Tag: inequality

The AI road not taken

The AI road not taken

Does this have to be the way? Artificial intelligence was supposed to boost productivity and create better futures in medicine, transportation, and workplaces. Instead, AI research and development has focused on only a few sectors, ones that are having a net negative impact for humanity, MIT economistargues in “ Redesigning AI ,” a Boston Review book.

“Our current trajectory automates work to an excessive degree while refusing to invest in human productivity; further advances will displace workers and fail to create new opportunities,” Acemoglu writes. AI also threatens “democracy and individual freedoms,” he writes.

“Government involvement, norms shifting, and democratic oversight” […]

Increased automation is something to be celebrated

Increased automation is something to be celebrated

Traffic streaks along Las Vegas Boulevard on Monday, March 20, 2017. (Jeff Scheid/The Nevada Independent) The future is apparently upon us—and, inevitably, there are those who consider its arrival a harbinger of doom for the working class.

Some economists, labor activists and workers have been growing increasingly worried about the automation of many low-skilled and entry-level jobs. As The New York Times recently reported, the trend of automation has increased as businesses navigate the uncertain and challenging economic landscape marred by the effects of the global pandemic.

As businesses work to meet the pent-up demand of consumers, and workers prove reluctant […]

A robot tax could backfire on human workers

A robot tax could backfire on human workers

Taxes targeted at firms that employ robots over human workers would be counterproductive, a new article argues — and no, it wasn’t written by a robot.

Why it matters: A growing number of technologists have argued that taxing companies that invest in robots would help reduce inequality and cushion job losses caused by automation, but such a tax could cost more than its worth by slowing economic growth, WSJ’s Richard Rubin writes .

Get market news worthy of your time with Axios Markets. Subscribe for free. How it works: The argument for a robot tax, as stated […]

What the New York Times Gets Wrong about Automation

What the New York Times Gets Wrong about Automation

Technological automation of industry has accelerated in countless sectors of the economy, from service to manufacturing, since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.

A Morning Consult poll shows that at least 1.8 million people, and probably many more , have recently turned down jobs because of generous unemployment benefits. Others have stayed out of the job market for other reasons, the Wall Street Journal reports, such as caring for children whose schools have yet to reopen.

Ben Casselman reports in a recent New York Times article that these hiring conditions have driven Kroger, Dave & Buster’s, Checkers, and many other major […]

The nostalgia for production does not get the best jobs

The nostalgia for production does not get the best jobs

Everyone loves production work. The interest in factories in the United States is something President Joe Biden shares with his predecessor, Donald Trump. “I could not believe for a second that the vitality of American production was a thing of the past,” Biden said in January when he signed an executive order to encourage more federal government purchases of U.S.-made goods. In the UK, the ruling Conservative Party has tilted the notion that jobs in new factories in struggling regions will reduce geographical inequality.
A new report from the UK Center-Right Think Tank summarizes the argument: Production is a […]

How Artificial Intelligence Will Shape Our Future

How Artificial Intelligence Will Shape Our Future

We’ll witness the creation of industries that are unimaginable now. Here’s what you need to know.

Opinions expressed by Entrepreneur contributors are their own.

As AI improves and becomes more powerful, its impact on the world economy will become vastly more significant. It will affect virtually every aspect of the world economy — from unemployment rates to economic growth, productivity, income inequality and more.Some argue that so far, AI has not had a large enough impact, but as its development accelerates, its effects will grow exponentially. Whether we like it or not, automation and job displacement are already here, slowly pushing […]

Should Robots Pay Taxes?

Should Robots Pay Taxes?

In June 2021, we started considering the provocatively titled podcast transcript, “Can a Robot Be Arrested? Hold a Patent? Pay Income Taxes?”, posted on the IEEE Spectrum site . Steven Cherry interviewed Ryan Abbott, physician, lawyer, and professor, about these topics and referencing his 2019 book, The Reasonable Robot: Artificial Intelligence and the Law . We’ve discussed whether artificial intelligence (AI) systems could be charged with crimes or can hold a patent. Whether “robots should pay taxes” turns out to be the scariest question yet.

Touching upon the subject only lightly in the podcast, Abbott details the problem of taxing […]

Nostalgia for manufacturing won’t bring better jobs for UK workers

Nostalgia for manufacturing won’t bring better jobs for UK workers

Workers leaving the Ford Motor works in Detroit, circa 1930. Novelist Erskine Caldwell called it the ‘eight-finger city’ because industrial accidents in manufacturing were so rife © Fox Photos/Getty Everyone loves manufacturing jobs. In the US, a fondness for factories is something President Joe Biden shares with his predecessor Donald Trump. “I don’t buy for one second that the vitality of American manufacturing is a thing of the past,” Biden said in January as he signed an executive order to encourage more federal government purchases of American-made goods. In the UK, the ruling Conservative party is drawn to the […]

Automation in artificial intelligence has an extensive effect on the economy.

Automation in artificial intelligence has an extensive effect on the economy.

Automation in Artificial Intelligence and its Effect on Economy

Industrialists and giant companies all over the world are further adapting to the idea of automation in artificial intelligence. In India, technological progress, is the main driver of growth of GDP per capita, allowing output to increase faster than labor and capital. Technology increases productivity by decreasing the number of labor hours needed to create a unit of output. An increment in labor productivity generally translates into increases in average wages, allowing workers to cut back on work hours and to afford more goods and services. AI should be welcomed […]

How automation led to stagnant wages and inequality

How automation led to stagnant wages and inequality

Automation technology has been the primary driver in U.S. income inequality over the past 40 years, according to a new paper by two prominent economists in the field.

Why it matters: Offshoring, the decline of unions, and corporate concentration have all played a part in widening the gap between lower-skilled and higher-skilled workers, but automation is the single most significant factor, and will likely grow even more important in the years ahead.

By the numbers: The real wages of low-education workers have declined significantly over the past four decades, with the real earnings of men who lack a high-school […]