sell them as much as possible to please their shareholders and their own wallets. Employment numbers dropping or other connected woes would not stop their greed and the automation would spread.

[johnyj]

There are already too much useless toys/clothes/gifts in my local supermarket, I can guarantee that most of them will never be sold at large quantity, most possibly they will get trashed after a period (no you don't even want to spend money to transport them to some developing countries)

But the fact that they are still being produced means that there are money given to those producers so that they don't even care about the market demand

[Anon136]

We had that system of about 50% employment for the centuries when men worked and women stayed home.

Yes, there will always be disparity, but the lowest income level has been improving in quality of life, and will likely continue to do so. Poor people still get the benefits of a house, running water, sanitation, electricity, and communications like cell phones and Internet, which they couldn't even dream of 100 years ago.

People having land doesn't matter. Land is just some dirt you can do stuff with. What matters is what's between your ears. You can use that in combination with land to grow food, build a house, or run a business, or you can use that without land to make money,  run a business, rent an apartment, and live anywhere. The main mistake poor people make is that they never accumulate any assets, instead spending all their money as soon as they get it. And those assets don't have to be land.  Even some stocks and binds, or just some cash in savings would do to start with.

Your kidding right. Land is all that matters. No matter if you dont have land you have nothing. I can charge you every cent you make to live on what you don't own.

You could charge it. But unless there is something supremely special about your land in particular, if you charge too much someone is going to undercut you because a little profit is always better than no profit.

[Rassah]

And that's why the counts in the old days had their own small armies.

Nowadays they're private security services, so things haven't changed much.

But you have to remember that bitcoin is the capital. It may become more valuable in the near future, but at some point that increase in value will stagnate, and if you use your bitcoins for buying goods that doesn't generate income you will eventually run out of bitcoins. Land generates income, so does rent on money lent.

As you said, rent on money lent. I already lend my bitcoins through https://bitlendingclub.com, and invest it in projects I think will give me a good return. You are absolutely right that if you just sit on the money and spend it on goods, you'll eventually run out. Millionaires that inherit their money without business tagging, and people with no business or finance training who win the lottery, often lose all their money rather quickly, and sometimes end up in worse debt than before they got all that money.
As I said, it's not the asset, it's what's between your ears (brain) and how you use it. Even if you have zero assets, you can always use your knowledge and intelligence to do some work and earn more assets. It's one of the reasons I quit my job and went off on my own: even if I lose all my money, I still have the skills and knowledge that will let me easily get another job and make more.

Besides, the world is not increasingly hostile, it's in fact the very opposite. We have never lived in a more peaceful time, ever.

http://www.ted.com/talks/steven_pinker_on_the_myth_of_violence

http://www.npr.org/2011/12/07/143285836/war-and-violence-on-the-decline-in-modern-times

When i said hostile, i didn't mean the general population. I meant the systems in power, with things like Cyprus, NSA, bail-ins being legalized in Europe and version of that in USA, people in Russia, Ukraine, Venezuela, Argentina, and China being increasingly upset at their leadership, and their leadership getting more oppressive to try to hold onto power, and if adoption of bitcoin leads to tax revenue shortages, or even just inflationary currencies end up not being able to sustain social programs governments pay for, all those people with comfortable safety nets and "free" government provided services will be quite angry, and start looking for wealthy scapegoats to go after. They are already complaining that wealthy people are not paying enough taxes, and that they "owe society" because society provided them with police protection, roads, educated work force, etc, while ignoring that the wealthy pay a higher percentage of total tax, and thus are the ones paying for those things already, and that the useless idiots making those complaints are not "society," but individuals who want more stuff for themselves.

[superresistant]

 
Have you seen this one ?

http://www.ted.com/talks/andrew_mcafee_what_will_future_jobs_look_like?language=en

[Nicolas Dorier]

Have you seen this one ?

http://www.ted.com/talks/andrew_mcafee_what_will_future_jobs_look_like?language=en

I agree that a guaranteed minimum income, that does not disappear if someone decide to work, is better than the current system, but the idea can't be possibly reconciled with libertarianism, and the effect would be to make everything more costly.

It amazes me that everybody claims Hayek said that, but I have yet to see the actual source of it.
Try to find this statement in Hayek's books.... People says he said that but no source pointing to one of his own essays.

Hayek had the habit to give arguments supporting his claims... but for this one strangely he didn't, and people only speculates about his arguments. (WTF?!)

Also, the effect of such policy would be null, if the average Income is 5000, and the minimum one is 3000 of that average income, then prices will just be (3000/5000) * 100 = 60% higher than without it...

There is absolutely no way to reconcile a guaranteed income with libertarianism without breaking NAP.

[superresistant]

There is absolutely no way to reconcile a guaranteed income with libertarianism without breaking NAP.

Sorry, what does NAP mean ?

[Nicolas Dorier]

Non Aggression Principle