Tag: Technical

Still optimistic about the future of jobs in a bot driven world

Still optimistic about the future of jobs in a bot driven world

Thanks to everyone who contributed to my optimistic discussion about the future of jobs in a bot driven world published earlier this month.

The quality of thinking and the passion of this readership is encouraging. In this article, I’d like to address some of the many thoughtful comments that were left. Before doing so, it’s important to draw attention to some of the underpinnings of my thinking which you can find here and here . They provide both a historical and economic context as to why I am optimistic, despite the many dire predictions that have, in my view, raised […]

Jobs on the line in Tim Dunlop’s Why the Future is Workless

Jobs on the line in Tim Dunlop’s Why the Future is Workless

Oxford University warns 47 per cent of the US workforce could be lost to automation. Picture: AP Gig economy. Uberfication. The precariat. These once unfamiliar terms have become commonplace in the post-global financial crisis world. We are witnessing an economic shift and changing labour relations that mirror the major disruptions of the past. Technology has changed certain jobs while rendering others obsolete. Economic uncertainty fuels social and political anxiety around the world, seen in the Brexit vote in Britain and the election to the White House of Donald Trump, a political candidate who tapped into anxieties about economic dislocation […]

Automation is not the end of the world. Here’s why

Automation is not the end of the world. Here’s why

Robots probably will take our jobs. That doesn’t have to be bad news For many people worldwide, the answer is unemployment. Work is not just what allows us to sustain ourselves and our families: it expands our possibilities to be and do what we aspire to; it gives meaning and rhythm to our endeavours as part of a broader social contract. This is why in times of “polycrisis” and broader economic transformations, we dread losing what we hold so dear to a presumed automation apocalypse. What are people most worried about? Note: Representative sample of adults aged 16-64. September […]

No politician can keep a promise to bring back jobs – especially not Donald Trump

No politician can keep a promise to bring back jobs – especially not Donald Trump

‘Donald Trump was addressing widespread anxiety about the loss of jobs to globalisation, to downsizing, and other factors associated with the economic policies of the past 40 years.’ Photograph: Mark Wilson/Getty Images Donald Trump ran for president with the slogan of “Make America Great Again”. Implicit in this was the idea of making America work again.

Trump was addressing widespread anxiety about the loss of jobs to globalisation, to downsizing, and other factors associated with the economic policies of the past 40 years, and he was telling people that he would bring the jobs back.

Two things about this: the first […]

Carl Wernicke: The Economy & Automation

Carl Wernicke: The Economy & Automation

Credit IHMC Last weekend I visited the clean energy festival downtown. I met the owner of a Tesla, the innovative electric car. He giddily described a phone app that opens his garage, starts the car and backs it out into the driveway.

But just wait, he said. Soon the car will be able to drive him to work, then head out on its own to work for Uber all day before returning to ferry him home.

That points to the economic challenge facing our new president.We are facing a rapid acceleration of a current trend: the replacement of human workers with […]

Will automation render labour useless?

As the industrial revolution gradually took hold in England and other parts of Europe, machines increasingly came to replace manual labour. Not everybody was happy at this development, especially those who lost their means of earning bread and butter.

One group, later to be called the ‘Luddites’, resorted to violence and broke up machines that were intended to replace manual labour. Since that time, any anyone who casts aspersions on technological advancement and its effects on labour has been labelled Luddites.

Since the Industrial Revolution, Luddism has been kept in check largely owing to the fact that the requirement for human […]

It’s the one thing Trump and Clinton agree on – and it’s probably a fantasy

It’s the one thing Trump and Clinton agree on – and it’s probably a fantasy

On Sept. 8, 2010, General Motors workers cheer as the first Chevrolet Cruze compact sedan off the assembly line, at the GM factory in Lordstown, Ohio. (AP Photo/Amy Sancetta) If there’s one thing Americans agree on, it’s collective nostalgia for the days when workers actually made things — when American factory workers earned good wages helping to crank out cars, refrigerators, furniture and other goods for consumers in the U.S. and around the world. So it’s no surprise that politicians are also united in pledging to bring those manufacturing jobs back to America, as both Donald Trump and Hillary […]

Elon Musk: We Need Universal Income Because Robots Will Steal All The Jobs

Elon Musk: We Need Universal Income Because Robots Will Steal All The Jobs

Image: Getty Spacentrepreneur Elon Musk thinks we’ll eventually need a basic universal income because of "automation."

"People will have time to do other things, more complex things, more interesting things," he told CNBC . "Certainly more leisure time. And then we gotta figure how we integrate with a world and future with a vast AI."

"Ultimately, I think there has to be some improved symbiosis with digital super intelligence," the Tesla CEO said.What will happen if robots steal our jobs? It’s a question that’s been on the minds of both the proletariat and the bourgeoisie since the advent of artificial intelligence. […]

Elon Musk: We Need Universal Income Because Robots Will Steal All the Jobs

Elon Musk: We Need Universal Income Because Robots Will Steal All the Jobs

Images: Getty Spacentrepreneur Elon Musk thinks we’ll eventually need a basic universal income because of “automation.”

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“People will have time to do other things, more complex things, more interesting things,” he told CNBC . “Certainly more leisure time. And then we gotta figure how we integrate with a world and future with a vast AI.”“Ultimately, I think there has to be some improved symbiosis with digital super intelligence,” the Tesla CEO said. 0:00 / 0:00 What will happen if robots steal our jobs? It’s a question that’s been on the minds of both the proletariat and the bourgeoisie since the […]

Automated Cars Could Threaten Jobs Of Professional Drivers

Automated Cars Could Threaten Jobs Of Professional Drivers

Ronald De Feo has watched robots take factory jobs for years. Now he sees them threatening a new class of worker: People who drive for a living.

"I am in Pittsburgh; it’s a test market for Uber’s autonomous vehicle," says De Feo, CEO of the industrial materials firm Kennametal. "We see all these (automated) Ubers running around the streets of Pittsburgh, a confusing and difficult place to navigate. If they can make that work, what do you think happens to the job of being a taxi driver?"

Computer scientists and economists say the threat isn’t merely theoretical: Automated cars pose an […]