Robot Workforce Threatens Education-Intensive Jobs

An anonymous reader writes "For years, robots have been replacing workers in factories as technology has come to grips with high-volume, unskilled labor. An article in Slate makes the case that the robot workforce is poised to move into fields that require significantly more training and education. From the article: 'In the next decade, we'll see machines barge into areas of the economy that we'd never suspected possible — they'll be diagnosing your diseases, dispensing your medicine, handling your lawsuits, making fundamental scientific discoveries, and even writing stories just like this one. Economic theory holds that as these industries are revolutionized by technology, prices for their services will decline, and society as a whole will benefit. As I conducted my research, I found this argument convincing — robotic lawyers, for instance, will bring cheap legal services to the masses who can't afford lawyers today. But there's a dark side, too: Imagine you've spent three years in law school, two more years clerking, and the last decade trying to make partner — and now here comes a machine that can do much of your $400-per-hour job faster, and for a fraction of the cost. What do you do now?'"

Comments

Re:Cry me a river

[djmurdoch]

2-3 years, not 120. The most an Apple laptop battery lasts is 2-3 years.

Re:sue

[AK Marc]

But what the people in the US don't understand is that if labor were free, it's still cheaper to ship the raw materials from Cupertino to Shenzhen, manufacture in China, then ship the product back to Cupertino to be sold. Why? Environmental regualtions and such. We are exporting our toxic waste to China by sending out the manufacturing. There's more to cost of manufacture than just assembly, but nobody on Slashdot ever seems to consider such things.