Machines set to make much of the human work force redundant

Quite a sobering video from CGP Grey, who shows how computers and robots are poised to eventually dramatically reduce not just the market for human manual labor (which it's already doing at a rapid pace) but everything from lawyers to artists to physicians.

The key to the realization is to realize that computers and machines don't have to completely take over an industry to create rampant unemployment. An example from the video is how groceries that used to employ, say, a dozen cashiers can now employ a handful of cashiers and install a bunch of self-check counters.

The only wrench I can throw into the idea, and it's not a refutation -- employment creates demand, and having something like 45 percent unemployment will dramatically reduce demand. Who knows how the system will eventually stabilize? But it would be interesting if we come to the point that we accept that people need jobs simply because people need jobs.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

or we could live in a low work utopia.

why do people need to work 40 hours Plus a week to get an weekly income.
we could all agree that 5 hours gets your weekly wage and computers do the rest..

Of course we will have to end capitalism and dismantle the vast majority of business practices currently used, replacing them with systems designed for efficiency of output rather than maximum profit.

VOTE 1 SKYNET

Ben_Reilly wrote:Quite a sobering video from CGP Grey, who shows how computers and robots are poised to eventually dramatically reduce not just the market for human manual labor (which it's already doing at a rapid pace) but everything from lawyers to artists to physicians.

The key to the realization is to realize that computers and machines don't have to completely take over an industry to create rampant unemployment. An example from the video is how groceries that used to employ, say, a dozen cashiers can now employ a handful of cashiers and install a bunch of self-check counters.

The only wrench I can throw into the idea, and it's not a refutation -- employment creates demand, and having something like 45 percent unemployment will dramatically reduce demand. Who knows how the system will eventually stabilize? But it would be interesting if we come to the point that we accept that people need jobs simply because people need jobs.



https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

Machines set to make much of the human work force redundant....
....Set to make ?
Machines have been doing that since the start of the industrial revolution, it just now there are less manual jobs for people to move to
When the traditional labor intensive jobs are done by machines now

The told me this when I first started work and the first computers came in. Will be no need for office workers they said lol!

 

AND they fuck up the economy, and what's the inevitable near-future outcomes likely to be ???

* Increased "structural" base unemployment ~ that's been happening since the 1970s ! (It's more than doubled - from just under 3% in the early 1970s - to around 6-7% since the 1990s..).

* Increased poverty and hardships, as hours - and hence take-home pay - is dwindling away in real terms (average wage rises have been lower than 'cost-of-living' inflationary rises since the 1980s..);

* RETAIL markets slump as a direct result of decreased 'spending power' by consumers ==> accelerating the race towards the next depression.

* Skyrocketing house prices over the past 20+yrs, allied with an undersupply of both "affordable" housing and "public" (i.e. council..) housing ==> increased homelessness.

* Attacks on Welfare, minimum wages, unionism, work safety/OH&S, and public health by "Big Business" and their friends in right wing politics, evangelist and fundamentalist religions, neo-fascist "think tanks", and their media mates ~ that's happening RIGHT NOW !

* All inevitably leading to :
Increased homelessness;
More people becoming destitute, hungry, cold;
Increasing civil unrest, crime rates, riots and protests;
Society breaks down as the "social divide" between the haves and have nots grows inevitably wider, and deeper..
=> increased chance of another revolution in the near future ?


THE current unsustainable levels of chronic unemployment and wasteful underemployment in many parts of the world could be eradicated if the average employee could be moved to a four day/32 hour week as the standard for "full time" employment !


AS the world stands at this time, this won't be happening anytime soon for a couple of reasons :

* TOO many employers not prepared to pay a proper decent "living wage" level; and

* TOO many workers are "wedded" to excessive mortgage levels on over-valued houses; along with the overspending on their consumer lifestyles...