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Those 100,000 Jobs Amazon’s Creating Are Exactly What Blue-Collar Workers Need

Those 100,000 Jobs Amazon's Creating Are Exactly What Blue-Collar Workers Need

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CREDIT: Getty Images If you hadn’t heard, there’s a good chance just about every manual laborer in America could be replaced by robots sooner or later.

Silicon Valley is quickly developing new machines with the physical abilities and artificial intelligence to do many of the repetitive jobs every day Americans hold today. It’s called automation , and it’s already replacing human workers in industries from manufacturing to fast food to long-haul trucking.That’s why Amazon’s announcement that it will create 100,000 U.S. jobs is so significant.Whether or not President-elect Donald Trump had anything with creating these jobs, as […]

Automation: The Real Killer of American Jobs – Part 2.

Part 2 of a 2 part series for the Good Men Project.

In Part 1 I stated that the real job killer of American manufacturing is robots, not the Chinese or Mexicans. Manufacturing is a good starting point to look at the impact of technology because manufacturing accounts for 12.5% of total U.S. GDP and nearly 9% of U.S. employment according to the most recent report from the Economic Policy Institute.

As innovation in automation and technology continue to develop, robotics will become cheaper, artificial intelligence will improve, and more sectors of our economy will experience similar transformations to those […]

Give robots ‘personhood’ status, EU committee argues

Give robots 'personhood' status, EU committee argues

The European parliament has urged the drafting of a set of regulations to govern the use and creation of robots and artificial intelligence, including a form of “electronic personhood” to ensure rights and responsibilities for the most capable AI.

In a 17-2 vote, with two abstentions, the parliament’s legal affairs committee passed the report , which outlines one possible framework for regulation.

“A growing number of areas of our daily lives are increasingly affected by robotics,” said the report’s author, Luxembourgish MEP Mady Delvaux. “In order to address this reality and to ensure that robots are and will remain in the […]

Robots Will Take Jobs, but Not as Fast as Some Fear, New Report Says

Robots Will Take Jobs, but Not as Fast as Some Fear, New Report Says

The robots are coming, but the march of automation will displace jobs more gradually than some alarming forecasts suggest.

A measured pace is likely because what is technically possible is only one factor in determining how quickly new technology is adopted, according to a new study by the McKinsey Global Institute. Other crucial ingredients include economics, labor markets, regulations and social attitudes.

The report, which was released Thursday, breaks jobs down by work tasks — more than 2,000 activities across 800 occupations, from stock clerk to company boss. The institute, the research arm of the consulting firm McKinsey & Company, concludes […]

CEO Argues Universal Basic Income Is Necessary for Social Stability

Bedingungsloses Grundeinkommen

It’s 2017 and universal basic income (UBI) is in the spotlight, thanks primarily to Finland’s pioneering experiment. But even before this, several countries had been considering UBI as an option – each with their own respective trial runs in the works. For instance, India’s Ministry of Finance is set to submit a report that endorses the viability of UBI.

They aren’t alone. The CEO of one of Germany’s largest telecommunications company, Deutsche Telekom (DT), gave his thoughts on the subject of UBI – or bedingungsloses Grundeinkommen – in a recent interview with German daily Handelsblatt. DT CEO Timotheus […]

Workplace of the future may require new safety net

Workplace of the future may require new safety net

Buy Photo This past election we heard much about the loss of manufacturing jobs. Columnist George Will puts these job losses in perspective in a recent article . Will cites a Ball State University study. From 2000 to 2010, only 13 percent of manufacturing job losses were due to trade. Productivity improvements accounted for over 85 percent of the losses.

Many fear that automation and robotics will cause economic dislocation for working people. Andy Stern addresses this topic in his book “ Raising the Floor : How a Universal Basic Income Can Renew Our Economy and Rebuild the American Dream.” […]

Ontario Town Rejects $1,320 Monthly Basic Income for its Residents

Ontario Town Rejects $1,320 Monthly Basic Income for its Residents

Last year, Ontario’s Liberal government announced a series of basic income pilot projects. The projects would test a $1,320 per month basic income for unemployed residents of select towns in the province.

Smith’s Falls, a small city near Ottawa, has voted not to participate.

Despite support from the city’s mayor, council voted 3-2 against implementing a basic income for its residents. Smith’s Falls is still reeling from the closure of a Hershey’s plant and Stanley Tools, which together employed almost a thousand people. “I have to believe they didn’t understand what they were voting down,” said one resident . “This can […]

FINLAND: First Basic Income payments sent to experiment participants

FINLAND: First Basic Income payments sent to experiment participants

Finland’s basic income experiment is now underway, with the first payments having been mailed this week. With the experiment generating much media attention, h ere is a review of some of the basics.

On January 1, 2017, Finland launched an experiment in which 2,000 individuals –randomly selected from a pool of unemployment benefit recipients–will receive unconditional cash payments of €560 (about 590 USD) per month for two years.

The first payments were sent out on Monday, January 9 .The main goal of the experiment, as it presently stands, is to determine whether unconditional cash transfers are more effective than means-tested […]

Universal basic income is becoming an urgent necessity Universal basic income is becoming an urgent necessity

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Universal basic income is not a magic solution, but it could help millions Universal basic income is not a magic solution, but it could help millions Universal basic income is the idea that just won’t go away. At heart, it’s a very simple concept – every individual citizen should receive a regular payment on an unconditional basis. However, the actual structure and design varies considerably. Nonetheless, what has become clear in the last year or so is that there is growing desire across the globe, including in the UK, to explore, debate, test, design, and build support […]

Workplace of the future may require new safety net

Workplace of the future may require new safety net

Buy Photo This past election we heard much about the loss of manufacturing jobs. Columnist George Will puts these job losses in perspective in a recent article . Will cites a Ball State University study. From 2000 to 2010, only 13 percent of manufacturing job losses were due to trade. Productivity improvements accounted for over 85 percent of the losses.

Many fear that automation and robotics will cause economic dislocation for working people. Andy Stern addresses this topic in his book “ Raising the Floor : How a Universal Basic Income Can Renew Our Economy and Rebuild the American Dream.” […]