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Self-Driving Cars Likely Won't Steal Your Job (Until 2040) (wired.com)
The self-driving robots are coming to transform your job. Kind of. Also, very slowly. From a report: That's the not-quite-exclamatory upshot of a new report from the Washington, DC-based Securing America's Future Energy. The group advocates for a countrywide pivot away from oil dependency, one it hopes will be aided by the speedy adoption of electric, self-driving vehicles. So it commissioned a wide-ranging study by a phalanx of labor economists to discover how that could happen, and whether America might transform into a Mad Max-like desert hell along the way. The news, mostly, is good. For one, self-driving vehicles probably won't wreck the labor market to the point where gig economy workers are hired out as mobile blood bags.
In fact, they'll eventually feed the economy, accruing an estimated $800 billion in annual benefits by 2050, a number mostly in line with previous researchers' projections. Two, robo-cars won't disappear the jobs all at once. "We have a labor market characterized by churning -- continual job creation and destruction," says Erica Groshen, a visiting labor economist at Cornell University and former Commissioner of Labor Statistics, who worked on the report. "The challenge is to make the transition as smooth as possible."
In fact, they'll eventually feed the economy, accruing an estimated $800 billion in annual benefits by 2050, a number mostly in line with previous researchers' projections. Two, robo-cars won't disappear the jobs all at once. "We have a labor market characterized by churning -- continual job creation and destruction," says Erica Groshen, a visiting labor economist at Cornell University and former Commissioner of Labor Statistics, who worked on the report. "The challenge is to make the transition as smooth as possible."
"We have a labor market characterized by churning -- continual job creation and destruction,"
That is OLD SCHOOL THINKING. No longer applicable.
That will no longer be true once AI and automated systems capabilities generally get better than the corresponding human ability.
Example: There's a technology that is better now at detecting certain types of tumours in images than radiologists.
We have to change our analysis of future job prospects, and not just rely on "something else will come up for people to do."
There will be a cross-over point for each type of job when automated system will be better at it and more cost effective than a person.
That will start happening to more and more job categories (or at least their most important tasks) faster and faster, as AI and automation continue their rapid advancement in capability.
Automation and AI are improving fast.
People are not.
Get used to it.
Where are we going and why are we in a handbasket?
Truck driver is the number one job in most states. Tesla already has shown an electric truck, that is probably already self-drivable.
This is going to hit a lot earlier than 2040.
I come here for the love
Actually, yes, I believe Tesla is much closer than 22 years away from having a self-driving truck. Far more than a self-driving car at least.
Trucks drive a lot differently than cars. Most truck driving is highway driving. A large part of truck driving... especially the type that is is associated with jobs counts is logistical from business park to business park. It is entirely possible and likely that companies that are moving stuff from docks to warehouse or warehouse to warehouse can very easily be made self-driving friendly.
Also, with the exception of managing traffic diversions due to construction (which I haven't seen yet on self driving vehicles), trucks can make the majority of their transit in the a single lane on the highway.
Also, it could be possible for a business to arise for "last mile operators" who are vehicle operators that are responsible for navigating populated areas in trucks. As such, they would assist the truck from the loading dock to the highway and then be picked up by a shuttle bus. Then they could be delivered by a shuttle bus to the highway and assist trucks the last mile to the unloading docks.
I am very much under the belief that we will accomplish self-driving trucks long before we achieve self-driving vehicles that could navigate my neighborhood.