What To Do About The Long-Term Implications of Automation

Noncooperation, nonparticipation, choke the economic system.

 

The entire power structure knows full well this kettle is brewing and that it has lost all semblance of legitimacy, that's why for profit prisons with convict leasing in america are a growth business. This is how we will handle an excess of human beings and the further intentional concentration of societal wealth. That is also why police depts have been militarized and the public is being systematically desensitized to “the law” murdering fellow citizens – even when unarmed – in the streets.

 

my suggestion is following the advice of our dear leader and going back to the old ways of oil and coal jobs to replace the good paying manufacturing jobs that left for china, korea, japan, etc..

climate change will be the intended consequence, but all we have to do is invent steering technology so hurricanes hit our enemy's in foreign countries. if we innovate tech for ocean patterns, we can steer floods at the bad guys too.

there is no other solution for a meritocracy that the people will consent too, if it involves giving up living wage busy work in exchange for automation. the college educated class is small, and many more people in the democracy don't like school much less hard subjects like STEM.

 

the H1b program should end, there are many poor Americans with the potential and will for high paying work. businesses should invest in educating and training Americans for free instead of importing talent.

that could be a way to further automation in an ethical way.

 

Considering who's been elected lately, I'm not sure if it's the politicians compromising their character, or the voters.

 

Good points.

IMO, one problem leading to compromising on character and the making of shady deals is that campaigns cost far too much. Congressmen need to be constant fund raising machines in order to hope to be reelected. I don't see how that can be accomplished without bending to the desires of those with deep pockets. We need to cut out the superfund nonsense, force campaigns back to being about citizens, and ensure that all citizens get equal representation. Basically, we need to strengthen and protect our democratic process of choosing leadership.

Plus, we need more education. We can't expect people to understand statistics, make scientifically sound policy decisions, be aware of why our policies are what they are, weed out and reject fake and questionable "news", etc., without adequate education.

Of course we as a nation have to want to do that.

 

I've seen MBA programs that are run in parallel with the student having a career in high tech, law, etc. These are sometimes run more like mentoring programs, where the "student" is applying course material to create solutions that apply to their career.

Some political candidates have pointed out that we don't have enough in the way of vocational training, which could include a similar style of mentoring, especially when the rate of change in our economy is such that it might be advisable to have education be something that is continued on and off through an entire career.

Many corporations pay for, provide, or at least encourage continuing education. They recognize the importance of continuing education. Community colleges provide opportunities as do colleges and universities.


Frankly, I wonder if the largest issue isn't that people who are employed tend to allow their working hours be the full extent of their concern about their career.

For example, the manufacturing workers who were considered to be "left behind" were most likely working hard and not recognizing the need to spend even MORE time being prepared for a different kind of employment.

And, the need for continuing education is not unique to manufacturing - those in high tech have to be constantly working on improving their skill set, too. Think about the medical professions where there is a constant deluge of new information, new drugs, new procedures, and other advancement.

 

Will- while I wish it wasn't true, we also have a lot of people who will simply get by with less rather than put forth the effort to learn and work. In these cases, mentoring won't really do much good. Such people need some fundamental change in the way they look at life, and they don't like that suggestion. To learn something from someone else a person has to feel like that teacher or mentor has something valuable that they need. Many just don't. They may want the result, but aren't interested in learning how it's done.

I have no idea how to change that.

 

Well, there are always those who reject education.

Perhaps the best we can do is move forward with those who do see value in education, both vocational and academic.

Any change requires a start that is usually far from universally accepted.

 

You have to work with what you have. and that can only include the ones who want to work together.
I agree on your second statement. People fear more extensive change, they want to fix things by tweaking the solutions they are used to which are so often not working.

 

The jobless cannot afford American products anyway. Better to support affordable products than to shove expensive ones into the faces of the underprivileged so that they take to crime in order to deprive you and me of our possessions.

 

I think that it could, and should, be local efforts that can be supported at the state level. Begin with asking for volunteers to come together to form mentorship groups. They should be as open as possible to as many different kinds of skills because they are going to need to find ways to promote themselves. Perhaps they can meet at local libraries initially. From there they reach out to local businesses and offer to give talks to new hires about the advantages of having a mentor. The mentors will probably have networks in the local business community that they can utilize. From the new hires should come volunteers who want to be mentored. Keep good records and start publishing success stories on websites and social media. This is a grass roots effort that will eventually grow to be a nationwide program with the right kind of people behind it.

That is how I see it expanding but others might have better ideas than mine.

 

There is an issue that I might have missed before but it does need to be addressed IMO.

The world population is growing while jobs are being lost to automation. This exacerbates the situation because it sets up a conflict between those who have jobs and those who need them. If someone needs to feed their family and the only jobs that come available are when someone dies there are those who will see the life of those who have jobs as just an obstacle that needs to be eliminated. In essence it is a means to downgrade the value of human life.

We have already witnessed the devaluation of workers when they are laid off and forced to take lower paying jobs. Failing to provide pay raises is another form of devaluing workers. The value of the minimum wage has dropped considerably. At what point does it become a matter where working for a pittance that cannot feed a family is any different to not working at all and not being able to feed a family?

When it reaches that stage (and I hope that it never does) then there will inevitably be uprisings. People won't stand for that and will make it clear to the powers-that-be that when someone has nothing they have nothing to lose so they will do whatever they have to do out of sheer desperation.

This is a potential outcome that will occur sooner because the population growth is exponential. The odds are that this situation will arise even before full automation comes into effect.

I don't know the answers but I do know that it will be worsened by factors like droughts, famines, crop failures, etc, etc.

 

It could be done by the schools or the accreditaters or both together. The major hurdle to be overcome is establishing that the curriculum is independent of the advertisers. An I-Degree would not be worth much at all

 

No there may be experts that may be able to tell the difference but most people will not have the tools. Kind of like there is a difference between vinyl and digital music but vinyl is almost gone. Or live vs recorded music.

 

the oil industry was the traditional replacement for the jobs lost in the race to the bottom for manufacturing, fossil fuel energy provides immediate high paying labor work.

i believe the 'jobs of the future' you are proposing require several years of high level education, but many Americans require immediate employment with good pay due to a sense of urgency for their pursuit of happiness.

a solution could be using media influence to create a culture of delayed gratification, but not sure if this will be profitable in the entertainment industry since it capitalises on immediate gratification that has been the hallmark of American culture.

 

if i may comment on this excerpt, federal involvement lowers the quality of education because when free stuff is given to an individual, they do not value it the same way as if it were earned from the privilege of hard work, honest pay, and family inheritance.

federal pell grants are generally handouts for 2 year degrees, and we as a society may or may not be able to afford to tolerate inferior work in these fields which require little education.

expanding federal pell grants to higher level degrees would further ruin institutions of great power in society, with individuals who are not equipped intellectually to handle such work.

 

What recent inventions/discoveries from Europe have changed the world?

 

First of all, that's not the right question if you're trying to counter my post.

You need to find inventions that were made by those who didn't have an immediate immigrant past. We have often led by being open to those of other countries coming here - which is a perfectly good solution to the problem I stated. We created the atom bomb, but it was the child of an immigrant family who led the way. The Manhattan project included war refugees such as Albert Einstein, Hans Bethe, John von Neumann, Leo Szilard, James Franck, Edward Teller, Rudolf Peierls, and Klaus Fuchs. And, now the cutting edge of physics of the small is CERN while physics of the large includes leaders such as Hawkings of the UK.


Another problem is that it isn't necessarily the first invention in a segment that is the issue. For example, you mention transportation, where there is an argument, but you also have to note that Japan dramatically changed the car industry in the US, a serious factor in the bankruptcy of the US auto industry. Also, we lost steel in large part due to modernization of steel production in foreign nations. China didn't invent computers, but they have designed and built the fastest computers in the world for some years now - an important requirement in studying stuff such as weather. And, they lead in wind/solar patents, though they weren't the first on the scene.

There is no doubt that the US is a major driver of industry and invention. However, again we are 5% of the brains and the world is moving in a direction where the industrial raw material is brains.

We can't afford to be passive about this. We need to be open to immigration and we need to be educating the brains we have.