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ATMs, bank tellers, and the automation paradox

ATMs, bank tellers, and the automation paradox

In September 1969 the Chemical Bank branch in Rockville Center, New York opened the first automatic teller machines. The first ATM was only able to give out cash, but by 1971 the machine could handle multiple functions , including providing customers’ account balances. The machine could do the job that was once reserved for human tellers. Over the next three decades, the number of ATMs increased exponentially. Today there are about 400,000 ATMs across America.

You can probably imagine what happened to bank teller jobs, can’t you? Their numbers increased.

What? That’s not what you expected? You thought the increase in […]

Thinking about wage subsidies and wage insurance

I wanted to focus on an interesting essay in AEI’s new book, “The US Labor Market: Questions and Challenges for Public Policy.” It’s by economist Glenn Hubbard and looks at ways public policy can support work. Twenty20. Not surprisingly, perhaps, Hubbard looks at expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit, as well as new wage subsidies. Both “dominate” alternatives such as a higher minimum wage and a guaranteed basic income, according to Hubbard. He even gives a smidgen of economist snark: It is also ironic that prominent technology industry executives advancing a guaranteed basic income no doubt consider their own […]

Venkat: It’s automation, not manufacturing, Trump should ponder

Venkat: It’s automation, not manufacturing, Trump should ponder

Tesla co-founder and CEO Elon Musk makes an appearance at the Tesla factory in Fremont, Calif. on Saturday, Oct. 1, 2011. Customers who have reserved a Model S came for a tour of the factory and a test ride in a beta model. (Jim Gensheimer/Bay Area News Group/MCT) While Donald Trump has promised “consequences” for companies seeking to move operations overseas, the more interesting question is what he plans to do about automation. Globalization and trade deals have taken the brunt of the blame this election year for job losses, but this misses the crucial role that technology plays […]

Free Money It Can Save the World or It Can Ruin It

Free Money It Can Save the World or It Can Ruin It

In recent weeks, there has been a spike in the debate around the idea of Universal Basic Income (UBI). UBI basically means that if you’re alive you deserve to receive enough money to keep you above the poverty line and provide for all your basic needs. The money can come either from a government or some other public institution, but the reception of the money is not contingent upon anything other than being alive. "Save the World or It Can Ruin It" Through a program called the Economic Security Project (ESP) , endorsed by such high profile figures as […]

Demonstrators urge province to take immediate action on basic income

Demonstrators urge province to take immediate action on basic income

Helena Jaczek, Minister of Community and Social Services, visited Sudbury, Ont., on Monday to talk about the provincial government’s plan to implement a basic income pilot project. (CBC) A meeting to discuss the Ontario government’s plan to implement a basic income pilot project was briefly interrupted on Monday evening in Sudbury, Ont., by calls to immediately hike social assistance rates.

Members of the Raise the Rates campaign held a straw poll. They asked people in the audience if they want the province to bring Ontario Works payments up to $1,320 a month and increase disability payments by $500, as recommended […]

Activists and tech leaders invest $10 million to research basic income

Activists and tech leaders invest $10 million to research basic income

Reuters photographerMore than 100 experts from Silicon Valley, activist communities, and academia have teamed up to learn about the year’s most popular idea for fighting poverty.

Announced December 8, the Economic Security Project (ESP) is a two-year fund of $10 million that will go toward uncovering everything there is to know about universal basic income, a system of wealth distribution in which every citizen receives a monthly stipend to cover basic needs.

The coalition contains a range of future-minded folks, including Y Combinator President Sam Altman, GiveDirectly Co-Founder Michael Faye, and Robert Reich, the former Secretary of Labor and a current […]

A Social Experiment: Helping a Family in Need with a Basic Income

A Social Experiment: Helping a Family in Need with a Basic Income

I would like to invite you all to contribute a few dollars a month to crowdfunding a basic income for a family in need .

Have you ever heard of the concept of a basic income ? It’s the idea that everyone in a society receive the same unconditional amount of income to be able to meet subsistence needs. Manitoba ran a very successful basic income experiment in the ’70s . Finland is about is about to launch a basic income trial . The PEI legislature just unanimously passed a basic income motion .

I’ve long thought that such a program […]

The Case For And Against Universal Basic Income

The Case For And Against Universal Basic Income

Some on the right are embracing a form of government policy as a means to end poverty: universal basic income.

Keep reading this article on The Daily Wire

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How to Determine If Your Business Can Weather the Age of Automation

How to Determine If Your Business Can Weather the Age of Automation

The world we live in is not what it was years ago. It is all about predicting what’s going to happen next, the next big trend, and the next new technology. Although the idea that robots will soon replace almost every job position is nothing new, that idea is coming closer and closer to reality. Times are changing; can your company keep up?

By 2018, it’s predicted that more than 3 million workers across the globe will be supervised by “robobosses.” One study even states that 47 percent of total U.S. employment is in the “high-risk” category of being automated. […]

Automation Can Actually Create More Jobs

Evidence shows increased productivity leads to more wealth, cheaper goods, greater spending power and ultimately, more jobs

By Christopher Mims of the WSJ .

There are four types of unemployment: seasonal, structural, frictional and cyclical.Structural unemployment is unemployment caused by a mismatch between the skills of job seekers and the requirements of available jobs.One example of this is when you are replaced by a machine, like bank tellers who were replaced by ATMs. Another example is when there is a fall in demand for your product, so you get laid off, like with typewriters since people now use computers. […]