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Backlash Builds Against Bill Gates' Call For A Robot Tax (cbsnews.com)
Bill Gates argued governments should tax companies that use replace humans with robots, which "provoked enough negative feedback to fry a motherboard," according to CBS News. Here's how they summarized some of the reactions:
- "Why pick on robots?" former Treasury Secretary Summers asked in a Washington Post opinion piece, which called Gates "profoundly misguided." The economist argued that progress, however messy and disruptive sometimes, ultimately benefits society overall.
- Mike Shedlock, a financial adviser with Sitka Pacific Capital Management in Edmonds, Washington, wrote on his blog that robot owners, who likely would pay the tax, would simply pass it along by jacking up prices.
- The European Union's parliament in February rejected a measure to impose a tax on robots, using much the same reasoning as Gates' critics.
But even while acknowledging that technology can complement humans rather than replacing them, a Bloomberg columnist argues that "Gates is right to say that we should start thinking ahead of time about how to use policy to mitigate the disruptions of automation." So if we're not going to tax robots, then how should society handle the next great wave of automated labor?
because you would not want to tax the ultra mega rich people that actually have enough money to help feed & house the disabled, poor & homeless, they need to buy that new yacht, jet and new limo every year
Politics is Treachery, Religion is Brainwashing
I don't know the answer either, but I know that Bill Gates is hilariously hypocritical,
As CEO of Microsoft he started a practice that still continues today. Despite having its headquarters in Washington state and employing many thousands of people there, Microsoft claims that all of its revenue comes from a tiny office in Nevada, a state which just happens to have no income tax. As a result, Microsoft has cheated Washington out of many billions of dollars in taxes over the last 30 years.
Microsoft made its billions off the back of putting millions of accountants and accountants interns out of business with the rise of Excel (and its contemporaries), and yet there were no issues about automation taking over back then... nor any tax on spreadsheets....
Automation has happened all of humanities history - we don't buy cotton material from cottage based weavers any more, and blacksmiths don't build train engines.
Did we tax steam engines when they made pumping water out of coal mines more efficient? Or driving mills instead of using water wheels? Or hauling goods and passengers long distances?
Did we tax Bethlehem Steel when they did time motion studies to figure out that laborers using smaller shovels can actually shovel more coal?
Did we tax assembly lines when they made producing cars and washing machines and radios more efficient?
Did we tax Intel's new 17nm fab, when – and just because – it made producing CPUs more efficient than their old 22nm fab?
Etc. etc.
Automation is not the enemy of humanity, it's the product of our knowledge and investment in science to better mankind. If you think automation is going to make people permanently unemployable then perhaps it's finally time to admit that we need some sort of universal income so that people can afford basic things like food and shelter. Alternatively, now would be a good time to start having the purge every year. ;)
Anons need not reply. Questions end with a question mark.
We have seen what happens when you disenfranchise the local population and strip them of the bare minimum needs for survival. 1789 and 1917 give a pretty good example. That's why we outsourced that to areas where people can't simply pick up pitchforks and kill us, 'cause swimming through oceans with pitchforks is a bit unwieldy.
If you now again create a powerless group of people without any rights and means of existence right at your door, they don't need to swim. And they have a second amendment that ensures they're armed.
I would not go ahead full bore neo-capitalist into another industrial revolution where you don't try to squeeze your workers dry but simply shove them to the side. Working your workers 'til they're dead is one thing, but shoving them aside means that they are still strong enough at the end of the day to hold a gun against your head.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
These dipsh!t producers need to realize that when they collectively suppress labor costs that very same "labor" can't afford to buy your goods.
Want to solve the lagging economy? Follow the philosophy of, "A rising tide raises all boats.
It doesn't matter if you call it Cost Of Living Allowance, Minimum Guaranteed Income, Universal Basic Income, or anything else, the only reasonable way to go forward in a capitalist society is with simple currency-based redistribution of wealth.
There are not and will not be enough jobs to go around. A significantly-sized population is required to maintain the level of technological development, so killing off the masses is a non-starter which would impinge upon the lifestyles of the rich. Their basic needs have to be met somehow. They are going to have to be handed money, because if you don't, one of two things will happen, or both. One, they will die in the streets in droves. Two, they will show up with torches and pitchforks and really ruin all the spreadsheets.
We can forestall this future with public works projects, and honestly that is a good idea anyway, especially in the USA where infrastructure is crumbling. But we cannot do so indefinitely. The health of our economic systems is based on endless growth, and the only way for humanity to enjoy endless growth is to expand into space. We are decades behind where we could be in that area. We may, in fact, be too late. Rockets can never get enough humans off this mudball to make a difference, for reasons of physics, and we still don't know how to build a space elevator. We may well fail here, and never escape our gravity well (a handful of experiments aside.)
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
UBI would still involve plenty of motivation to work. You're always going to make more money if you work.
Laws are rules for the court, but merely a bottom bar to hit for life. Think beyond laws in your actions always.
While I agree with there being a big problem with the ultra wealthy in numerous regards, the problem is not Capitalism. The US is not practicing Capitalism, it's practicing a form of Mercantilism which we call "Crony Capitalism".
I am interested in discussion of how one can avoid the one becoming the other, especially when the definition of capitalism is that capital controls the means of production.
The wealthy install politicians where they believe it suits their interests, and those politicians act as protectionists.
So, how do you stop the wealthy from exerting this unfair advantage over others?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
"It's not capitalism ... it's just every time that capitalism is tried". Come on, dude, every single time we try this it fails. Miserably. The reek of the "no true Scotsman" fallacy is all over this.
It's time to face facts - we have tried to implement capitalism again and again. It's failed again and again. Take off the ideological blinders and you'll see that it simply does not work in practice, and cannot work in practice. You place the blame on the people but we aren't changing the people any time soon. If the system does not work it is because the system is wrong. You can't complain that your model failed because the real world refused to conform to your idealism. You have to acknowledge that the world is as it is and design a system to fit with that, rather than the absurd ideological nonsense of deciding what you'd like to be true then complaining that the real world isn't that way when it doesn't work.
Exactly. It's human nature to always want more, which is why billionaires don't stop trying to make money. It's also how we define ourselves (especially men) within society, by what we do. Communism failed in large part because it ignored this fundamental fact, and removed the incentive to work harder/better, or to invest anything, be it time, effort, or money.
Look at it this way - if you won a contest that gave you $1,000 a month from now on, tax-free, would you quit your job, or would you think to yourself "I have $1000 more per month to spend on fun stuff!" Now, maybe you'd quit your job to go back to college for a better degree, in order to get an even better job, but is that a bad thing either?
The AC is basically right. Capitalism rewards those with the capital and the market rewards the most efficient at using that capital. It is often more efficient to cheat and an easy way to cheat is to get into the position of making the rules. As long as it is more efficient to repress the competition then actually have a better product, the successful capitalist will focus on repressing the competition and you end up with crony capitalism.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inverted_totalitarianism