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More From Tim O'Reilly about the 'WTF?!' Economy (Videos)
More From Tim O'Reilly about the 'WTF?!' Economy (Video)
On August 12 we ran two videos of Tim O'Reilly talking with Slashdot's Tim Lord about changes in how we work, what jobs we do, and who profits from advances in labor-saving technology. Tim (O'Reilly, that is) had written an article titled, The WTF Economy, which contained this paragraph:
"What do on-demand services, AI, and the $15 minimum wage movement have in common? They are telling us, loud and clear, that we’re in for massive changes in work, business, and the economy."
We're seeing a shift from cabs to Uber, but what about the big shift when human drivers get replaced by artificial intelligence? Ditto airplane pilots, burger flippers, and some physicians. WTF? Exactly. Once again we have a main video and a second one available only in Flash (sorry about that), along with a text transcript that covers both videos. Good thought-provoking material, even if you think you're so special that no machine could possibly replace you.
"What do on-demand services, AI, and the $15 minimum wage movement have in common? They are telling us, loud and clear, that we’re in for massive changes in work, business, and the economy."
We're seeing a shift from cabs to Uber, but what about the big shift when human drivers get replaced by artificial intelligence? Ditto airplane pilots, burger flippers, and some physicians. WTF? Exactly. Once again we have a main video and a second one available only in Flash (sorry about that), along with a text transcript that covers both videos. Good thought-provoking material, even if you think you're so special that no machine could possibly replace you.
I mean, we've had Day Laborers waiting at lumberyards for decades, and apparently, it was a thing 2000 years ago when Christ was a corporal. What about Uber makes this any different?
I keep coming back to see if you've stopped shooting yourself in the foot.
It appears that you have not.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
WTF economy is a better name than "sharing economy."
"Sharing economy" is an attempt to hide what it actually is.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
I'm seeing two rectangular divs with F in them (Flashblock extension at work). Just out of curiosity, I went to slashdot on my iphone, and it plays an html5 version of the video. So it's not a case of slashdot workers being so incompetent that they're unable to use html5, it's more like they decided to keep playing flash video for desktop users (for backward compatibility for people with old browsers) while serving up html5 for mobile users.
Automation has kept me employed for decades, someone has to design, build, configure and maintain the automata
The $15 minimum wage will contribute minimally to inflation, because the amount of money represented by all of the low wage earners combined is actually still a relatively small percentage of the overall economy.
It will certainly have a modest effect on inflation, but not anywhere near the effect that detractors frequently attribute to it.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
I don't think you realize just how paltry all of those worker's wages are to the overall economy.... there is an absolutely *ENORMOUS* gap between the high income and low income earners, and even despite the vastly larger number of low income earners, they still collectively contribute to only a very tiny percentage of the overall economy.
Think "Pareto Principle".
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
What's the motivation for replacing humans in various jobs with a robot?
Why are we doing this? The outcome is going to be terrible, so again.
What's the motivation?
"If any question why we died, Tell them because our fathers lied."
> "Who proofreads this stuff?
The grammar in these sentences and paragraphs is so bad, this whole interview is unreadable to someone who is a native English speaker. Either the person who transcribed this is not a native English speaker, or they are completely illiterate. Get it together, Dice - you're embarrassing yourself."
Were you adding all those mistakes to your post ironically/to prove some point? Anyway, fixed. :p
The wealthy may only spend a tiny fraction of their money on consumer goods, but that is only because they have more money in the first place.... Over 70% of the GDP is accounted for by consumer spending, and the bottom 80% earners controlled only 5% of all financial wealth in the USA in 2013.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
There is a direct correlation between income and consumer spending, which accounts for 70% of the GDP. The lowest 80% of all wage earners control only 5% of that figure, while only 20% of all wage earners contribute to 95% of all consumer spending.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
Indeed. Once you've paid your rent, electricity, Internet connection and bought food, if you have any left then you can add basic services phone and television. Nobody who lives on minimum wage or close to it is spending enough to make any difference.
I see an HTML5 video just fine on my desktop system. Flash has been deleted from my system years ago. So basically, it's probably the Flash detection routines that are faulty.
The best possible result would be WalMart going bankrupt. They are a drain on all levels of government from city through federal. And they aren't too good for the private economy, either. They pay their people so little that if they worked full time they would qualify for general assistance and food stamps. But they won't let them work full time, because that might give them some rights.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
There's a problem here. The most likely first response is the cost of a place to live going up over $250/month. Those who have the power to set prices are likely to see that as just an opportunity to increase prices.
OK, some places already have rent control. In those places it's just the price at turnover that will increase. Which, of course, will be a great incentive to coerce turnover.
FWIW, I *am* in favor of a basic income, but it's not a straightforwards problem, and simple answers won't work. I think the first step needs to be a reform of the tax law so that the tax is a simple linear tax (y = mx + b) where m is the tax rate, x is the income, and b is the -1 * "basic income". y, of course, is the tax owed, and can be negative. And x, income, has NO exemptions. If you want to support some selected group, do it outside the tax law. (OTOH, losing money, say on the stock market, *is* a negative income, resulting as much negative tax as earning the same amount would have resulted in a positive tax.) There are problems here with, among many other things, interfaces to foreign tax laws. Algorithms without corner cases are rare.
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Which is why raising minimum wage by some amount does not result in a correspondingly large increase in inflation... it contributes some, but historically the effects of raising minimum wage have always been extremely minor, and is entirely outweighed by the fact that the people whose wages were increased tend to be able to afford a better standard of living.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
There's a problem here. The most likely first response is the cost of a place to live going up over $250/month. Those who have the power to set prices are likely to see that as just an opportunity to increase prices.
The problem with this logic is twofold.
First, you can't simply increase rent because people are making more money; people remember for years what they think the cost of things should be, and are reluctant to pay more than that, and will shop around for a better deal. So, while company A decides to raise prices, Company B decides not to do so, and gets more business because of this and still results in an increase in profits (due to a sale rate closer to capacity).
Secondly, an increase in price in one area of an industry, especially the budget options, causes a ripple effect increasing the prices of everything in an industry. While this may cause a short-term price increase, factors will return it to a lower equilibrium. If you do a 20-50% increase in rent for budget apartments (which could only happen with a cartel controlling almost all apartments in a city), it will start to increase everything else in the housing market. If budget apartments suddenly cost as much as midrange, then why would you rent budget? This leads to an increase in midrange rental, increasing prices there, so more people go expensive or buy a house/condo. This causes people to leave the rental market, so suddenly you have empty budget apartments all over the place. To rent those out again, the prices will have to start to come down.
Consumer spending accounts for 70% of the GDP, the less wealthy spend a greater percentage of their income on necessities. The top 20% spend more than 10 times as much on consumer goods as the bottom 80% combined.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'
You must have always had lots of disposable income. And never lived where housing was tight. Where I live it's quite often that when I would look for an apartment, I'd check a new listing, and by the time I got out to look at it, someone else would already have taken it. II'd analogize it to a parking space, but if you don't live where housing is tight, that probably wouldn't make sense either.
And as for buying instead of renting...you need a lot of cash and a stable residence for that to be a viable option. I'd think that you were too old to know better, but I'm already retired, so I'm going to guess that you bought a house 30 years ago. Either that or you live in a small town distant from any metropolitan area. (I'd guess that you were still living at home and had never had to find a place to live, but the tone of your comment indicates someone older.)
I think we've pushed this "anyone can grow up to be president" thing too far.
Not even slightly.... The number of people may be very large, but the amount of money they control and spend is still very small compared to overall consumer spending. The top 20% income earners account for 95% of the economy. Even doubling minimum wage wouldn't impact that number in any appreciable way because of the enormous income disparity between the rich and the poor.
File under 'M' for 'Manic ranting'