Author: automata

Is a Universal Basic Income the Answer to Automation-Caused Unemployment?

In Brief

With automation poised to take over an estimated 57 percent of jobs, many are turning to universal basic income (UBI) as a possible solution to widespread unemployment.

t UBI systems are already being tested in countries such as Canada, Finland, and the Netherlands, so hard data on the practicality of such systems should be forthcoming. Disruption and Displacement While technological advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics will clearly make a lot of processes easier and more cost-effective, the impending repercussions need to be addressed before the inevitable happens. As automation begins to take over several jobs, […]

Productivity And The Minimum Wage – Higher Productivity Does Mean Fewer Jobs

One of the arguments that is used in the minimum wage debate is that a higher minimum wage will drive productivity higher. This is true, it will, because only those jobs where the labour is productive enough to cover the higher minimum will survive. We don’t in fact measure the productivity of unemployed people. Thus, if one of the adaptation mechanisms to a higher minimum wage is that businesses increase labour productivity then by definition there will be fewer jobs : Sir Charlie Mayfield, chairman of the John Lewis Partnership and a government adviser on productivity, told the Guardian […]

How technology will destroy low-wage and middle class jobs the world over

How technology will destroy low-wage and middle class jobs the world over

Rise of the Robots underlines that we have to rethink the assumption that education and reskilling on the job will lead to better prospects. (Shutterstock) It’s likely that machines will be smarter than us before the end of the century – not just at chess or trivia questions but at just about everything, from mathematics and engineering to science and medicine.” – Gary Marcus, professor at New York University

There is an ongoing crisis of jobs in India and the world that does not provoke as much discussion as it should. The Labour Bureau revealed this year that India added […]

Is a Universal Basic Income the answer to automation-Caused Unemployment?

In the 1950’s technology it was predicted would free people from drudgery jobs and allow people to spend more time in leisure activities. This assumed that the freed up time would be spread out equally, but what happens in reality is that there are big winners and losers. The losers, generally those without the qualifications to make it in the knowledge economy became the unemployed and people received a subsistence living, if they weren’t working. There are now generations of families who have been unemployed or underemployed and there is never any political will to get them back into […]

Fast-food technology

Fast-food technology

Associated Press
McDonald’s CEO Steve Easterbrook demonstrates an order kiosk during a presentation at a McDonald’s restaurant in New York’s Tribeca neighborhood.

Changes on way, but not just to save labor costs
NEW YORK – It’s a scenario often invoked by critics of minimum wage increases: fast-food workers replaced with burger-flipping robots.The imagery resurfaced when President-elect Donald Trump named Andrew Puzder to head the Labor Department. Puzder, CEO of the company that owns Carl’s Jr. and Hardee’s, is known for saying significant wage increases would lead to job losses and the automation of some tasks.But the sentiment does […]

A mining fund in Goa could soon give all its residents an equal, regular income

A mining fund in Goa could soon give all its residents an equal, regular income

Tourist brochures frequently describe Goa as some kind of utopia and the Economic Survey – expected at the end of January, a day before the next Union Budget – could go some way in bridging the gap between imagination and reality. The document will discuss the feasibility of implementing basic income, an unconditional cash transfer for all residents that could bring improvements in health, nutrition and education.

In Goa, the basic income could come out of the Goa Iron Ore Permanent Fund, created by the Supreme Court in April 2014 as part of its judgement in a case regarding widespread […]

UBI – real solution in perfect storm of debt

UBI – real solution in perfect storm of debt

A new report from the investment service Wealthify reveals that many Scottish people are unable to save for the future because of “zero hour contracts, insecure work and low pay.” Moreover, according to the report, Scottish women save less than half of the money of men, and 10 times less than some areas of England.

Campaigners have proposed a universal basic income (UBI) in response to this–such as Kirstein Rummery, Professor of Social Policy at the University of Stirling, whom Nathanael Williams interviewed in a Commonspace article about the Wealthify report.

Rummery said, “The only real policy solution would be Universal […]

Is a Universal Basic Income the Answer to Automation-Caused Unemployment?

What the fuck are you going on about? if we’re going to go for $70,000, we might s well shoot for the moon. After all, it’s just a number. If we’re going to follow your logic, why not $7,000,000,000.00? That doesn’t make any sense. $70,000 a year wasn’t a made up imaginary number. He wasn’t suggesting we print money until our press breaks. Money represents wealth. And soon there will be enough wealth that we could give every citizen $70,000 a year while maintaining the purchasing power of the dollar. In the united states, our lowest universal basic income […]

Robots Could Destroy Millions of Jobs Globally

Robots Could Destroy Millions of Jobs Globally

It’s difficult to predict exactly how robots and other AI might change the economy. A Nobel Prize-winning economist has warned that the rise in robotics and automation could destroy millions of jobs across the world.

Angus Deaton, who won the Nobel Prize last year for his work on health, wealth and inequality, said he believes robots are a much greater threat to employment in the US than globalization, Business Insider reported.

Addressing the theory that Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential elections was fueled by a backlash against globalization, Deaton told the Financial Times: “Globalization for me seems to be […]

As Tech Takes Jobs, Govts Debate Guaranteed Income

As Tech Takes Jobs, Govts Debate Guaranteed Income

The robots are coming for our jobs. Someday, they’ll take the wheel from human truckers, the plow from human farmers, the scalpel from human surgeons and maybe even the paintbrush from artists. But how exactly will society cope with the transition of jobs from human to machine hands?

The answer to that could be a basic income, a stipend provided by the state as a social safety net for displaced workers. In fact, President Barack Obama even weighed in on the idea of a basic income in a recent interview with Wired. “Whether a universal income is the right model […]