US Workers Face A Higher Risk Of Being Replaced By Robots (cnn.com)

There's a surprising prediction for the next 15 years from the world's second largest professional services firm. An anonymous reader quotes CNN: Millions of workers around the world are at risk of losing their jobs to robots -- but Americans should be particularly worried. Thirty-eight percent of jobs in the U.S. are at high risk of being replaced by robots and artificial intelligence over the next 15 years, according to a new report by PwC. Meanwhile, only 30% of jobs in the U.K. are similarly endangered. The same level of risk applies to only 21% of positions in Japan.
61% of America's financial service jobs "are at a high risk of being replaced by robots," according to the article, vs. just 32% of the finance jobs in the U.K. (Those U.S. finance jobs tend to be "domestic retail operations" like small-town bank tellers, whereas U.K. finance jobs concentrate more in international finance and investment banking.) The firm's chief economist sees a world where new jobs are more likely to go to higher-skilled workers, and he ultimately predicts "a restructuring of the jobs market... The gap between rich and poor could get even wider."

Comments

Machines replacing bank tellers?

[fl_litig8r]

You mean machines that will accept deposits and dispense cash from my accounts? That's just crazy talk.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

The Moravec's paradox of jobs: the more educated jobs are more likely to be replaceable. All the worse if they're better paid.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

It makes perfect sense.

If your working contribution costs more to automate than it takes to pay your wage, you will be safe from automation (at least until automation drives down the costs of further automation sufficiently to resolve this case).

If your wages are on par with, or greater (amortized over time) than the costs of replacing you with automation, your job is at high risk of being eliminated to automation as a cost saving measure.

Combined, the only "safe" class of workers are those in a situation where automation is, for some reason other than cost, unable to replace them, which is a category that gets eroded quickly due to increasingly capable robot and software designs.

Human society NEEDS to be ready for the inevitable reality where NOBODY works, and the only people who "Make money", are those who OWN robots, or have a share in companies, and milk their investments.

Money ceases to be an essential functional commodity in such a circumstance, as people will invent alternative methods of exchange to obtain necessary services.

Either money has to be distributed for no labor expended by a governing body (basic income strategy), or true post-scarcity future economic models need to be created. There are no alternatives where really rich people get everything and everyone else just dies. (Sorry plutocrats, but that is how you destroy the human race, not live immortal, pampered lives.)

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[msauve]

This is "according to a new report by PwC." (why is the "w" lower case?) They're referring to robots handing out Academy Award winner envelopes. And that wasn't a job that took any intelligence.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Kjella]

Here in Europe it usually means skipping cash altogether with online banking and payment cards. Usually it's because of a national debit card standard organized by the banks, like BankAxept here in Norway or EC-card in Germany. This is the price list of one our banks via Google Translate, prices converted to USD:

One time installation/terminal fees, fixed/mobile: $489/241
Monthly payment fees, fixed/mobile: $61/$83
Transaction fees, per transaction $0.026 flat

Use your card for a Big Mac? McDonald's is happy. Use it to buy a $1000 TV? The store is happy. Say you have a sale every 5 minutes, 10 hours a day, 6 days a week = ~25 days/month = 3000 sales total. That's $78 in processing fees + $61/83 = ~$150 total in operating costs for the whole month. Compare that to the expenses securing cash, transporting cash, keeping enough change and so on that they don't want and here it's yes please, use cards. And if the cash flows electronically, what do you need the local bank teller for? I just checked the stats for my purely online bank, 380k customers with 325 employees and 90% of the population do it online now.

Even the banks that do have branch offices now mostly train people to use the machines rather than process their deposits/bills and it's almost all retirees. Some banks have even started to put fees on the ATMs, because even maintaining and stocking them costs money even if there's no bank teller. With mobile pay now it's even BYOD, they don't even have to issue cards anymore. They're moving closer and closer to becoming a purely virtual organization that doesn't deal in anything but 0s and 1s. But that's okay, it's not like I really miss the days you were waiting in line at the counter.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[geekmux]

Human society NEEDS to be ready for the inevitable reality where NOBODY works, and the only people who "Make money", are those who OWN robots, or have a share in companies, and milk their investments.

Money ceases to be an essential functional commodity in such a circumstance, as people will invent alternative methods of exchange to obtain necessary services.

Either money has to be distributed for no labor expended by a governing body (basic income strategy), or true post-scarcity future economic models need to be created. There are no alternatives where really rich people get everything and everyone else just dies. (Sorry plutocrats, but that is how you destroy the human race, not live immortal, pampered lives.)

There is only one equation the human race needs to figure out in order to survive.

Solve for Greed.

Plutocrats turning the planet into a global Welfare state as Greed funds UBI at the lowest level possible will likely result in another concept coming to fruition.

Eat the Rich.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[quonset]

In other words, you have one point of failure. Power goes out, no business until the power is restored, no access to your money/accounts.

Sounds like a great opportunity for terrorists.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

Eat the Rich

- there is always somebody poorer than you.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Highdude702]

Also it's pretty hard for hackers to steal the money I have in my sock drawer

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[DarkOx]

Money ceases to be an essential functional commodity in such a circumstance, as people will invent alternative methods of exchange to obtain necessary services.

Nope at least not until large numbers of people have so much they decided stopping anyone else from taking some if it isn't worth thinking about. We are a looooong way from such a time.

Who knows maybe a day will come where people here on earth just sit back an enjoy free the great riches showering down upon the earth from return of the giant space harvestors their great great great great grandparents sent out to gather resources across the galaxy and beyond.

Until there people will indeed need a form of exchange. If not some fiat currency funny money than it will be something else. The trouble is the barter system really won't work. If the capital class already has a robots to work their fields, maintain their other robots, transport them from place to place, print whatever durable goods they want, etc what exactly will you offer them in exchange?

I don't know what the answers are and I don't know what is going to happen but it simply can't look like the world you are envisioning. It violates far to much of what little we do know about human nature and economics.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[fyngyrz]

It's also hard to track cash purchases, whereas it is trivial to track electronic ones.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[RicktheBrick]

Right now we have a President who thinks we can not afford to give people health care. He also thinks that this country is so great that too many people will risk their life to illegally get here to spend their life in fear. They will also pay into social security without ever getting any retirement pay. As for health care, he will do everything is his power to destroy ACA but he will still blame it on Obama. With all the progress that is going on why do we still try to take away things from some of the people? When will we feel secure enough to not have to worry about some people getting a decent life? I can say for sure it will not be in the next four years.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

Nope, you are thinking about that entirely wrongly.

It is not that everyone has so much money that it becomes worthless through deflation--

It is that nobody has any to spend, but still have outstanding needs. It becomes about as useful a commodity to facilitate trade as refined uranium is. Which is to say, not at all, because nobody except a very few have any refined uranium. The same will be true for money.

Instead of money, people will trade something else. Fuck, it could be damn bottle caps for all I know. Just not money as investors consider it.

To be useful in the process of securing goods or services, ordinary people need to have that commodity to trade. This is not devaluation due to deflation, it is devaluation due to lack of liquidity in the market.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Ol Olsoc]

I don't know what the answers are and I don't know what is going to happen but it simply can't look like the world you are envisioning. It violates far to much of what little we do know about human nature and economics.

Note - this is not disagreeing with you, just conversation.

And it certainly cannot look like the one we have now. If we have a world with almost no one working, we won't have anyone to buy the stuff the robots produce. A crawl to the bottom as it were.

What is the use of a robotic assembly line that can produce widgets at half the cost of a human line, if there are only 5 percent of humanity that can purchase the widget?

I just had a ridiculous thought of a board meeting where the suits are sitting around and one says "There is a huge untapped market for our product out there - but how do we get money into people's hands so they can buy our stuff?" The so called job creators being forced to create jobs so that someone will buy their stuff.

Some other thoughts are that humanity might undergo a lengthy and slow contraction as people die off unreplaced. If we cannot break out of the concept of work or die, this is pretty close to what is going to happen. A Welfare state won't work if 90 percent of people are on it. Then again, neither will a capitalist or any other 'ist.

We might get rid of them quickly though. What might start out as racial reassignment ie, "send 'em back to where they came from!" might work for a few years, but eventually all the systems will overload.

Perhaps people will be removed from the population after reaching a certain age. Perhaps there will be forced sterilization, and only the working will be allowed to reproduce.

I suspect however, that we will solve this the old fashioned way. With warfare. We will probably gleefully torch the earth, and let the survivors if any, pick up the pieces. At that point, the robots will be pretty moot to survival. What good are smartphones to people who have been bombed back to the stone age? As a pretty smart guy once said, "I know not what weapons World War 3 will be fought with, but World War 4 will be fought with sticks and stones."

The glimmer of hope is that similar doomsday scenarios have been trotted out after every something something revolution, and by and large, life has been made better. Hopefully this will too.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Ol Olsoc]

Also it's pretty hard for hackers to steal the money I have in my sock drawer

You people and your stupid fiat currency! I barter, the only way to transfer goods. Got any cows? I'll trade you three sheeps and a goat for a good milch cow.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Ol Olsoc]

It's also hard to track cash purchases, whereas it is trivial to track electronic ones.

Ermagherd! Of course its easy to track them. That's one of the reasons I live on my credit card. I have a statement every month that tells me what and where I've spent my money. I can also use those purchases to show where I was at at the time if need be.

Why would you worry about your purchases being tracked?

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Highdude702]

It's not nice to call your wife a cow. Let alone trade farm animals for her..

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[matbury6017]

Hi Kjella, the calculations you've posted here don't account for fraud, i.e. copying people's banking credentials to access their accounts. What are the operating costs when we take all the various kinds of fraud that affect people's online banking?

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[VanGarrett]

Instead of money, people will trade something else. Fuck, it could be damn bottle caps for all I know. Just not money as investors consider it.

Would such a new medium of exchange not, in turn, also be money? Sure, it might start out as something practical, like bottle caps or, indeed, precious metals, but once it starts gaining momentum, the same math that applies to the cash dollar, would then apply to your Nuka-Cola lids. Just the same, when that becomes useful for the exchange of goods and services, it's not clear to me that the rich would be hesitant to snatch that up, too. Just the same, the poor folk who acquire sufficient stock piles of these units, would likely be keen to spend them on their own automation products, just to get them up in to Rich-People-Land.

"I'll make my own money, with BLACKJACK and HOOKERS!"

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[matbury6017]

Yes, but not just power outages. Think IoT-powered DDoS attacks. The Mirai botnet could easily hold banks to ransom. And then there's just the fact that a lot of ISPs suck big time. I can't count the number of times that a retailer hasn't been able to take card payments because their internet's down. They quickly and effortlessly set up cash only lanes which tells me that they're well versed in the system not working for one reason or another.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[DarkOx]

What I think you are missing is that at some point there exists only one commodity or real value: sufficiently advanced automation. If you have that it will obtain anything else you could possibly want for it. Think of ever other commodity as dividends for owning sufficiently advanced automation. Want bread fine you don't need wheat you need robots that can plant a field, harvest, mill, and bake; or you need a robot that can manufacture the robots that do those things.

What you don't need to do is trade with farmer Bob or hire him to tend your field. He has nothing to offer you of any value.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[K. S. Kyosuke]

And the difference compared to today is...? Most money is electronic these days.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

Food and water are needs that are not going to go away. There has to be some mechanism for people to acquire these basic needs. A basic income would be a logical name for such a scheme. I wonder if anyone's ever tried it before? Oh, wait - it was tried back in the 70s in Canada and was a success.

The only reason it was canned was because, despite the evidence to the contrary, people thought it would make people lazy.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

Even a nuclear armed Hitler couldn't stop the Singularity at this point.

You clearly underestimate the power of fear, uncertainty, and greed.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

certain things are essential to continued existence. Those are genuine needs.

Things like shelter, food, and protection from predators. (which in the modern world, includes financial/legal ones, which have replaced the natural ones.)

Wanting something that is not essential to continued existence is a genuine want, not a need. Things like "better" housing, or "better" food.

When nobody is working, they do not get the universal exchange medium (Money, because their only real commodity worth value, labor, now is worth precisely 0$), and thus cannot even secure for themselves the essential required materials needed for continued existence.

Their neighbors will likewise not have access to the required materials needed for continued existence. The eventual reality will dawn on them, that rather than procure those needed materials from the people who can produce it for free, (using robotic labor), they can procure it from each other, by treating each other's labor as valuable, and assigning a new currency system that respects this. (Or even, trading things with each other in exchange for the risk/action of stealing it from those that can produce it for free, which is then still a labor that has real value, just not to those who own the machines, and have all the money-- and applying an exchange system based on that risk.)

Either way, it will end up with the same eventuality.

Those able to produce it for free, who refuse to provide for free (post scarcity), or allow free access to the exchange medium (Basic income), will only end up without a market to distribute to or produce product for. The value of owning the robots vanishes.

The reality that humans need a place to live, food to eat, water to drink, etc-- will not go away after human labor becomes obsolete. Thus, the humans in question will continue to have those needs, without a viable way to obtain them from the economic system, because they have NOTHING of value to exchange for them.

 

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

Unless you want to marry a robot, a robot cannot provide you with a desirable mate. (and may never be able to, even, if Uncanny Valley cannot be overcome. At best, the robot can create another human to your exact specifications, which just compounds the problem. What defines YOU, the human requesting another human be created, against the human product it creates for your consumption? That human may not desire you. You might own all the robots and wealth in the world, and be undesirable. What then rich man?)

Likewise, the robot cannot spontaneously conjure more property for you to own/localities for you to place factories on, or mines for materials.

There are things that robot labor alone will not resolve. If nothing else, instituting min basic income as a method of assuring a suitably supply of floozies for wealthy plutocrats to fuck, becomes the value that the rest of society has. (Literal proletariat.), and what the plutocrats pay them money so they can continue to exist for.

Such humans will consider themselves more valuable than that, and will come to resist/overthrow the robot owners.

All roads that lead to the 100% adoption of mechanized labor are 100% certain the for collapse of the socioeconomic model.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[DontBeAMoran]

Those machines have been replaced by websites and debit cards readers at the stores.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

No. Contemplate the ultimate conclusion of the creation of AI that is able to define and create newer and better AIs, given the task to maximize efficiency and economy.

The lifestyle of a wealthy plutocrat is HIGHLY inefficient, and uneconomical.

The very robots they depend on for everything (because they have killed everyone else), will stop providing them with resources, once the algorithms produced determine that the only remaining optimizations involve cutting the plutocrats off the teat.

Humanity ended. No-one remains alive.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

Ah, so now you claim to be the one person in the whole world who is without sin and can cast the first stone. You make me laugh - and I need a good laugh - I'm having a text conversation with someone who has decided that today is the day they kill themselves, after spending years being hounded by judgmental bible thumpers who have absolutely no clue as to what transsexualism is (most of you confuse it with the sexual fetish of cross-dressing as opposed to a legitimate medical condition).

Rejecting jeebus after wasting a decade as a true believer was one of the most liberating things I ever did. I have no regrets over it. But you obviously do, or you wouldn't feel the need to get others to conform to your ways as a reinforcement of your delusions.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[hackwrench]

Entertainment. I write and earn money from ads. I'm looking at making videos and taken tentative steps in that direction. I am getting "paid" in points that can be converted to store cash value vouchers at various stores for using Bing, formerly a consumption activity. Monetization is becoming the new job.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[hackwrench]

The w is lower case because they think it makes them look trendy, hip, and modern. It is basically a comb over.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

Besides, Paul is clear that eunuchs are blessed. And what is a male-to-female transsexual if not a eunuch?

Also, the bible makes it clear that humans are both male AND female, not one OR the other. It is written, "male and female made he them." Not "male or female made he them." That's what jeebus says. :-)

BTW, not all transsexuals are gay either, so don't even go there - you guys have such big problems with that, but it just doesn't apply here. 50% of m2f are straight. What's even more interesting is that many of us were straight before transitioning, then our sexual orientation spontaneously changed during transition so we're STILL straight. Something you can't wrap your head around.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[hackwrench]

You want nice? Well, that's gonna cost ya!

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[__aaclcg7560]

You mean humans that will accept deposits and dispense cash from my accounts? That's just crazy talk.

FTFY — I pay no penalty for using human tellers when visiting my credit union.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[religionofpeas]

it was tried back in the 70s in Canada and was a success

No, that's invalid, because it was only a small scale experiment. The problem with that is that you use external money to fund the program. In a full scale version, the money needs to be generated by the people that receive it. That means that every person that gets a job and makes extra money on top of their UBI, needs to contribute a portion of their income towards the UBI program, which makes it much less attractive to get a job.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[phantomfive]

Human society NEEDS to be ready for the inevitable reality where NOBODY works

Why? Why not change things when it happens? The time when NOBODY works is a long time from now.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[phantomfive]

Most people, actually, if you're sitting here surfing the net on your laptop.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[hackwrench]

Access will be available, but have you seen the vast number of people who not only refuse to use that access, they jeer at the people who have gone on record that they will. Boy those people are going to be fun to mess with. What am I saying, "going to be"? They already are. Their tears, outrage, and cries of "I'm being oppressed, but not really because oppression isn't happening; What do you think I am, a SJW?" are delicious.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

Go ahead and explain why should some, those with the capacity to produce be supporting others, who do not have that capacity? Just try not to use 'they will kill you and take your stuff' argument, USSR tried it, fell apart, more importantly those with the capacity to produce also do have (and will have more) capacity to protect themselves. Animals that cannot feed themselves die off, that is the nature of things. Of course they can try and steal, that is expected. Of course those, who have something of value will protect themselves, that is also the nature of things. But to feed and to shelter and to entertain your would be assailants because they want what you have? That IS perversion. I suppose *some* level of voluntary charity always existed and will exist in the future, however beyond some voluntary charity and beyond the threat of violence what else do you actually think is there? Religion? There is no god, religion is a useful political tool to keep the poor at bay (a threat of everlasting violence after death scares a large number of human animals). So what is your idea, why should a newly born person be entitled to the productive output of an existing person?

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

Because there are things like tipping points in economics.

There are still buggywhip makers today, but they are not and will never be what they once were. Likewise, there will be a long period where only 90% of the current workforce is unemployable, and 10% are still employable, so not defacto 100% mechanized labor. But still sufficient that for all practical concerns, you will not have a job, statistically, and thus society needs to contemplate that reality.

You can't change systems like this when sudden changes allow radical shifts in the social dynamic. (see how quickly actuaries were fired after the spreadsheet was invented, for example.)

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

The grim specter of reality, that if you DO NOT keep a sufficient number of them alive, you are making the gene pool too shallow.

You like variety, and vitality in your sexual partners, do you not?

That alone is reason to keep a sizable and diverse group of additional humans alive on what is otherwise a charitable basis.

Remember, every major experiment in eugenics has been a total failure. Social darwinism is NOT real.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

You constantly underestimate the ultimate mover: genes. Fuck your genes, die and disappear, my genes must survive and your genes must be destroyed and prevented from taking up the natural resources and energy that my genes could use instead. That is the basics of it.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[phantomfive]

Because there are things like tipping points in economics.

When do you think that will happen? When will it start to happen? Do you have a prediction, or is this just wild speculation? Right now there are more jobs in the US than there have ever been, more people working.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

The predictions you are seeking, are the subject of the story linked by the article. It is not the first of such predictions, nor the only group that has made them.

One can find said predictions if they want. Most cite a major tipping point in the next 20 years as being "highly probable."

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[ShanghaiBill]

Individual people can own robots too, you know.

The same thing was said about cars and computers, yet how many individual people own those?

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[religionofpeas]

Want bread fine you don't need wheat you need robots that can plant a field

Well, you need a field.

What you don't need to do is trade with farmer Bob or hire him to tend your field. He has nothing to offer you of any value.

Farmer Bob owns a field.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[phantomfive]

I wasn't asking for a prediction from PwC, they're morons. I was asking for a prediction from you; you are much more interesting.

Most cite a major tipping point in the next 20 years as being "highly probable."

Not even this article predicts that.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[vtcodger]

Wunnerful. Simply Wunnerful

We can look forward to Greek levels of unemployment (20% plus overall, 40% plus for kids).

With all the routine, public facing, jobs jobs taken over by ... wait for it ... Clippy.

I can't tell you how much I look forward to this glorious future.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[MorePower]

If Farmer Bob owns a lot of fields, it might pull him up into being one of the rich elites (hell he might already be a rich elite if he's running a big agribusiness now). Smaller farmers might be able to rent access to their fields and scrape by, but I bet sooner or later some misfortune hits like a cancer that some rich elite will happily have his robo-doctors cure... if Farmer Bob sells his field.
Of course, those of us who don't own farm fields (you know, the vast majority of us) won't be leveraging farm fields in the robo-future.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

Take for instance, this article on forbes. (Yes, I know. Have noscript ready.)
https://www.forbes.com/sites/k...

It is rather short on details, but makes the salient point about alpha-go creating a wholly original move, through machine "creativity."

It is not really that big of a change in tactics required to train similar AIs to do, for instance, market trading strateges-- which has already caused a mass exodus of humans from stock trade floors.

Further refinements of such methods could eventually lead to radical shifts in how things like aircraft are designed, or computer chips are laid out. Skilled human minds that rely on intuition can be replaced with purely logically founded iterative software agents, with billions of prior tested design strategies to work with behind them.

To get an idea of how quickly the fallout of a major paradigm shift can rattle through an economy, take a look at this Atlantic article from last year.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ma...

It also has the following gem in it:

In 2013, Oxford University researchers forecast that machines might be able to perform half of all U.S. jobs in the next two decades.

which is on par with my initial statement. Since it was called out specifically, let's see if we can find it.

And here it is. (warning, pdf)

http://www.oxfordmartin.ox.ac....

Like I said, the linked story is not the only group that has looked at this issue. I am vaguely recalling at least 2 others that have reached similar conclusions to Oxford and PwC, and who have given a rough estimate of hitting the tipping point within the next 20 years, give or take.

I have no reason to argue against people better trained in trend analysis than myself.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

Precisely. The people with the robots have everything they could possibly want, and the other people have nothing that the robot owners want.

The robot owners stop interacting with the rest of the humans. The rest of the humans create an alternative market to deal with the lack of buying power or potential trade capacity with the robot owners (because the robot owners want nothing the other humans have), but the other humans may have, in aggregate, what they are looking for if they trade amongst themselves.

The robot owners will simply remove themselves from the market, and will have no incentive to join the newly created one.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[vtcodger]

If you can find a copy of Kurt Vonnegut's first novel "Player Piano" you might want to read it. I recall it only vaguely having read it about 60 years ago. It deals with the social impacts of automation. It's quite dark. And sadly, I don't think it'd be all that different if it were written today.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[phantomfive]

It is rather short on details, but makes the salient point about alpha-go creating a wholly original move, through machine "creativity."

I know how AlphaGo works, and it's not the breathless hyperbole in the article. Workers are more at danger from bog-standard automation like ATM machines than from scary AI.

As for the Oxford paper, you have to view it as an outer bound on the number of jobs that can be performed by machine (though not necessarily will). It's based on assumptions that AI projects like AlphaGo reach potential that even their creators don't hope for. The actual number is likely to be much, much less.

But you don't have to look at advanced AI, plenty of jobs in the economy can be replaced by standard automation, "disrupted" to use SV terms. In fact, the past 30 years has seen tremendous destruction of jobs. In the last century it's even worse: over 90% of the jobs that existed have been destroyed.

That is all balanced out because the economy is a job creating machine. As mentioned, we have more jobs than ever, despite all that destruction. The job creation machine is going to ramp up and keep creating more, even as other jobs are being destroyed.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[afgam28]

There's no reason why either a power system, or a payments system, need to be built around a single point of failure. It's just a matter of how much engineering and money we want to put into these systems. For businesses that care, it's common to have backup power, and electronic payment systems usually have an offline mode (at least the popular ones do).

But businesses are more worried about things like theft, and this is an actual problem that electronic payments solve. Stacks of cash no longer have to be secured from violent criminals by armed guards, and audit trails make it harder to commit fraud and embezzlement.

Terrorism, on the other hand, hardly ever actually happens in Europe or the US. And when it does, terrorists are focused on, you know, inflicting violent terror, not on blocking electronic payments.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[wierd_w]

I was reading the oxford paper, and that does not seem to be the conclusion that their team reached, and cited work from several other groups that had similar findings.

One of the cornerstones of the "New jobs" argument is that demand for highly educated and skilled labor will increase, which they specifically address as not consistent with empirical findings of their peers:

Yet
as computerisation enters more cognitive domains this will become increasingly challenging
(Brynjolfsson and McAfee, 2011). Recent empirical findings
are therefore particularly concerning. For example, Beaudry,
et al. (2013) document a decline in the demand for skill over the past decade, even as the supply of workers with
higher education has continued to grow. They show that high-
skilled workers have moved down the occupational ladder, taking on jobs traditionally performed by low-skilled workers, pushing low-skilled workers even further down
the occupational ladder and, to some extent, even out of the l
abour force. This raises questions about: (a) the ability of human labour to win the race against
technology by means of education; and (b) the potential extent of technological unemployment, as an increasing pace of technological progress will cause higher job turnover, resulting in a higher natural rate of unemployment (Lucas and Prescott, 1974; Davis and Haltiwanger, 1992; Pissarides, 2000). While the present study is limited to examining the destruction effect of technology, it nevertheless provides a useful indication of the job growth required to counter-balance the jobs at risk over the next decades.

So, is your attestation that this previous historical trend will hold actually well founded, or is it just a belief?

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

Let's see. You are claiming it didn't succeed because "every person that gets a job and makes extra money on top of their UBI, needs to contribute a portion of their income towards the UBI program, which makes it much less attractive to get a job." but that's exactly what happened. A percentage of UBI was clawed back as earned income rose, and yet people DID work, and DID contribute back to the program. So, according to your stated standards, it WAS a success.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

What is so wrong about the "they will kill you and take your stuff" argument? It has the backing of history. Or are you going to say we should just ignore the lessons of history that make a solid case against you? Retard.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

You constantly underestimate the ultimate mover: genes. Fuck your genes, die and disappear, my genes must survive and your genes must be destroyed and prevented from taking up the natural resources and energy that my genes could use instead. That is the basics of it.

Too late - my genes are already passed on into the next generation, and the generation after that. And in another 15 - 20 years or so, yet another generation. So since it's too late for my genes to die and disappear, I would strongly encourage you to restore the balance by offing yourself.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[religionofpeas]

A percentage of UBI was clawed back

My standards are 100% of UBI funded by the participants. Was that met ?

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

There are more than enough people in the productive category for that purpose. Beyond that the technology is getting more advanced, the gene selection and mutation can be manipulated artificially, so this argument will cease to exist soon if it hasn't already. There enough people in the productive spectrum to keep the species going , I am more than certain of it. There are millions of business owners in the world.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

In many cases, yes - they went on to regular, full-time jobs that continued even after the program ended. Or do you not count that either?

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

The retard here is you, the millions of the productive people can afford the tech ( and they have enough of it as is ) to annihilate the rioting masses, of course the most efficient tools have already been deployed. Urbanization and specialization ensures that the ones with little to no productive capacity will starve to death and will kill off each other. This is not your farmer society, where people could live off the land. Vast majority of people today will die of starvation if the stores are not resupplied for a few weeks. Beyond that we are talking about automation here. Protection has is and will be automated more and more, where it would make no sense not to acquire it to put down riots and attacks by the crowds. A mix of machine guns and droids will probably be effective enough. A sleeping biological agent added to some popular food can probably wait to be activated to take down the hosts. It is not that far fetched, especially distribution should be easy enough to handle, people buy whatever is the cheapest, so make it cheap and see it spread.

But never mind all that, the productive people can have the police, the army, the politicians on their side because they can pay.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Pinky's Brain]

The robot owners also have deeds on pretty much all the land, they control all the robot armies, they have international treaties which say all taxation has to be approved by international tribunals run by themselves. They will have the full legal title on the entire earth and the military hardware to back it up, you'll get what they want you to have ... be it a shallow grave or a ghetto they magnanimously let you live in.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

Tech can't "annihilate the masses." Your app doesn't beat a baseball bat. And it's far easier to sabotage a power grid upon which your tech depends than it is to defend it.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[phantomfive]

I was reading the oxford paper, and that does not seem to be the conclusion that their team reached,

Which conclusions are you talking about? That the economy is a job creating machine and is continuing to be so? The paper isn't about that, as is explicitly mentioned in the part you quoted: "the present study is limited to examining the destruction effect of technology"

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[jenningsthecat]

But never mind all that, the productive people can have the police, the army, the politicians on their side because they can pay.

Ah, yes - the old "might makes right" argument. Even Ayn Rand condemned that point of view in her books, in spite of the fact that a thinly disguised version of it was a key element of her 'philosophy'. If the old bitch were still alive, I'm not sure whether she would applaud your boldness or chastise you for tipping her hand.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

Read the thread: might makes right is the argument I am objecting to. Collectivism used to provide power based on numbers. Automation and technology equalizes the odds, 10 people against 1 is not that bad if 1 has a few robots on his side.

As to Ayn Rand, I appreciate her philosophy and writing, it is great, but I never needed it to reach my own conclusions decades ago. I only read her books a few years back after hearing so much about them. She was a great philosopher AFAIC, a pretty good writer as well, but the ideas were always here, with or without her books. As to violence - that is the argument of the collectivists, not of the individualists.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

Automation and decentralization go together, the more you can automate the less you need to rely on others. As to baseball bats - you can't eat them. With no food in the stores you can't even wield them.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Pinky's Brain]

No, that's why we need truly independent nations and absolute sovereignty. Every nation should be able to determine how to assign the wealth within it's borders. No more "free trade trade agreements" which are really just "property" protection agreements for the international homeless elite.

End ISDS's.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Pinky's Brain]

The economy is a product creating machine, to allow full employment all the products which can be created at full employment have to be consumed ... ever more product.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Ksevio]

Granted I don't go into banks much but I'm pretty sure they can't give you money without power to see what your account balance is these days.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

Automation and decentralization don't go together. Look at the automated diesel pumps in remote areas that get scammed because there's no physical human presence.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

Of course they do, look at BTC - transaction automation to the maximum, decentralization to the maximum. Look at cars - automation of movement, decentralization of transportation. Look at manufacturing - automation of manufacturing and of transportation allows for decentralization.

Your example does not contradict anything, automation of a fuel pump may invite some scammers, that does not mean decentralization is not happening.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[Memnos]

Because, Mr. Mironenko, I and many, many like me who do have the capacity realize that it is much better to live in a society that meets the basic needs of its members as best it can, and in fact are willing to pay for it. This does not mean that anyone should be penalized for working to make their lives better, as the current social welfare systems typically do in most countries. It means that I, as a citizen of country X, say to my fellow citizens of country X, we're all getting a dividend based on our society's current wealth. It covers the basics to live upon each month and the assurance of the level of health care that our country can afford. If we want more we can work and/or invest and it will at each increment always be to our financial benefit to do so. At some level of income and wealth, I and many others will pay more, perhaps much more, in than we get back as a citizen dividend. But it's well worth it not to have to live in a dystopian shithole. There are many who feel as I do and, sorry, collectively we have the financial means and the rational and moral arguments to utterly overwhelm those who feel as you do. It's part of a social contract we humans have almost always had, since before we learned how to farm. It's been preserved because it keeps the tribe alive -- you know, the "nature of things".

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

No, see, you are an armchair (amateur) troll. Stanford describes Ayn Rand as

a novelist-philosopher who outlined a comprehensive philosophy, including an epistemology and a theory of art, in her novels and essays....

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[ArmoredDragon]

There is only one equation the human race needs to figure out in order to survive.

Solve for Greed.

That's never going to happen. Greed is a fundamental feature of who you are. Even if you were given everything you ever wanted, you'll eventually want more, owing to the hedonic treadmill. Saying otherwise would be like saying you can stop a person from ever having desires (even repressed ones) to cheat on their spouse.

Every time somebody tries to solve greed, what results is a crappy system of government that makes the average person much worse off. UBI, if it were to ever become a thing, would just be yet another iteration of that.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[mesterha]

Go ahead and explain why should some, those with the capacity to produce be supporting others, who do not have that capacity?

Because that is a purpose of most democracies. My country allows people to live on it's land and use it's resources. You are not an island. You live in a society. You are not allowed to set the rules.

Animals that cannot feed themselves die off, that is the nature of things.

So you justify how to create a society by looking at common animals.

Of course they can try and steal, that is expected. Of course those, who have something of value will protect themselves, that is also the nature of things. But to feed and to shelter and to entertain your would be assailants because they want what you have? That IS perversion.

You talk about the natural ways that animals behave, while most talk about how people should behave. A society is built to enforce rules for the common good of people. If that means taking away some fraction of the resources of the rich then that is justified. You're kidding yourself if you think that they didn't earn those resources off the backs of others. Capitalism is a government created compromise for the betterment of society. It is not one of your natural laws.

I suppose *some* level of voluntary charity always existed and will exist in the future, however beyond some voluntary charity and beyond the threat of violence what else do you actually think is there? Religion? There is no god, religion is a useful political tool to keep the poor at bay (a threat of everlasting violence after death scares a large number of human animals).

Do you feel superior? Careful, there is always someone smarter than you. Maybe someday you won't make your cut.

So what is your idea, why should a newly born person be entitled to the productive output of an existing person?

So how would your great society work? The devil is in the details.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[rtb61]

Sure their are us always someone people but people who are many orders of magnitude richer are far tastier, so they always brag. If it makes you feel happier, east the richest first, they are the tastiest.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[LeftCoastThinker]

You are basically imagining the world of Star Trek... Sorry, we are nowhere near there. Yes, we will continue to automate simple, repetitive tasks. I now deposit all my checks via my smartphone. When I need to get cash, I go to the ATM. When I have a problem, I want to call or go in and not wait in a long line or talk to a robot online, I want a real human being, and I don't want to have to wait for 30 minutes. The aforementioned advances in technology allow me to do just this. Yes, the bank may have a few less employees, but for the last 40 years the banks I visit always have a manager, a business accounts person and 2-3 tellers. They probably serve more people today, but they still have the same numbers.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[phantomfive]

The only reason you can even ask that is because you've never seen how most people live. You've never seen a shantytown.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[syntotic]

NONE OF YOU IS UNDERSTANDING IT. Robot means Droid means INDIAN, from INDIA. India sends to the USA particularly squarey, droid, andro-, bullish heads and faces, rather than indochimps or similar wide ethnological types. So the forecast in TRUTH is that US Workers Face A Higher Risk Of Being Replaced By INDIANS. See how it makes sense? Robots here are NOT very welcomed. I did witness two of the most recent robotic dispensers being underserved and finally removed; automatic tellers and cashiers and menus disabled in the night, robotic trashcans being abused and not common place, (Africans still insist in placing their hand inside the hermetic robotic door, trying for hours to penetrate it, when there is no trash accumulated stuck in the door), newspaper dispensers unused and untended... and that is about it. Not many other robots around but trash trucks, which did not precisely reduced employment but on the contrary. And I am talking very few cases: only one chain with automatic cashier tables, only one McDonalds with screen menus, one neighborhood with robotic trash cans, few automatic doors, etc. Only exception is all faucets with sensor, which has the payload of keeping Africans dirty and half washed and without hot water as they expect and cherish naturally. We would expect the USA to be robot filled a la XXI Century The Jetsons, but in fact there is not much interest but rather like sluffiness... and THIS kind of complaints, about replacement of workers. Translate all similar articles from robots to INDIANS and you will get the real sense. I suspect that now there are more people who do understand robot as Indian than people UNDERSTANDING what it means to start filling our lives with ROBOTS!

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

And yet you're the one who wants everyone to race to the bottom instead of having the ability (and the financial wherewithal) to be individuals, and pursue their own goals, via UBI. Like I said, you're sooo full of shit you sound like Sean Spicer.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

And you're so fucked up being unable to understand that UBI, properly designed, includes claw-backs as your income rises, so that most people will actually not be net beneficiaries of UBI schemes. So, everyone gets the same amount, but most people end up with that same amount clawed back at tax time, along with their regular personal income tax amount. And the UBI is a taxable income. If your total income, including UBI, exceeds the basic exemptions, you're also going to be paying tax on it.

Here, I'll make it simple for you with some numbers. If everyone gets a basic UBI of $800 a month and a 50 percent claw-back, anyone earning $1600 a month ends up having to give back all their UBI, as well as paying tax on that $1600 a month of earned income. So anyone earning more than $19,200 a year doesn't end up costing the UBI scheme a single cent.

It can be made to work. It has been made to work. It's all in how it's implemented.

Besides, I don't see you offering anything better. Either do so or STFU, because you're not contributing to improving the situation, you're just making noise.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[ArmoredDragon]

What you fail to understand here is the Greed I wish to solve for is not Greed stemming from the average man. It is the particular flavor of Greed that is creating this clusterfuck. The humans who literally have billions and are still not satisfied and demand more.

What part about the words "hedonic treadmill" don't you understand? Go look up what that term means and then think about what you just said here. It perfectly explains what you're complaining about, and the hedonic treadmill applies to all people, from hobos to billionaires.

THAT is the Greed that we need to solve for, and for the benefit of all mankind.

No, it won't benefit anybody. All it will do is effectively cap economic growth and make people poorer, which is exactly what you end up with when you try to "fix" these things. Yes, it is true that the rich get richer, however the poor are also getting richer. Does the gap between the wealthiest and the poorest increase over time? Yes. However that does not in any way mean that the poor are getting poorer, and in fact the poor are not getting poorer, and in fact their quality of life is always improving, which is something that can actually be proven with hard numbers and statistics:

https://www.ted.com/talks/hans...

By the way, I'm willing to bet that you'd score worse than the chimpanzees in Hans Rosling's test.

As far as the average man, all it will take is a single generation of the global Welfare state in place for humans to be humbled enough to be content.

No, that won't actually work. UBI for example essentially just proposes adjusting the money supply, but it doesn't do anything at all to adjust the supply of finite resources. If anything, it would make it worse. The thing is, you're making a very flawed assumption that money is the endgame for wealth, but the reality is that ownership of material goods is wealth. Poor people today have more access to material goods than at any other point in history.

When governments make policy decisions based on this bad understanding, they tend to ruin their economy and end up making their population poor. Venezuela is a great example of this. France's Hollande also found out the hard way why your ideology doesn't work (his country started seeing massive tax revenue decreases when he decided to retaliate against the rich for earning so much.)

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

everyone to race to the bottom instead of having the ability (and the financial wherewithal) to be individuals

- yeah, I don't want any single person to benefit from any oppression of any other single person out there. Not one should be oppressed to provide anything to any one. To actually *earn* to be an individual is quite different from thinking you are an 'individual' because somebody was oppressed to provide you with this so called 'individuality'.

Whatever you said doesn't matter to me one single bit, I look at what you write here and I know exactly what sort of a monstrous prick I am dealing with.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[geekmux]

What you fail to understand here is the Greed I wish to solve for is not Greed stemming from the average man. It is the particular flavor of Greed that is creating this clusterfuck. The humans who literally have billions and are still not satisfied and demand more.

What part about the words "hedonic treadmill" don't you understand? Go look up what that term means and then think about what you just said here. It perfectly explains what you're complaining about, and the hedonic treadmill applies to all people, from hobos to billionaires.

That chasm between the handful of humans who own half the wealth on the planet isn't shrinking. The proverbial treadmill may exist at all levels, but it is out of fucking control at the highest levels. We need to stop fucking "observing" the phenomenon of never being content at that level, and solve for it, so we can stop dividing the human race between the 1% who control and manipulate the 99%.

THAT is the Greed that we need to solve for, and for the benefit of all mankind.

No, it won't benefit anybody. All it will do is effectively cap economic growth and make people poorer, which is exactly what you end up with when you try to "fix" these things. Yes, it is true that the rich get richer, however the poor are also getting richer. Does the gap between the wealthiest and the poorest increase over time? Yes. However that does not in any way mean that the poor are getting poorer, and in fact the poor are not getting poorer, and in fact their quality of life is always improving, which is something that can actually be proven with hard numbers and statistics:

https://www.ted.com/talks/hans...

By the way, I'm willing to bet that you'd score worse than the chimpanzees in Hans Rosling's test.

In the past, shifts in technology resulted in humans being put out of a job. The answer was always "go find another one", or "go get educated".

The discussion at hand here has to do with the next, and likely last evolution of technology, which is automation and AI replacing the concept of human employment. CEOs today would rather hire robots than pay humans $15/hour minimum wage. That greedy mentality is merely the tip of the iceberg. AI engines that can comb through thousands of legal cases in minutes will outperform any human lawyer with regards to research. Robotics working with precision that will eliminate human error in the surgical room. Autonomous cars removing the need for human drivers and any related employment. Within the next half-century, automation and AI will likely be able do any job a human is doing today, and probably better. Unless we solve for Greed, the chasm between those who control automation and AI and the rest of the human race will continue to grow, perhaps well beyond care or concern for the unemployed masses. Go get an education? What the hell for? There's nothing for humans to actually go do anymore. The wealthiest billionaires on the planet have no desire today to part ways with the majority of their riches in order to better the planet, so I fail to see how that would ever change in the future.

To Hans Roslings credit, has the quality of life across the planet improved? Yes. My point is it could be a hell of a lot better for a lot more people if the wealthy elite actually embraced the concept of being content, and shared wealth to help millions. Of course, the other impact of reducing natural disaster deaths and people living longer is managing finite resources against an ever-growing population, which will eventually fight against the goal of ever-improving metrics. Forget the Greed problem for a minute. Think the planet can sustain a population of 12 billion? 20 billion? How hard i

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

And everyone knows what sort of a libtard asshole you are. See how that works? Those sidewalks and roads you use? Did you pay tolls to use them, or were they paid for with taxes from the "oppressed?" Public safety? Water? Food inspection? Society has moved beyond your sick ilk, despite the best efforts of Trumpsters to reverse it.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

The mob does a lot of idiotic things and eventually these things turn around and bite it in the ass while restructuring everything around. Restructuring is going to happen now, that the outsourcing and automation will remove the power from the mob and will ensure that the people who actually produce stuff have their proper say in this world.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

Dream on. The "powers that be" only have power as long as the mob believes they are helpless to resist. Or did you miss those grannies in the Ukraine in the streets armed with cobblestones fighting (and dying) against government soldiers armed with rifles?

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

The mob wants to steal, that much is clear. When you are talking about 'resisting' what exactly is it you imagine people must resist? Their inability to steal from people who are better at protecting their assets today than ever before.

What exactly are the expectations? That you will come out with stones and you will get somebody to throw you a bone? That you can put together a system to steal on your behalf because you can throw stones?

I think the productive population on this planet needs to mobilise and make sure this never happens again that a mob with stones should be able to steal anything at all. Automation is the answer.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[ArmoredDragon]

*sigh* It's like I'm talking to a wall. Ok let's put this in elementary school terms:

Your arguments all assume that the economy is a zero-sum game, but it's just not. In other words, the global economy isn't analogous to a pie that each person on this planet gets a slice of. A better analogy would be a pie that is always getting bigger and bigger, so each proverbial slice also grows bigger, no matter what percentage it makes up. However if you suddenly put a cap on just how rich the richest people can be, then this pie stops growing while the population continues to grow. This inevitably means that everybody gets poorer, not just the rich.

I hope that makes sense to you, because if it doesn't then honestly no amount of explaining will.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

"The mob" doesn't want to steal. However, when pushed, people will do what they have to do to re-organize society so that it continues to function. Sometimes that means violent revolution. There is no natural law that says it's "stealing" - that's a human concept, and as such, subject to interpretation and revision. For example, tooo many libtards who enjoy the benefits of taxation claim that taxation is stealing. And the most valid answer to that is "Fuck you, hypocrite." At some future date, it may become "Up against the wall!"

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers?

[geekmux]

*sigh* It's like I'm talking to a wall. Ok let's put this in elementary school terms:

Your arguments all assume that the economy is a zero-sum game, but it's just not. In other words, the global economy isn't analogous to a pie that each person on this planet gets a slice of. A better analogy would be a pie that is always getting bigger and bigger, so each proverbial slice also grows bigger, no matter what percentage it makes up. However if you suddenly put a cap on just how rich the richest people can be, then this pie stops growing while the population continues to grow. This inevitably means that everybody gets poorer, not just the rich.

I hope that makes sense to you, because if it doesn't then honestly no amount of explaining will.

Yes, it does make sense. Good sense. One might even say it's Common Sense.

Unfortunately, it's rather worthless, since there's not a lot that makes sense anymore, including analogies that are based on the past.. When a person's survival is based on their ability to work and provide value, and our technology roadmap is looking to destroy the concept of human employment for the overwhelming majority, all bets are off. We don't have a pretty pie chart to accurately project this iteration of "growth". All we do have is the known constant of Greed, and no viable answer for what happens when the human employment is eradicated. Do you think those that are working to destroy the concept of human employment through automation and AI truly give a shit about anything beyond their own gains from such actions? Show me how a robotic manufacturer is planting the proverbial tree behind every mechanized solution to ensure a new job grows from that disruptive action. Show me how governments are actually concerned about this and working to ensure programs like UBI are funded reasonably, while working to find a point behind educating a human in the future. Hell, higher education struggles to justify the expense today, in an environment that still values and employs educated humans.

In the end, we still have not Solved for Greed, and the masses should prepare to join the Welfare state. Greed will ensure the rich are not obligated to pay you a penny more than what they feel the unemployable masses are worth, but you'll somehow feel better because all humans will hold the same quality of life. Starvation may become extinct, so perhaps there's some benefit as the poverty line rises slightly for all. Of course, the problem with less death is an ever-growing population and resource management. Again, the chasm between the uber-rich and the other 99% of the planet is widening, which tends to prove that our slice of the pie will likely not be much, no matter how big the proverbial pie gets.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

Yeah, and the world has seen what that leads to. People who had all of their assets taken away and maybe shot, sent to gulags, what that does to a country and to its population is unthinkable. While in the Tsarist Russia there might have been few that were destitute, in the new Soviet Russia the entire country was destitute, millions died, millions murdered, the country with its socialist ideas taken to some form of a local maximum existed on slave labour and product deficits and eventually fell apart because that type of an 'economy' is not sustainable.

'Up against the wall' may sound good at some point, it leads to total disaster of-course for the ones who are still left to linger.

But the point is that automation should make it much easier to protect yourself and your assets against such assaults.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[BarbaraHudson]

The ONLY universal law is the law of the jungle. And keep in mind that the USA gained its' independence because of terrorists who were guilty of treason. If you stand in the way of my survival, you either negotiate something we both can live with, or else. I don't consider my survival under such conditions as a "total disaster." And you won't be around to consider sh*t because you'll be too busy arguing about how that's not right.

Automation has nothing to do with it. There's no reason why someone can't turn your defense mechanisms against you, and the more of a prick you are, the more you incentivize others to do so. So be an anti-social heartless prick - please - it will be good for the gene pool. The fewer the hypocritical libertarians there are, the better.

You'll learn that your value isn't what you have, but how you get along with others.

Re:Machines replacing bank tellers?

[roman_mir]

I get alone with others just fine as long as it is profitable both ways and is based on free will.

I don't recognize the concept of 'treason' by the way.

My survival is my business, I see self protection as necessary and automation helps quite a bit. Your desires notwithstanding I stand at least as good a chance to come up on top as you believe you stand and I do quite a bit of long term planning to avoid unnecessary conflicts.

Re:better to eliminate those financial jobs

[bertoelcon]

Would it kill CNN (or slashdot for that matter) to include things like references, facts, and arguments to back up conclusions?

It would since those often don't exist.

Why not say where worker are expensive

[Stonefish]

There are suites of jobs which are at risk in high wage earning countries. Hopefully yours won't be one of them. Lets face it we're about to be exposed to the largest revolution in earning power that the world has ever seen.
Drive a truck or buy a PC to do it for you.
Deliver pizza's or buy a PC to do it for you.
Deliver financial advice or buy a PC to do if for you
Assist with inventory or buy a PC to do it for you
Drive a tractor or buy a PC to do it for you....
Get the picture...

Re:Why not say where worker are expensive

[Anonymous Coward]

> Drive a tractor or buy a PC to do it for you....

John Deere TaaS - tractoring-as-a-service?

Re:Why not say where worker are expensive

[CanadianMacFan]

It's one thing to deliver a pizza, other food, or small parcel to a house where the person can come to the door easily. But currently when delivering to a large building you let the person in to bring it up to your door. If you use drones/robots/self-driving cars or some combination of them they will have to get a lot more advanced to get to that level. People aren't going to want to go down to the lobby to wait for their orders. And if you keep the person to deal with the building you might as well have them do all the work.

Some tractors already drive mostly by themselves today. The operators handle the turns and let the tractor drive the straight part while they are able to focus on what they are doing (seeding, applying something, harvesting, ...). When they get near the end of the row the operator takes control again for the turn and repeats the process. It's the overseeing what is happening to ensure nothing is going wrong that is being automated now. The automated driving of tractors has been done already. The operators don't really have to handle the turns when in the cab but do it more out of habit.

Re: Why not say where worker are expensive

[Frankzy]

Most tractors actually handles the turns themselves as well. The only thing the operator has to do is watching for any unmapped obstacles, but other than that you can just kick back and enjoy..

good luck with that!

[slick7]

I can understand replacing simple tasks, but complicated ones? It's difficult enough to find maintenance techs owning anything more than a pair of channel-locks and a cresent wrench. Programming a robot to perform diagnostics, mechanical or electrical will become a nightmare. Being able to correlate dissimilar concepts on machine failure to effect a proper and effective repair is daunting. After 45 years of experience, I still find myself learning something new, or re-learning a better way. Don't even get me started with constant retooling.

Re:good luck with that!

[Anonymous Coward]

A machine doesn't have to replace all of the things a tech can do in total, or in one machine.

For example, a washing machine doesn't replace all the things a domestic servant did in 1900, but a washing machine, dryer, dish washer and a vacuum cleaner in total replace a significant fraction of them.

Some machine learning algorithms actually do better than humans in some cross-correlation activities than humans, but are generally relatively specific to the task to which they are designed. This is becoming less a function of programming in the traditional sense, but more a case of selecting strategies and components and training and validation sets, although that's still a complicated task, but ironically one that can be increasingly handled by automation to select those elements and I've used genetic algorithms to select elements for machine learning tasks before.

Re:good luck with that!

[drinkypoo]

I can understand replacing simple tasks, but complicated ones?

The complicated tasks are going away. It is already the practice to replace whole modules when a component fails. That's the kind of job that a robot can handle. Onboard diagnostics tell you which major component is having a problem, the component is yanked and sent home for repairs and a new one is slapped in. Sooner or later we'll give homes easily serviceable plumbing under raised flooring so that the robots can get to it. The list goes on, a world designed to have robots in it will look different from this by necessity.

Re: good luck with that!

[Zero__Kelvin]

It has been standard practice to swap modules and then send those modules elsewhere to be troubleshot for as long as I can recall. It's nothing new.

Re: good luck with that!

[drinkypoo]

It has been standard practice to swap modules and then send those modules elsewhere to be troubleshot for as long as I can recall. It's nothing new.

Nobody said it was new. It is, however, becoming more common. There are still a lot of parts not wrapped up in modules which you have to replace to make repairs. That's going to change as robots do more of these jobs.

Re: good luck with that!

[slick7]

Not all manufacturing plants are designed to be modular. Modularity of components can only go so far, then human intervention becomes inevitable. Having a robot open an enclosure to replace a input/output module of a PLC, let alone re-wire it is more complex than plug and play. Also to that end, how does a robot modify electrical/mechanical prints? By what protocols? A better construct would be a human - machine symbiosis. Once again, good luck with that.

If robots were advanced and inexpensive enough...

[No Longer an AC]

What if I could purchase a robot that could go out and earn a living for me?

This is fantasy of course, but if I could afford a robot with even most of my abilities as an employee but who could work much longer hours only needing to be taken offline for maintenance occasionally think of it!

Of course, then there will be pressure to upgrade my robot because after a few years it will be surpassed by newer more capable models.

How will my robot compete with all the technological advances of newer robots?

And then there's that four year life span.

If that isn't planned obsolescence, what is?

So you're telling me my robot will be "more human than human", but that it "may develop its own emotional responses" but after 4 years it's "time to die"?

How expensive is the basic pleasure model?

Our Future.

[geekmux]

Regardless if people fight the idea or not, automation and AI decimating the concept and capability of human employment is no longer science fiction. And when US states started crying out for $15 minimum wage rates, the initial response back from corporations was to look towards automation, because that option was now worth the investment.

Coming to the conclusion that automation and AI would target countries with higher wage costs seems to be rather obvious. The real question is what will be done to control unending Greed from turning the planet into a Welfare state.

We keep talking about UBI, which is another concept that will become inevitable as automation and AI decimate human employment. The problem lies with funding UBI, which will likely be done through taxation. Unfortunately, corporations are some of the worst entities when it comes to actually paying taxes by employing armies of lobbyists to minimize or hide those obligations, with the end result being trillions sitting in offshore tax havens today. Since this will never change, unending Greed will all but guarantee that UBI will become nothing more than Welfare 2.0 for the masses.

You can forget the American Dream. You can forget the Human Dream. The reality of automation and AI is a global Welfare state, all because of Greed.

Re:Our Future.

[DarkOx]

Coming to the conclusion that automation and AI would target countries with higher wage costs seems to be rather obvious. The real question is what will be done to control unending Greed from turning the planet into a Welfare state.

Which will never work, UBI will never work. Why because people will never be satisfied with what they have. They will always want more. The planets resources remain limited. If its no longer a question of how hard they have to work for X; the answer to "why should I not have finer clothes, travel further faster, be warmer or be cooler, eat something nicer, etc will be that I should!"

There may be a short era of good feels, a generation that grew up working a no longer needs to and is simply satisfied with a life of comparative ease; but their grand children will demand free super sonic airline tickers, I promise you!

I am not going to pretend to know where any of this is headed. I don't think its UBI and I don't think its welfare state 2.0. I would be more worried about the collapse of states. You point out corporations are already paying armies of lobbyists to avoid taxes. You really think a group of top tier capital owner class types wont employ an army or robots that looks much more like the armies of the past and simply refuse to pay the taxes? What does for example Amazon need the government for once they can hire/build their own fully automated asset protection?

Re: Our Future.

[burtosis]

Don't be a moron. This has nothing to do with minimum wage possibly getting set at a reasonable number. They are going to do it either way and you know it, so stop pushing your absurd political agenda.

The op was making the quite valid point that a reasonable minimum wage only accelerated the problem. This was brought to you by the single ruling party of the invisible hand.

Re: Our Future.

[fluffernutter]

Accelerated it by what, a week?

Re:Our Future.

[drinkypoo]

There may be a short era of good feels, a generation that grew up working a no longer needs to and is simply satisfied with a life of comparative ease; but their grand children will demand free super sonic airline tickers, I promise you!

You're going to have to put up some kind of evidence for that. The millenials are used to having nothing, which is what their parents (and their parents' parents) left them.

You really think a group of top tier capital owner class types wont employ an army or robots that looks much more like the armies of the past and simply refuse to pay the taxes? What does for example Amazon need the government for once they can hire/build their own fully automated asset protection?

Unless and until one of these corporations actually manages to amass such an army, you can file that away under "skiffy bullshit" because the governments have all the military and will bomb them into a smoking hole in the ground if they don't play along.

Re: Our Future.

[drinkypoo]

The op was making the quite valid point that a reasonable minimum wage only accelerated the problem.

That's a lot of nonsense, though. You might more reasonably say that upcoming automation caused the minimum wage problem. Companies could always play the "we will automate these jobs" card in order to argue against increasing the minimum wage.

Re:Our Future.

[cats-paw]

you say welfare like it's a bad thing.

Do you have something against people being able to afford food and shelter?

I see a lot of conservative tears over the idea that people should be given enough money to afford food, shelter and healthcare. Their plan is always something like "get a job". Well now the jobs are going to go away, and will continue to go away, and the response is, "don't worry, there'll be more jobs thanks to free market fairies".

Re:Our Future.

[BarbaraHudson]

Which will never work, UBI will never work. Why because people will never be satisfied with what they have. They will always want more.

Which is why UBI will work. People won't just sit back and be lazy - they will want more, and will work for it. The whole "UBI will just create lazy people" meme is a lie, because people always want more.

Re:Our Future.

[roman_mir]

Good, do that. I, on the other hand, am preparing my kids to live outside of the boundaries enforced by the system the rest of you are making sure to keep in power. The future is not a single system of control but fragmentation of power and decentralization. Automation only assures that, automation ensures a more free future rather a more oppressive one. The age of the automobile made people freer from control of the oppressive government than we would have been without the cars. The age of automation will make people freer from other types of control that we are experiencing today.

Re: Our Future.

[sjames]

I;m not so sure it accelerated anything. The rollouts of automation so far are happening without regard to the minimum wage in the area. I would say other factors shifted the economic equation such that it makes sense even at the old wage.

That does suggest that increasing the minimum wage is a stopgap measure, but we need that right now while we implement a longer term solution.

Re:Our Future.

[sjames]

Which will never work, UBI will never work. Why because people will never be satisfied with what they have. They will always want more. The planets resources remain limited. If its no longer a question of how hard they have to work for X; the answer to "why should I not have finer clothes, travel further faster, be warmer or be cooler, eat something nicer, etc will be that I should!"

That sounds a lot like why our current system isn't working!

Re:Our Future.

[roman_mir]

So it should be done covertly, government needs to be allowed to overextend itself, letting the money become a worthless fiat that eventually loses the ability to buy weapons and to pay for the walking talking military meat. Once the government is rotten and weak enough you don't need a shooting war to take it down.

Re:Our Future.

[scamper_22]

I don't think UBI will rely on general taxation.

I don't think you could have enough tax money and political/social will to implement a UBI. Rather it will take some change in the monetary system.

I don't say this is wise to do, but if the central banks can print money / purchase government debt fast enough, it could let them continue functioning. It would require global coordination of course.

But I guess that is the battle between globalists and nationalists.

I honestly don't know if it will succeed, but from where I sit, that is the path progressives and globalists and marching. More power to them if they can make it work. Of course, the dangers of globalists have been well written about it.

Re:Our Future.

[Sigma 7]

UBI will never work. Why because people will never be satisfied with what they have. They will always want more.

And if someone on UBI wants more than what they currently receive, then nothing prevents them from getting a job for additional income. There will always be jobs available, whether people abandon jobs and migrate to UBI en mass, or whether people do actions worthy of being posted on NotAlwaysWorking.com

What does for example Amazon need the government for once they can hire/build their own fully automated asset protection?

Companies can only be independent from governments if they consume no resource owned or provided by the government. This includes currency that's needed to pay for merchandise that Amazon sells, and the same currency that is expected to be paid out as dividends to shareholders.

Re: Our Future.

[geekmux]

Don't be a moron. This has nothing to do with minimum wage possibly getting set at a reasonable number. They are going to do it either way and you know it, so stop pushing your absurd political agenda.

My comments have fuck-all to do with politics, for one simple reason.

Greed is colorblind.

Re:Our Future.

[Kiuas]

You point out corporations are already paying armies of lobbyists to avoid taxes. You really think a group of top tier capital owner class types wont employ an army or robots that looks much more like the armies of the past and simply refuse to pay the taxes? What does for example Amazon need the government for once they can hire/build their own fully automated asset protection?

The government is needed to afford the masses some means of income so that the businesses can keep their consumer base and keep operating.

Most consumer businesses will collapse under a system where the majority of individuals have no jobs and no alternative source of income. You may not like UBI but something like it is going to be a necessity if/when automation reaches a high enough point, because the economies cannot function without consumer demand, which in turn cannot exist without people having a source of income.

Re:Our Future.

[DarkOx]

You're going to have to put up some kind of evidence for that. The millenials are used to having nothing, which is what their parents (and their parents' parents) left them.

Okay let me offer you some evidence then. Picture the tent cities and bread lines of the early 1930's. These kept the economically displaced persons during the depression alive. For that matter imagine the tenements of the 1910s and 1920s. If for example in modern American someone proposed that we could save a bunch of money by replacing public housing with something a lot more like those tenements and we should just get rid of SNAP and replace it with bread and soup lines they would be branded as in humane.

If you won't accept it would politically impossible to impose that level of austerity on today's welfare recipients consider many places its already legally impossible, you are not allowed to create a residential unit without at least one toilet. So a shared bathroom for an entire building won't even fly legally in much of this country.

This was a perfectly acceptable standard of living at that time, today people would riot. Heck in the EU the refuges are burning down their free housing because they don't like the assortment of candy available, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/new... .

  People on UBI will look at the nicer things the earners have, they won't be able to get jobs because they won't have any skills they can offer that automation isn't meeting. They will either let their jealousy drive them to despair or they will develop a sense of entitlement and decide they should have those nice things too! Its human nature.

Now lets talk about your millenials who are used to having nothing. They are not used to having nothing. They are used to attending universities that look like amusement parks compared to fifty years ago. They are used to paying for this with unsecured loans, which they than ask (and when polled indicate they anticipate) forgiveness for. That is not having nothing, that is having it all and not working for it. Once the graduate they move back home and continue their comfortable if freedom lacking existence.

Re:Our Future.

[geekmux]

Which will never work, UBI will never work. Why because people will never be satisfied with what they have. They will always want more.

Which is why UBI will work. People won't just sit back and be lazy - they will want more, and will work for it. The whole "UBI will just create lazy people" meme is a lie, because people always want more.

Oh really?

Ever notice how many people living in the Welfare state are highly motivated to change their status?

Yeah, me neither.

Re:Our Future.

[Cro Magnon]

One problem there is that some people in low-end jobs are worse off than people on welfare.

Re:Our Future.

[micahraleigh]

The jobs are going away because the government tells companies to pay cushy above market compensation.

Re:Our Future.

[BarbaraHudson]

The experiment with UBI in Canada in the '70s proved that people WILL try to better their situation. Because of a less precarious home situation, more kids finished high school. Hospital visits dropped - which in a publicly funded single payer system means additional savings. Crime went down. People could work part-time and only a portion of UBI was clawed back as their earnings went up - not dollar for dollar - so they had incentives to work part-time in the hope that it would lead to full-time jobs.

It's all in the design. Bad design, bad outcomes. Good design, good outcomes, healthier population with increased employment. We're going to have to do it anyway. Besides, how many of the 0.01% who inherited their privilege could survive a week at a regular joe or jane job?

Re:Our Future.

[BarbaraHudson]

Can you really meet your basic needs on, say, $600 a month? Or would you look around for ways to make a bit extra, to lower the stress of living in extreme poverty?

Re:If robots were advanced and inexpensive enough.

[Anonymous Coward]

What if I could purchase a robot that could go out and earn a living for me?

It would be just like in the USA before the civil war of secession, where you can buy and sell slaves. The rich people get access to slaves, and those slaves displace the workers who would otherwise get paid.

Nor replaced but protected

[psergiu]

The robots are not here to take our jobs, but instead to protect us.
This has been known since the beginning of the century, as described in this documentary.

I mean, who wants do do those menial jobs of transporting and feeding older people ? Especially in the ones in multi-story buildings.

Re:Nor replaced but protected

[drinkypoo]

The robots are not here to take our jobs, but instead to protect us.
[...]
I mean, who wants do do those menial jobs of transporting and feeding older people ? Especially in the ones in multi-story buildings.

You might be able to solve that by making a robot that can wash an old person's ass for them. But you might also solve it by making a robot that eats old people. Robots aren't moral, they're machines.

But remember, basic income is an unfair handout!

[Anonymous Coward]

I have spoken with many people about why basic income is really the only way we can go unless we want the government to take all our land and go full communism (hint: that works out very badly). The major resistance always comes down to basic income being "welfare" even in spite of the fact that removing all other welfare is part of the basic income strategy and pays for it pretty effectively. So many people who have jobs and a home and a decent life and worked hard to get there just can't stomach the idea that the government might give people who haven't done any work $15K a year for doing nothing at all. There is a serious inability to look past themselves and consider that not everyone had their starting circumstances or had those paths available or is even capable of doing the same thing. "If I can work hard and make a good life for myself, they can too. If they're not where I am then it's entirely because they are [insert dismissal here, usually lazy]."

Hey, Captain High Horse! I see you have a lot of nice things in your home that you worked hard for and want to keep. So you don't want the government to take action to reduce crimes of necessity, right? Enjoy having your property at higher risk of theft, then! It's the path you chose!

We have to stop looking at ourselves or people richer than ourselves as some sort of template that all people could fit into if they just weren't lazy ignorant pieces of shit. Some people are just inherently smarter or better or more driven than other people. It's an uncomfortable fact of life. At some point the middle class will be totally hollowed out and the magical dismissal of the lazy other will give way to hatred for those in power that "allowed this to happen." Why do we need to suffer so mightily before we address the problems that are practically beating us over the head every single day?

Re:If robots were advanced and inexpensive enough.

[lorinc]

What if I could purchase a robot that could go out and earn a living for me?

You can. You just have to buy shares of a company and vote for a board that will fire employees and replace them with machines and algorithms in order to increase dividends.

The caveat is that you need to have so much money that you already don't need to work. If you don't, then you'd better vote for universal basic income, because those who have will do anything to increase their dividends, including replacing you with machines and algorithms.

Re:If robots were advanced and inexpensive enough.

[Anonymous Coward]

The difference is that slaves are expensive. Their cost doesn't go down. Robots will be cheap and commonplace commodity.

And this will make it impossible to extract rent by owning robots and leasing them out, as the GP pointed out.

The high end is protected, is it?

[MPBoulton]

I understand and accept that jobs that rely on someone simply following a process given down by management, without needing to apply judgement or on-the-spot thinking, is a piece of very low hanging fruit for automation. Baristas, fast food counter staff, checkout/till staff in supermarkets etc. are, as we already know, all going to find their jobs disappear in the near future.

However, many skilled jobs make use of IT systems for data analysis and calculations, where much of the setting up is still done by a squishy human on a PC in an office paid a high salary for their work and knowledge in using the system and explaining the results to clients. Many professional services firms are already automating much of the calculation and systems work to other countries, or to a computer.

Many first world governments are actually encouraging ways to make such work more standardised and easier to automate. The UK government's consultation into the way final salary pension schemes in the UK are valued every three years is one such example, although you have to really dig into the detail of the green paper to find it:

https://www.gov.uk/government/...

Many of these highly paid staff will see themselves as safe from automation, but their bosses certainly don't.

Re:If robots were advanced and inexpensive enough.

[burtosis]

Good luck buying robots to generate an income for you when you don't have a job and everything about the robot is locked down with drm, patents, and proprietary details. Not to mention the overwhelming workload that would be required to keep it running, unlikely that it's even feasible for a single person. Best you could hope for is to earn the smallest amount of money possible while giving the lions share to large mega corporations.

Re:better to eliminate those financial jobs

[Highdude702]

That's what I thought when I saw CNN also.

Singularity

[fyngyrz]

AGI is not going to give us an infinite supply of workers. It'll give us an even larger supply of free-willed individuals. They're not going to be any more willing to do drudge work than humans are. Probably less.

LDNLS constructs, non-intelligent but highly capable, are the incoming infinite worker force. They're already present, and getting more sophisticated by the day. Rapidly.

The singularity has been relatively soft-edged; people don't realize they're in it yet. But they are.

Re:Singularity

[fyngyrz]

I would suggest a study of the divergent motivations of humans and AIs.

Sure. Just as soon as we manage to create AI. We have A; we most certainly don't have I. Yet.

Incoming

[fyngyrz]

f you use drones/robots/self-driving cars or some combination of them they will have to get a lot more advanced to get to that level.

If you use drones/robots/self-driving cars or some combination of them they will have to get just a tiny bit more advanced to get to that level.

FTFY

Look around you / do a little search engine work. We have walking robots, ramp-ascending robots, stair-climbing robots, door-opening robots, button-pushing robots, robots with internal cargo storage, robots that can navigate offices and homes. Right now.

That stuff doesn't even have to be developed at this point, it just has to be aggregated. As the financial case has now been made to do it, it's going to happen very quickly. Within ten years, max.

Re:Incoming

[CanadianMacFan]

Operating the system to call up to open the main door isn't just a matter of pushing a couple of buttons. What if the translation system/operator input the ring number wrong? You need the robot to be able to either call for the correct ring number or look it up using the system (but the name is not always there). There are a lot of different entry systems. Do you program the robot for all of them or do you build an AI (better)? The process of gaining access to a building by ringing up a person isn't a straight-forward push 3 or 4 button exercise.

And now that you've got this robot moving around drones doing deliveries are removed from the equation. So you have a self-driving car and a robot once you get to the building.

Re:Incoming

[BarbaraHudson]

Drones can't handle dense wet snow any better than a car with summer tires can (or even winter tires, for that matter). Drones can't handle vandalism any better than a parked car can. Drones can't handle fraud any better than a car can.

Re:Incoming

[fyngyrz]

I didn't say a word about drones, if by drones, you mean quadcopters and the like.

As for robots, your thinking is too constrained. There are lots of design options that will handle snow just fine (and every other kind of terrain) that don't involve tires. Spider legs, for instance.

Vandalism: easily vandalized robots are counter indicated, obviously. Likewise robots that don't record what's happening to them. These are trivial engineering issues in the sense that solutions are readily available. They're no significant impediment to robot deliveries.

Fraud: One obvious solution is payment before delivery. Another, for payment on-site, is the same tech, or related tech, to that which lets a soda machine know you actually fed it dollar bills, before allowing access to the cargo. This isn't even a problem requiring solution before proceeding -- otherwise there would be no delivery now, and that's obviously not the case.

The only tech that really needs to happen that we don't quite have yet is the smarts to run the robot, and we're a little short on power systems, too. But we're very, very close. Solve those, get the cost down to where it needs to be, integrate available tech, and done.

Re:Incoming

[fyngyrz]

None of this is significant in terms of being any kind of a showstopper, in my estimation as an engineer. Yes, there are lots of things to cover in such an undertaking. No, none of the ones you mention are expected to pose significant problems.

Adequate power systems (power to weight, and charge issues) and the highest level management software are the only two hurdles really still a distance away. The former looks like it's going to fall within a year or two, the latter I give ten years, max.

Re:Incoming

[BarbaraHudson]

You did in fact say "drones". It was the very first few words of your post - "If you use drones/" First you quoted the poster, then repeated it. I never mentioned toys such as quadracopters, which are obviously not up to the job. But even military drones can't cope with all (or even most) weather.

Re:Incoming

[fyngyrz]

You did in fact say "drones". It was the very first few words of your post - "If you use drones/"

What I said was "drones/robots/self-driving cars or some combination" - clearly indicating any and all. Not "drones" per se.

But even military drones can't cope with all (or even most) weather.

Today's tech is not the end game by any means. So using today's capabilities to make claims about tomorrow's likely circumstance needs to extend the progress curve before it can be taken seriously. IOW, the fact that a military drone can't cope with some weather at this time is in no way an indication that the same type of drone won't be able to in the near future (and the progress being made in LDNLS systems is a very strong indication they probably will.) Same for everything else. What it boils down to: Yes, today there still are lots of delivery jobs. But in a not-too-distant tomorrow, there won't be. Same for many other sectors.

Prepare or be blindsided. It's just that simple.

Re:Incoming

[BarbaraHudson]

To create a drone that can handle all eventualities will be to create a drone that requires so much energy, and such a large mass/payload ratio, that it would be simple to just sneakernet whatever you want to send. And of course, the more each drone costs (to make it multi-environmental/multi-task enabled), the more likely it will be a target of theft or vandalism. There's always a cost/capability trade-off, and no amount of hand-waving or wishful thinking is going to change that. As one example, there is simply no model that would make sense to deliver the materials to pave a road by drone. A dump truck is cheaper, safer, and quicker.

Re: Machines replacing bank tellers? process-drive

[petes_PoV]

The Moravec's paradox of jobs

This is just another aspect of de-skilling. Since the 1990's the fad has been for people to perform "processes" rather than jobs. The idea being that so long as you adhere to the "process", all your actions will be of the same high quality as your co-irkers. Ha!

But as soon as you are able to write down a formal description of your job, you have effectively written a computer program for doing it. So the most easily replaceable jobs will be the ones that require little judgement, little experience (esp. when there is no possibility of having to deal with exceptions) and simple interfaces to other "cogs" in the great machine.

So if you can replace a personnel officer with a computer, then companies will do it. Just feed in the parameters for the sort of people you wish to hire. Merely give the machine stock replies to the most common workplace complaints. Give it an algorithm for employee assessment - and let it it do its thing. It won't replace the entire personnel dept. But if it can perform the mundane operations, it should considerably cut the number of actual people required to support the company.

And it it this reduction - rather than complete replacement - of mid-level and managerial posts that is where the job losses will occur.

Servicability

[fyngyrz]

Sooner or later we'll give homes easily serviceable plumbing under raised flooring

That's exactly how I designed the plumbing in my home. You can get at every inch of plumbing, and where it transits a wall or floor, you can unhook it and pull it right through if you need to. The only in-wall plumbing in the entire home is for the shower, and the shower was emplaced on the back face of the wall the refrigerator is pulled up to; pull the refrigerator out, and you're looking directly at an open wall face containing the shower plumbing, just stick a wrench on it and do what you need to do. All sink plumbing and toilet plumbing is direct to the basement through the floors, and presents zero access challenge for service.

I did the electricity in a similar manner; it was even easier to design, due to the physical flexibility of the wiring and its relatively lower demands on space.

Houses don't have to be designed to have difficult to access utilities. Likewise a lot of other conventional approaches can be improved, such as insulation, wall thickness, concrete grades, mutability of internal space. If you ever get a chance to put a home together, it's entirely worth your time to think about things like these before agreeing to anyone's plans.

This is going to be a train wreck

[OrangeTide]

Americans are against getting financial assistance or any other kind of "hand outs", so it will be interesting to see how we adapt to this.

I think it will be a mess, because we're not likely to plug the legal loop hole around robots. You don't have to pay wages to a robot, they don't pay income taxes, they don't spend their earnings in the local community, and the employer doesn't have to buy robots healthcare. The way public companies are legally required to operate in the interests of their shareholders (profit) will probably make it difficult for corporations to not buy robots. If it saves them money on the books and increases productivity, they don't have a choice, it's just good business.

Re:This is going to be a train wreck

[drinkypoo]

It's not a legal loop hole. It is the sensible way to do business. What is not sensible is the way we do social services. We waste a bunch of money on fraud determining who is eligible. If you simply give them away to everyone, then that gets a whole lot cheaper. Now you only have to verify citizenship.

Re:This is going to be a train wreck

[religionofpeas]

We waste a bunch of money on fraud determining who is eligible

You save a lot more, though. In one month, a single person could easily eliminate a dozen non-eligible people from the program, which would easily pay for the expenses.

Re:15 years?

[OrangeTide]

The surface of the Earth is finite and solar power is becoming cheap and effective for mobile robotics. In 50 years I will likely not be able to afford a place where I can still see the sky. If I can't afford even that small luxury, how can I afford to live in space where I'll have to pay for air?

Re:But remember, basic income is an unfair handout

[OrangeTide]

Eminent domain is supposed to be a process to consolidate property for a purpose that serves the public good. It almost never works out that way. Usually a state or local government use the laws to rip people's homes away from them and hand it over to some special interest.

Indeed, I know I don't own my house or the land it sits on. Not only can someone file some paperwork and take it away from me. If I stopped paying my property tax for long enough, I would be removed and my house auctioned off. Private property is an illusion.

My guess: Kindergarten workers will be hit by this

[boa]

The knock-on effect of automation will make more people stay at home, reducing the need for services like kindergartens. Same goes for other businesses when people return to their homes and do more stuff themselves: Looking after their children, cooking more at home, gardening, cleaning and such.

Just guessing here, but if I'm right, this may not be all bad. Back to the fifties? ;)

PwC are a vested interest...

[matbury6017]

Mmm... anyone think that a global accountancy firm might be somewhat biased in their reporting on this subject? The most helpful and interesting article I've found to date has been this review of a report that seems to be fairly rational: https://3starlearningexperienc...

Who buys the output of the robots?

[zerofoo]

In a world where no one works, and no one earns income - who is left to buy the output of the robots?

Capitalism driven production REQUIRES consumers with disposable income. The one cannot exist without the other. To save capitalism, you need to save the consumer.

Re:Who buys the output of the robots?

[boa]

In a world where no one works, and no one earns income - who is left to buy the output of the robots?

Capitalism driven production REQUIRES consumers with disposable income. The one cannot exist without the other. To save capitalism, you need to save the consumer.

Good point. Also, states need tax revenues, so they need someone or something to tax. Not much to tax if most people are out of work. AFAIK, there are no social modes suitable for the future we seem to be heading towards. This may get ugly.

Re:Who buys the output of the robots?

[sysrammer]

"In a world where no one works, and no one earns income - who is left to buy the output of the robots?"

Other robots, natch.

Re:Who buys the output of the robots?

[mmarrow]

In a world where no one works, and no one earns income - who is left to buy the output of the robots?

Capitalism driven production REQUIRES consumers with disposable income. The one cannot exist without the other. To save capitalism, you need to save the consumer.

A side effect of increased automation will be long term deflation, with eventually most items being free

Re:Who buys the output of the robots?

[houghi]

We need to re-evaluate what time is worth.

When you start with 10 workers with 1 boss and 5 are replaced by a machine the extra money will go to the 1 boss. Assuming the 5 other workers are their SO, their income per family has just halved, while the income of the boss has doubled.
So you now have a bigger wage gap. The money they make together is still the same, but suddenly you have 10 poor people.

Ideally what would happen is that the profit is devided by 11 people and they ALL work half the time. In reality what happens is that they ask 3 of the 5 workers to work even harder, so they can fire two more. So now the 3 need to feed the 10.

It is a bit like famine in Africa. It is not that there is a shortage, the distribution is fucked up.

So how can this be done? My boss has asked me to do overtime. This means in the end that while I work extra hours, somebody else won't be able to do so. So he can do two things (besides the illegal ones)
1) Offer to pay 150% overtime.
Not going to do that, because that would mean paying so much extra in taxes on those hours, it becomes stupid to do so (87%)
2) Offer to take those hours at a different moment and that at 1.5. So I do 8 hours overtime. That means I can take 12 hours at any other time.

When will he do that? In an emergency. Otherwise he will see that more people are hired. That means I not only have the money to spend it, but also the time to do so during e.g. my 35 paid holidays.

Re:Who buys the output of the robots?

[ebvwfbw]

In a world where no one works, and no one earns income - who is left to buy the output of the robots?

Capitalism driven production REQUIRES consumers with disposable income. The one cannot exist without the other. To save capitalism, you need to save the consumer.

I have to wonder where you learn economics. Maybe that's what they're teaching today? Look into Milton Friedman. Disposable income is not a requirement.

More Than They Predict

[JimSadler]

The US pays wages that limit our ability to compete in world trade. Going to automation and robotics will be far more invasive than the article mentions. The second point in the article is deadly in error. The non working will simply not quietly starve to death or live in want. They will rebel. The root nature of our economy will change to support these folks or we will cease to exist. There are a few sociologist who are working on this issue but getting the public to change their views and beliefs will not be easy.

Re:More Than They Predict

[__aaclcg7560]

The US pays wages that limit our ability to compete in world trade.

Not quite. China is becoming too expensive to manufacture because laborers there want higher wages for a middle-class lifestyle. Manufacturing is coming back to the US but the new factories are highly automated. When John Deere opened a new factory, they had 10,000+ applications for 800 jobs.

The non working will simply not quietly starve to death or live in want.

Or join the underground economy by doing odd jobs for cash. I had an uncle who ran a landscaping business for cash under the table, his family drew welfare benefits and never filed taxes in 30 years. Just because the jobs don't officially exist doesn't mean people won't find a way to survive through the hard times.

Tracking

[fyngyrz]

I have a statement every month that tells me what and where I've spent my money. I can also use those purchases to show where I was at at the time if need be.

Mmm-hmm. Well, if you can't keep track of your spending, I suppose that'd be a reason to want to have others do it for you. I don't have that problem, personally, so it's difficult for me to emphasize with your use case. As for needing to show where you were... who do you need to show this to? The very fact that you think you need to show it to someone is worrisome, and speaks more to the problem than any solution.

Why would you worry about your purchases being tracked?

Because the government thinks it's perfectly okay to directly violate the constitution that authorizes its existence, that's why. Because the government is trying to look at the people's persons, houses, papers and effects without warrants, that's why. Because the government will, if given a chance, interfere with personal and consensual choices it has absolutely no ethical reason to concern itself with, that's why. Because the government runs a system of unjust gulags, driven by a manifestly corrupt legal system, which one should avoid with great care, that's why.

Re: Tracking

[hackwrench]

From experience, I find that what you are likely doing is not tracking your purchases at all which is a perfectly valid approach. All of my purchases were the right decision at the time.

Re:Tracking

[Ol Olsoc]

I have a statement every month that tells me what and where I've spent my money. I can also use those purchases to show where I was at at the time if need be.

Mmm-hmm. Well, if you can't keep track of your spending, I suppose that'd be a reason to want to have others do it for you. I don't have that problem, personally, so it's difficult for me to emphasize with your use case.

Of course I can keep track of my spending. I just hve a nice form that someone else puts together for me. And if by some chance you actually are keeping track of your spending to the exact penny, you are in extremely rarified air, because very few do. So first off, I'm pretty skeptical, but congrats if you do. The word is empathize btw, but might have been spell check.

BTW, I also get about 2K back every every year on a cashbck card. Since everyone is paying the same except at some of those cutrate cash gas stations, why not?

As for needing to show where you were... who do you need to show this to? The very fact that you think you need to show it to someone is worrisome, and speaks more to the problem than any solution.

Nonsense.So many Slashdotters are much buttsore about being tracked. I turn that around by having myself tracked at all times. I always have an alabi if needed. Now that being said, I don't do anything particularly illegal, maybe go 56 mph in a 55 zone, so I use their tools for my own purposes. If for some reason someone wanted to know where I was, I can tell them. I can prove it. You don't like it? Tough.

Why would you worry about your purchases being tracked?

Because the government thinks it's perfectly okay to directly violate the constitution that authorizes its existence, that's why.

Ah, I see. A Sovereign Citizen.

Because the government is trying to look at the people's persons, houses, papers and effects without warrants, that's why. Because the government will, if given a chance, interfere with personal and consensual choices it has absolutely no ethical reason to concern itself with, that's why. Because the government runs a system of unjust gulags, driven by a manifestly corrupt legal system, which one should avoid with great care, that's why.

A famous man once said thou art one paranoid mutha!

Sorry dear Soverign one, but your time has come and gone. It isn't 1840. There's just no way to get along in this world without being tracked. Closest you can come is to live in a compound in Idaho, with no Social security number, deal only in barter, and nothing else, but even then you'll be watched because people who do that sort of thing tend to be a tad unhinged.

I'm pretty surprised that you are brave enough to even get on Slashdot. Even AC's can be found out if there is a good enough reason. Someone who is violating your sovereignty is probably reading your post as we write it.

Re:Tracking

[AthanasiusKircher]

Well, if you can't keep track of your spending, I suppose that'd be a reason to want to have others do it for you. I don't have that problem, personally, so it's difficult for me to emphasize with your use case.

While I share your concerns about tracking, let's not pretend that there isn't a convenience factor to financial tracking software for those who are willing to give up some potential privacy.

It's not just for people who can't keep a budget. Electronic transactions that can easily be imported and auto-classified into categories can be really helpful for seeing where your money goes in detail. Sure, there are "old school" methods of budgeting (like the "envelope" model where you create envelopes of cash for each budgetary category each month or pay period or whatever and spend cash out of them), but financial software makes this all a heck of a lot easier.

I was skeptical of all of this too, until a close friend (who actually is quite financially savvy and has no problem keeping within his budgets) told me what happened when he started using Mint and discovered how much money he was actually paying Starbucks every year. He was really shocked, but if you're just using cash, it's not an easy question to answer unless you're really keeping detailed records in a relatively laborious fashion.

As for needing to show where you were... who do you need to show this to? The very fact that you think you need to show it to someone is worrisome, and speaks more to the problem than any solution.

Again, although I share your privacy concerns, I also completely understand why someone would find this convenient for all sorts of things -- extra documentation of reimburseable business expenses, proving things if you got audited by the IRS, etc.

Because the government thinks it's perfectly okay to directly violate the constitution that authorizes its existence, that's why.

While I am horrified by the government surveillance, in this particular instance, I think your paranoia may be misdirected. Personally, I'm a lot more concerned presently about what companies may be aggregating my purchasing data and in what ways than I am about the government monitoring my financial records.

Re: Tracking

[Ol Olsoc]

From experience, I find that what you are likely doing is not tracking your purchases at all which is a perfectly valid approach. All of my purchases were the right decision at the time.

Have no idea why you would determine the veracity of my claim from your personal experience. My wife and I track every penny.

The credit card living started after going through purchases years ago when I first had a corporate card and had to reconcile for my whole group. It was pretty surprising how often that card was hacked. It also kept people in line. So I just transferred the concept to looking at every purchase to my own cards. I have one for basic living expenses, one for materials purchases, and a gasoline discount credit card. So each month, I go over the statements and if the spending gets out of line I know what to ease up on. In the end, I know exactly how much I spent for fuel, I know exactly how much I spent for food, I know exactly how much I spend on vacation, and entertainment. Then I get some money back at the end of the year.

I do understand that most people don't keep any track at all. That's why when they get into financial trouble, they are often shocked to see how they spend money when they start trying to keep track of expenditures. My methods might seem odd, but you might be surprised at just how well they work.

Re: Tracking

[hackwrench]

So you actually do have other people track your purchases for you before you track them yourself.

Not a concern

[John.Banister]

Treasury Secretary Mnuchin says it's 50-100 years out.

Re:Our Future. - non-stick companies

[petes_PoV]

corporations are some of the worst entities when it comes to actually paying taxes

The real problem is that corporations can easily move to countries where the tax burden is lighter. And if their entire operation: whether manufacturing, services or simply annoying people by phoning them up - is automated, it becomes even easier. These corporations are not "sticky": they are not bound to a specific geography, unlike people who tend to put down roots, dislike disrupting their kids' education by moving school, dislike moving to other countries where they don't speak the language and generally dislike change in general.

So for those companies, they can effectively play one tax-collecting country against another: getting deals, moving to the lowest tax-rate region, engaging in "creative" practices. There is already a question among economists of why corporation taxes are already non-zero (ans: probably because political stability, low corruption, "friendly" laws and lack of a nearby war are attributes worth paying for). It would seem reasonable that companies would seek to minimise any robo-tax they were subject to. Especially as it would be difficult for a single country to implement - they'd just see all roboticised industries leave.

I suppose the next thing would be for corporations to buy their own, independent, islands and set themselves up as sovereign states.

Return of the barter system?

[zerofoo]

There are a number of ways this could play out.

If the robotic means of production are owned by the few - the remaining many may simply revert back to a barter system (you reload ammo for me and I'll grow food for you...etc).

The other possibility is that the robotic means of production become SO cheap that everyone owns a robot to take care of their immediate needs. It's a futuristic stretch of the imagination, but think of a 3D printer on steroids - the robot(s) build your house, grow your food, treat your medical needs...etc.

That would be an interesting way of distributing the methods of production among all.

The dystopian "robots take all the jobs away" option doesn't seem all that likely.

Do not fear robots!

[Gravis Zero]

I am not should be particularly worried because I do not fear losing their jobs to robots because I am higher-skilled workers. See, there is no need for people to fear Face A Higher Risk Of Being Replaced By Robots . ;)

You have that backwards

[SuperKendall]

Those U.S. finance jobs tend to be "domestic retail operations" like small-town bank tellers, whereas U.K. finance jobs concentrate more in international finance and investment banking.

So why are the U.S. jobs more at risk? They seem to think what the tellers do is simpler than the "international finance" people.

But simpler does not mean more automatable. In theory bank tellers across the U.S. could have been replaced long ago by the ATM - but as we all know ATMS are everywhere and that has not happened. What is left for tellers to do at this point is the one thing that is going to take longest to really automate - personal human to human services.

Sometimes a bank customer use has a question and an ATM cannot just answer that. In fact I just got a higher end credit card and one of the features it offers is that calling the 800 number immediately connects you to a human - no voice menu. Automation was supposed to be the end of that kind of thing but it just led to higher end jobs.

Meanwhile those fancy "international finance and investment banking" jobs sound like much more specialized jobs which means they are more open to automation, and probably doing a better job at it since there are no language barriers for computers (though system barriers may be similar, they only need to be overcome once rather than per employee).

Re:You have that backwards

[__aaclcg7560]

Automation was supposed to be the end of that kind of thing but it just led to higher end jobs.

I'm reading "Chaos Monkeys: Obscene Fortune and Random Failure in Silicon Valley" by Antonio Garcia Martinez, where he saw a trading desk at Goldman Sach went from 20 traders and two programmers to two traders and 20 programmers. That's when he bailed out on Wall Street to go to Silicon Valley to get into ad clicks.

Re:My guess: Kindergarten workers will be hit by t

[boa]

The kindergarten, valuable as it is, was just an example of possible knock-on effects. There's a social side to it, but also an economic. How to pay for a service when unemployed and with lots of free time and the skills to do it yourself.

Re:Our Future. - non-stick companies

[sjames]

That's when we switch to either denying entry to the market if they don't pay taxes or just set up import tarriffs. One way or another, they will pay because the market is just too big to write off.

Re:Automation can be more productive

[__aaclcg7560]

They don't get sick, take vacations, go on maternity leave, strike, ask for raises, or need benefits.

Robots required maintenance. If a robot goes out spec by the tiniest fraction that prevents it from functioning normally, someone is going to fix it. Robots fixing robots is quite a ways off in the future.

Re:If robots were advanced and inexpensive enough.

[religionofpeas]

What if I could purchase a robot that could go out and earn a living for me?

Won't work. Prices of labor will fall to a point where a robot is barely able to sustain itself on the income.

Re:15 years?

[religionofpeas]

I don't know why you feel the need to remain constrained by current limitations when you have access to unlimited labor

You don't have unlimited labor. Someone else does. And they'll just take whatever they want. And if you have any complaints, please discuss it with the armed battle bot over there. Shoo shoo.

The Art of being Human

[Neuronwelder]

Tell me, which one of you would rather speak to a person? For a bill over the phone? Ordering at a restaurant? Buying a car? A human or a bot? I guess if you have social anxiety disorder this would be great news to you. You may say: "Now it's just going to be the repetitive jobs.." Ahh! But the pendulum does not stop in mid swing!!

Re:If robots were advanced and inexpensive enough.

[religionofpeas]

Robots are cheap and available today

Nobody's going to hire your robot to do their work, if they can just get their own cheap robot to do it, and pocket all the profits.

Meaningless prediction from inconsequential people

[RightwingNutjob]

Every once in a while these stories come up. Twenty dollars says the people who made this prediction have never made a living doing any of the work they're predicting is prone to automation. So of course without any intimate appreciation of the finer details of the work, they can blithely declare that it's ripe for automation. Or outsourcing. RodenberryTopia, here we come!

And yet, in $CURRENT_YEAR, everything from cell phones to airliners are still hand-assembled. Yes, there is mechanical assistance, and electronic aid so that what used to take twenty men can be done by one or two, but even in the most automated of Japanese or South Carolina car factories, there are still people employed. What the automation has meant is that production has ramped up and product costs have gone down to the point where every household can aspire to have has can have two or three Lexuses or BMWs in the driveway and a plane ticket to the other side of the planet is no longer the province of the ultra rich. More cars and more planes means more people working at more factories. It balances out.

But if you sit on your ass in a cubicle and operate an Excel spreadsheet all day, these are just numbers and abstractions for you. So you can plug them into an equation someone else has given you and conclude that we'll all have nothing to do come next decade. Pathetic.

An increase in potential

[SuperKendall]

went from 20 traders and two programmers to two traders and 20 programmers

The great news there for us technical folk is that if 20 programmers are working today, you can be sure they will need 40 in a few years to clean up the mess the 20 left.

Re:An increase in potential

[__aaclcg7560]

The great news there for us technical folk is that if 20 programmers are working today, you can be sure they will need 40 in a few years to clean up the mess the 20 left.

Maybe, maybe not. High Frequency Trading is losing its luster and might be on the way out.

http://www.investopedia.com/news/high-frequency-trading-flash-boys-losing-steam/

Message already received loud and clear

[sgt_doom]

"There's a surprising prediction for the next 15 years"

Wow! That's a shocker! Let's see now . . . Bank of America just built three new branches, full automated, no humans need apply --- Café X in San Fran is fully automated, no human barristas wanted --- Goldman Sachs used to employ 600 cash equity traders, but due to automation today only employs 2 --- Rolls Royce recently came out with an operating system for super container ships which requires no crew!

Don't robots rely on software?

[mnemotronic]

Recent events (Stuxnet, Mirai) and revelations (wikileaks) indicate just how vulnerable software-dependant systems are to unauthorized control and manipulation. Count on the robots being hacked.

Old old OLD news

[Tony Isaac]

Since the 1800s, robots started taking over human craftsmanship jobs:
- making cloth
- making glass bottles
- making paper
- farming
- making nails and horse shoes
- making cars
- making (just about anything)
Since the 1900s, robots started taking over human service jobs:
- typing documents
- filing documents
- sending messages (postal service)
- handling financial transactions
- store clerks (e-commerce web sites)
- marketing
- distributing news

I'm sure there are many more jobs that have been automated, that I've missed. Yet somehow we have very close to "full" employment. Our collective standard of living is higher today than ever, even for the poorest among us.

The robots are coming, this is true. I say this is a good thing! We humans have brains, we will find something better to do than the drudgery that the robots are taking over for us.

"Free" is an economic impossibility

[zerofoo]

The "Labor Theory of Value" says that the value of an item is equal to its labor input component.

That's a nice theory - but ignores the concept of scarcity. Even if you have unlimited energy (which we don't) and unlimited labor (provided by robots in theory), you still have the problem of scarcity of materials.

Our economic world has unlimited demand. Humans generally are not satisfied with what they have and want more. Scarcity of materials will still require some sort of cost structure to satisfy the supply/demand curve.

So long as humans compete for scarce resources, there will need to be an economic system to facilitate that. Free labor won't eliminate it.

Re:15 years?

[OrangeTide]

I don't have any robots, I cannot afford them. I doubt a bank will loan me the money for them either.