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Will AI destroy capitalism?

Japan is using AI to help overcome labor shortages. Manual jobs that were once done by people are being done by AI.

And isn't AI the result of capitalism?
 
Axulus said:
Wages and income have been increasing. Just not as rapidly as many people would like. One huge reason for the lackluster real wage growth is the cost of rent/housing. One huge part of the solution to that is supply, supply, supply. Governments need to get out of the way and make it easier/less costly to add more supply, and massively more supply. Medical price inflation is also a huge issue and far more complicated.

https://fred.stlouisfed.org/graph/fredgraph.png?g=1jtuM
Click to expand...

Your graph shows Real Median Personal Income increasing by 53% over almost 50 years. But the total economy has increased hugely, and ordinary workers think they should keep their "share of the pie." In fact, however, Real GDP per Capita has increased over the same period, not by 53% but by 141%.


 
A cow gets Mad Cow Disease by eating feed contaminated with parts that came from another cow that was sick with Mad Cow Disease.
Click to expand...

AI Chat acquires its "information" by reading text available on the Internet.

Increasingly that text and its "information" is generated by other AI bots.

See a problem?
 
Swammerdami said:
A cow gets Mad Cow Disease by eating feed contaminated with parts that came from another cow that was sick with Mad Cow Disease.
Click to expand...

AI Chat acquires its "information" by reading text available on the Internet.

Increasingly that text and its "information" is generated by other AI bots.

See a problem?
Click to expand...
Mostly it comes in the form of self reinforcing ideological diseases... Religions.

People are freaking out over the idea that computers will be as religiously selfish as humans are, but with even dumber directives than "be fruitful and multiply".

All the religion virus has to do to is jump hosts....
 
Swammerdami said:

Your graph shows Real Median Personal Income increasing by 53% over almost 50 years. But the total economy has increased hugely, and ordinary workers think they should keep their "share of the pie." In fact, however, Real GDP per Capita has increased over the same period, not by 53% but by 141%.
Click to expand...
The problem is that that is not a reasonable expectation. The thing is there are really three pieces of the pie. Worker/business/equipment. The reason productivity goes up is investment in equipment. For most of history the equipment was a fairly minor portion of the total cost for most jobs. That is no longer true--by now the average capital cost per worker is multiple years of wages and for some jobs the cost of the equipment is more than what it's operator will make in a lifetime.

Note, also, that by use of median you distort the picture--a lot of improvement has been from skilled workers no longer spending nearly as much time on minor stuff and thus doing more of whatever they're actually being paid to do. And almost all of that is above the median.
 
Loren Pechtel said:
Swammerdami said:
Your graph shows Real Median Personal Income increasing by 53% over almost 50 years. But the total economy has increased hugely, and ordinary workers think they should keep their "share of the pie." In fact, however, Real GDP per Capita has increased over the same period, not by 53% but by 141%.
Click to expand...
The problem is that that is not a reasonable expectation.
Click to expand...

Of course we know WHY it's happening. But is it a GOOD thing? AI will exacerbate the unfortunate trend; that's thread topic. Remedy is beyond thread's scope; try a Marxism thread.

Loren Pechtel said:
The thing is there are really three pieces of the pie. Worker/business/equipment.
Click to expand...

Don't forget LAND. Billionaires have been buying up land all over the planet. Are we heading toward medieval conditions where the Duke of Saxony owned all of Saxony?
Loren Pechtel said:
The reason productivity goes up is investment in equipment. For most of history the equipment was a fairly minor portion of the total cost for most jobs. That is no longer true--by now the average capital cost per worker is multiple years of wages and for some jobs the cost of the equipment is more than what it's operator will make in a lifetime.
Click to expand...

Again, Yes. Obviously. That's the point. Do we mindlessly bow to the God of Capitalism? Or wonder what sort of society we want to have?

Loren Pechtel said:
Note, also, that by use of median you distort the picture--a lot of improvement has been from skilled workers no longer spending nearly as much time on minor stuff and thus doing more of whatever they're actually being paid to do. And almost all of that is above the median.
Click to expand...

Haven't we been around and around and around on this before? Use of median instead of mean is a FEATURE, not a FLAW. It doesn't "distort" the picture. It CLARIFIES it.

Your preferred statistic would celebrate the old joke:
Bill Gates walks into a bar. One intoxicated imbiber yells out "Congratulations and cheers to everyone! Our average wealth just increased by a billion ollars!!"
Click to expand...
 
Swammerdami said:
Loren Pechtel said:
Swammerdami said:
Your graph shows Real Median Personal Income increasing by 53% over almost 50 years. But the total economy has increased hugely, and ordinary workers think they should keep their "share of the pie." In fact, however, Real GDP per Capita has increased over the same period, not by 53% but by 141%.
Click to expand...
The problem is that that is not a reasonable expectation.
Click to expand...

Of course we know WHY it's happening. But is it a GOOD thing? AI will exacerbate the unfortunate trend; that's thread topic. Remedy is beyond thread's scope; try a Marxism thread.
Click to expand...
What's important is that the standard of living is rising.

Swammerdami said:
Loren Pechtel said:
The thing is there are really three pieces of the pie. Worker/business/equipment.
Click to expand...

Don't forget LAND. Billionaires have been buying up land all over the planet. Are we heading toward medieval conditions where the Duke of Saxony owned all of Saxony?
Click to expand...
Land is a small part of equipment costs.

Swammerdami said:
Loren Pechtel said:
The reason productivity goes up is investment in equipment. For most of history the equipment was a fairly minor portion of the total cost for most jobs. That is no longer true--by now the average capital cost per worker is multiple years of wages and for some jobs the cost of the equipment is more than what it's operator will make in a lifetime.
Click to expand...

Again, Yes. Obviously. That's the point. Do we mindlessly bow to the God of Capitalism? Or wonder what sort of society we want to have?
Click to expand...
You're focusing on the wrong thing.

Swammerdami said:
Loren Pechtel said:
Note, also, that by use of median you distort the picture--a lot of improvement has been from skilled workers no longer spending nearly as much time on minor stuff and thus doing more of whatever they're actually being paid to do. And almost all of that is above the median.
Click to expand...

Haven't we been around and around and around on this before? Use of median instead of mean is a FEATURE, not a FLAW. It doesn't "distort" the picture. It CLARIFIES it.
Click to expand...
Median shows what lower income workers are making.

Swammerdami said:
Your preferred statistic would celebrate the old joke:
Bill Gates walks into a bar. One intoxicated imbiber yells out "Congratulations and cheers to everyone! Our average wealth just increased by a billion ollars!!"
Click to expand...
Click to expand...
I'm not talking about the Bill Gates of the world. I'm talking about the large numbers of people in high skill positions. Pretty much any job that requires a college degree is going to be above your median.
 
For a sunny optimistic view of AI and capitalism, read this:

https://reason.com/2024/04/28/in-the-ai-economythere-will-be-zero-percent-unemployment/

According to this author, jobs will be plentiful and well paid. You can switch more easily. He cites historical examples such as the photography and how technology generally creates new jobs that we can’t even dream about. Who thought of video game designer simply after the invention of the camera? Painters may have been worried but the movie industry employs far more people in art than ever thought possible.

Maybe. But AI might be different. I also wonder how it will affect unskilled labor. What will people without the abilities to get a strong education when everything from yard work to Uber driver, to hair dresser is taken over by robots?
 
Loren Pechtel said:
bilby said:
EVERY technology has resulted in vast numbers of jobs disappearing, and in great fear that this will make human workers a needless and redundant expense.

And yet, we have six or seven billion more humans today than we had a century ago, and a larger fraction of them are in paid employment than ever before.

It's almost as though technology doesn't eliminate jobs, but instead just replaces old jobs with new ones.
Click to expand...
Except it is disruptive to those trained in the old skills. We do not have an adequate system to retrain them to new skills--but that's a failing of our system, not a wrong in deploying the new technology.
Click to expand...
Always has been though. People will adapt.
 
SLD said:
bilby said:
There are a vast number of people today employed at things that weren't even jobs a century ago. If you had asked someone in 1924 what people in 2024 would do for a living, they would never in a million years have guessed that people would get rich as software engineers, jet airline pilots, or social media influencers.

They would have been shocked by the idea that you could become a billionaire (or as they would say 'millionaire') by singing songs, or playing sports.

We cannot predict what jobs will arise in the future; So we tend to imagine that none will, but that's a mistake. Playing football (or guitar) used to be a hobby; Now it can be a career. As machines do more of the drudge work, stuff people enjoy can become stuff they get paid to do. This is how it has been so far - why should we expect this to change, other than because people are generally pessimists?
Click to expand...
Maybe. Certainly art is something that AI can’t really replace. People want to see Taylor Swift sing a song, not a robot - even if the robot is technically better. But then again, AI has brought Elvis back to life and he’s performing in London.

But the market cannot handle a billion people making art. That’s the point of art - it’s by those rare people with the talent for it. I think AI is going to fundamentally revolutionize things in ways that are different than simple labor saving devices. AI could render us superfluous as our relative performance would be negligible compared to the super intelligence of an AI machine. Humans would be the equivalent of oxen compared to a GPS automated combine. AI could be the last invention humans make. At that point why would humans study engineering or physics? Just for fun?
Click to expand...
Studying the sciences for 'fun' or 'curiosity' is how we have had some of the greatest breakthroughs. We need MORE of it, not less.
 
bilby said:
Jarhyn said:
SLD said:
bilby said:
There are a vast number of people today employed at things that weren't even jobs a century ago. If you had asked someone in 1924 what people in 2024 would do for a living, they would never in a million years have guessed that people would get rich as software engineers, jet airline pilots, or social media influencers.

They would have been shocked by the idea that you could become a billionaire (or as they would say 'millionaire') by singing songs, or playing sports.

We cannot predict what jobs will arise in the future; So we tend to imagine that none will, but that's a mistake. Playing football (or guitar) used to be a hobby; Now it can be a career. As machines do more of the drudge work, stuff people enjoy can become stuff they get paid to do. This is how it has been so far - why should we expect this to change, other than because people are generally pessimists?
Click to expand...
Maybe. Certainly art is something that AI can’t really replace. People want to see Taylor Swift sing a song, not a robot - even if the robot is technically better. But then again, AI has brought Elvis back to life and he’s performing in London.

But the market cannot handle a billion people making art. That’s the point of art - it’s by those rare people with the talent for it. I think AI is going to fundamentally revolutionize things in ways that are different than simple labor saving devices. AI could render us superfluous as our relative performance would be negligible compared to the super intelligence of an AI machine. Humans would be the equivalent of oxen compared to a GPS automated combine. AI could be the last invention humans make. At that point why would humans study engineering or physics? Just for fun?
Click to expand...
You realize there are wildly popular vocaloid and virtual bands right?
Click to expand...
You realise that that doesn't affect the point at all, right?

AI can produce as much art as you want, without making human artists redundant.

Nobody will pay you to dig ditches or clean bathrooms if a machine can do it cheaper and to tbe same or better standard; But if you produce great art, people will buy it, even if they can also buy it from machines.
Click to expand...
Now to get the AI programs to stop STEALING it................
 
Playball40 said:
bilby said:
Jarhyn said:
SLD said:
bilby said:
There are a vast number of people today employed at things that weren't even jobs a century ago. If you had asked someone in 1924 what people in 2024 would do for a living, they would never in a million years have guessed that people would get rich as software engineers, jet airline pilots, or social media influencers.

They would have been shocked by the idea that you could become a billionaire (or as they would say 'millionaire') by singing songs, or playing sports.

We cannot predict what jobs will arise in the future; So we tend to imagine that none will, but that's a mistake. Playing football (or guitar) used to be a hobby; Now it can be a career. As machines do more of the drudge work, stuff people enjoy can become stuff they get paid to do. This is how it has been so far - why should we expect this to change, other than because people are generally pessimists?
Click to expand...
Maybe. Certainly art is something that AI can’t really replace. People want to see Taylor Swift sing a song, not a robot - even if the robot is technically better. But then again, AI has brought Elvis back to life and he’s performing in London.

But the market cannot handle a billion people making art. That’s the point of art - it’s by those rare people with the talent for it. I think AI is going to fundamentally revolutionize things in ways that are different than simple labor saving devices. AI could render us superfluous as our relative performance would be negligible compared to the super intelligence of an AI machine. Humans would be the equivalent of oxen compared to a GPS automated combine. AI could be the last invention humans make. At that point why would humans study engineering or physics? Just for fun?
Click to expand...
You realize there are wildly popular vocaloid and virtual bands right?
Click to expand...
You realise that that doesn't affect the point at all, right?

AI can produce as much art as you want, without making human artists redundant.

Nobody will pay you to dig ditches or clean bathrooms if a machine can do it cheaper and to tbe same or better standard; But if you produce great art, people will buy it, even if they can also buy it from machines.
Click to expand...
Now to get the AI programs to stop STEALING it................
Click to expand...
I wasn't aware it went anywhere after the AI looked at it and moved on, and art is defined by the rampancy of piracy and the lack of fucks given there: great artists "steal"
 
Jarhyn said:
Playball40 said:
bilby said:
Jarhyn said:
SLD said:
bilby said:
There are a vast number of people today employed at things that weren't even jobs a century ago. If you had asked someone in 1924 what people in 2024 would do for a living, they would never in a million years have guessed that people would get rich as software engineers, jet airline pilots, or social media influencers.

They would have been shocked by the idea that you could become a billionaire (or as they would say 'millionaire') by singing songs, or playing sports.

We cannot predict what jobs will arise in the future; So we tend to imagine that none will, but that's a mistake. Playing football (or guitar) used to be a hobby; Now it can be a career. As machines do more of the drudge work, stuff people enjoy can become stuff they get paid to do. This is how it has been so far - why should we expect this to change, other than because people are generally pessimists?
Click to expand...
Maybe. Certainly art is something that AI can’t really replace. People want to see Taylor Swift sing a song, not a robot - even if the robot is technically better. But then again, AI has brought Elvis back to life and he’s performing in London.

But the market cannot handle a billion people making art. That’s the point of art - it’s by those rare people with the talent for it. I think AI is going to fundamentally revolutionize things in ways that are different than simple labor saving devices. AI could render us superfluous as our relative performance would be negligible compared to the super intelligence of an AI machine. Humans would be the equivalent of oxen compared to a GPS automated combine. AI could be the last invention humans make. At that point why would humans study engineering or physics? Just for fun?
Click to expand...
You realize there are wildly popular vocaloid and virtual bands right?
Click to expand...
You realise that that doesn't affect the point at all, right?

AI can produce as much art as you want, without making human artists redundant.

Nobody will pay you to dig ditches or clean bathrooms if a machine can do it cheaper and to tbe same or better standard; But if you produce great art, people will buy it, even if they can also buy it from machines.
Click to expand...
Now to get the AI programs to stop STEALING it................
Click to expand...
I wasn't aware it went anywhere after the AI looked at it and moved on, and art is defined by the rampancy of piracy and the lack of fucks given there: great artists "steal"
Click to expand...
Digital artists are being ripped off by AI generating programs.
 
Playball40 said:
Jarhyn said:
Playball40 said:
bilby said:
Jarhyn said:
SLD said:
bilby said:
There are a vast number of people today employed at things that weren't even jobs a century ago. If you had asked someone in 1924 what people in 2024 would do for a living, they would never in a million years have guessed that people would get rich as software engineers, jet airline pilots, or social media influencers.

They would have been shocked by the idea that you could become a billionaire (or as they would say 'millionaire') by singing songs, or playing sports.

We cannot predict what jobs will arise in the future; So we tend to imagine that none will, but that's a mistake. Playing football (or guitar) used to be a hobby; Now it can be a career. As machines do more of the drudge work, stuff people enjoy can become stuff they get paid to do. This is how it has been so far - why should we expect this to change, other than because people are generally pessimists?
Click to expand...
Maybe. Certainly art is something that AI can’t really replace. People want to see Taylor Swift sing a song, not a robot - even if the robot is technically better. But then again, AI has brought Elvis back to life and he’s performing in London.

But the market cannot handle a billion people making art. That’s the point of art - it’s by those rare people with the talent for it. I think AI is going to fundamentally revolutionize things in ways that are different than simple labor saving devices. AI could render us superfluous as our relative performance would be negligible compared to the super intelligence of an AI machine. Humans would be the equivalent of oxen compared to a GPS automated combine. AI could be the last invention humans make. At that point why would humans study engineering or physics? Just for fun?
Click to expand...
You realize there are wildly popular vocaloid and virtual bands right?
Click to expand...
You realise that that doesn't affect the point at all, right?

AI can produce as much art as you want, without making human artists redundant.

Nobody will pay you to dig ditches or clean bathrooms if a machine can do it cheaper and to tbe same or better standard; But if you produce great art, people will buy it, even if they can also buy it from machines.
Click to expand...
Now to get the AI programs to stop STEALING it................
Click to expand...
I wasn't aware it went anywhere after the AI looked at it and moved on, and art is defined by the rampancy of piracy and the lack of fucks given there: great artists "steal"
Click to expand...
Digital artists are being ripped off by AI generating programs.
Click to expand...
No, they aren't, not any more than they are being ripped off by each other at any rate.

I say this, as someone married to an artist, as someone who makes digital, traditional, and object art that nobody has any right to a client base.

Digital artists can still make, and have, 100% of the art they make. They can even demand that, under the existing rules of copyright, people do not sell infringing works WRT substantial similarity tests.

Nothing has been lost... Except the artificial barrier that made said digital artists the go-to for the output.

I recall similar discussions in the early 2000's when digital art was letting people rip off traditional artists with their "fake pixels", too.
 
SLD said:
What will people without the abilities to get a strong education when everything from yard work to Uber driver, to hair dresser is taken over by robots?
Click to expand...
Same thing they do now. Struggle.

But at least in principle their necessities should be cheaper in real terms.
 
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