Job Evaporation

[funinspace]

Which is great until the looms can self-replicate.

Well, when the loomnet becomes self-aware jobs will be the least of our problems. What with all the Terminators about.

Well, I wouldn't get all strung out about it quite yet...

 

[dismal]

Well, when the loomnet becomes self-aware jobs will be the least of our problems. What with all the Terminators about.

Well, I wouldn't get all strung out about it quite yet...

Yeah but smash the looms anyway just to be safe right?

What did improved productivity ever do for us?

 

[funinspace]

Well, I wouldn't get all strung out about it quite yet...

Yeah but smash the looms anyway just to be safe right?

What did improved productivity ever do for us?

Just get some scissors; have a cookie, and you'll feel right as rain.

 

[sharon45]

Repair looms.

Which is great until the looms can self-replicate.

Well, people should not be just standing around as though they are helpless while this eventually transpires.

 

[sharon45]

Automation should be about saving time, resorces, and employees in wasteful positions, to free these up for newer, more complicated projects, which at the moment, can not be efficiently automated.

It already is. The problem is that the employees in the wasteful positions aren't necessarily the same employees who work on the newer, more complicated projects.

Right, they of course don't have to be if they are not properly readying themselves for change. My dentist has gotten a laser drill, and just took a course on it during the summer, because he does not want to be left behind.

 

[Treedbear]

What do you do for a living?

Repair looms.

It's a looming disaster.

 

[Horatio Parker]

Not as long as the unemployed are utilized as price controls. And that won't change until the public figures out what's going on - if ever.

Can you elaborate on this a bit?

Thumbnail sketch, during the period Great Depression - WWII, it was discovered that govt spending could create full employment. This lasted until the oil commodity price shock inflation of the 70's. This inflation was attributed to the "wage price spiral" i.e. higher wages are inflationary. Ergo, in order to keep inflation in check, wages must be kept down, govt spending must be kept down. Thus the NAIRU (non accelerating inflation rate unemployment) was born, considered to be at that time, IIRC, 6%.

So while it takes less labor to do all the necessary stuff, that's a problem not a solution because only the private sector can absorb excess labor. Govt cant because for one, it must borrow to spend(untrue but that's the CW), and two employing the unemployed is inflationary because NAIRU.

Whereas one might think that there's lot of stuff that needs to be done, and there also people and resources to do that stuff, it can't happen with the above policies.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

I'm not an industrial guy, so when I went to a metal plant to look over a potential project, I was a bit surprised and saw what was happening to jobs in America. And it isn't exactly a surprise, as many people bring it up all the time.

While some jobs are being displaced in industry to other areas, plenty of jobs are evaporating through automation. The entire plant was being run by a handful of people. Those jobs aren't coming back, computers replaced them.

I've been making this point for a long time and getting attacked for it.

I'm one of those guys doing the automation (from the software side, I don't actually build it.) That's where the blue collar jobs are going, not overseas. The only jobs that are reasonably safe are the ones where thinking constitutes an important aspect of your job.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Unemployment is low but I'm not seeing the expected wage pressure. There is an abundance of low paying jobs with low cost goods and services. A self-sustaining walmart-class where two or more toil away, surviving and supporting this cheap end of the economy.

The problem is with the unemployment numbers. Unemployment might be low but that is because an awful lot of people have found jobs beneath their skills and a lot of people are part time. U6 catches the part timers but even it doesn't catch the people beneath their skill.

 

[starwater]

From Uber/cab drivers to truckers and bus drivers, a few million other jobs are headed towards the horse shoeing industrial dustbin... Society really needs to be thinking about the impact sooner than later, but hey the NFL kneeling thingy is much more fun...
http://www.denverpost.com/2017/06/29/self-driving-beer-truck-world-record/

On Thursday, the arbiters of future trivia questions awarded the 132-mile road trip as the “Longest continuous journey by a driverless and autonomous lorry.” To all you non-Brits, that means a tractor-trailer.
For the record books, the trip in a tricked-out vehicle from tech company Otto, hauled 51,744 cans of Budweiser beer from Fort Collins, through downtown Denver and onward to Colorado Springs on October 20, 2016.

Yup. Live in Denver. Interesting the first longest driverless semi truck journey was a beer run.

 

[Malintent]

yup. Trump is selling the lie that immigrants are taking er jobs.. but the fact of the matter is, robots er.

 

[Canard DuJour]

Not as long as the unemployed are utilized as price controls. And that won't change until the public figures out what's going on - if ever.

Can you elaborate on this a bit?

Thumbnail sketch, during the period Great Depression - WWII, it was discovered that govt spending could create full employment. This lasted until the oil commodity price shock inflation of the 70's. This inflation was attributed to the "wage price spiral" i.e. higher wages are inflationary. Ergo, in order to keep inflation in check, wages must be kept down, govt spending must be kept down. Thus the NAIRU (non accelerating inflation rate unemployment) was born, considered to be at that time, IIRC, 6%.

So while it takes less labor to do all the necessary stuff, that's a problem not a solution because only the private sector can absorb excess labor. Govt cant because for one, it must borrow to spend(untrue but that's the CW), and two employing the unemployed is inflationary because NAIRU.

Whereas one might think that there's lot of stuff that needs to be done, and there also people and resources to do that stuff, it can't happen with the above policies.

I would urge everyone to read this several times over. Especially anyone who thinks there isn't enough money!! for us all to have decent jobs and nice things.

 

[KeepTalking]

It already is. The problem is that the employees in the wasteful positions aren't necessarily the same employees who work on the newer, more complicated projects.

Right, they of course don't have to be if they are not properly readying themselves for change. My dentist has gotten a laser drill, and just took a course on it during the summer, because he does not want to be left behind.

That's not the most apt analogy. That laser drill is still going to require a Dentist to operate it, and it also does not allow the Dentist to reduce staff because he is using a shiny new drill. Where there could be an impact is with those people whose job it is to produce drill bits for the old drills. A laser drill does not have a bit that wears out through normal use, so any jobs that support the dental drill bit industry are at risk by the new technology. For the record, I doubt that the dental drill bit industry is a very large employer.

 

[sharon45]

The only jobs that are reasonably safe are the ones where thinking constitutes an important aspect of your job.

Yes, and constantly figuring out ways that people can outmaneuver the robots.

 

[rousseau]

Can you elaborate on this a bit?

Thumbnail sketch, during the period Great Depression - WWII, it was discovered that govt spending could create full employment. This lasted until the oil commodity price shock inflation of the 70's. This inflation was attributed to the "wage price spiral" i.e. higher wages are inflationary. Ergo, in order to keep inflation in check, wages must be kept down, govt spending must be kept down. Thus the NAIRU (non accelerating inflation rate unemployment) was born, considered to be at that time, IIRC, 6%.

So while it takes less labor to do all the necessary stuff, that's a problem not a solution because only the private sector can absorb excess labor. Govt cant because for one, it must borrow to spend(untrue but that's the CW), and two employing the unemployed is inflationary because NAIRU.

Whereas one might think that there's lot of stuff that needs to be done, and there also people and resources to do that stuff, it can't happen with the above policies.

I would urge everyone to read this several times over. Especially anyone who thinks there isn't enough money!! for us all to have decent jobs and nice things.

Something doesn't add up with the critique, though, so maybe I need a bit more elaboration.

If unemployment is used as a mechanism to control accelerating inflation, and inflation is typically unwelcome, then isn't the level of unemployment still just an aspect of society at equilibrium?

Say theoretically we have full employment and inflation causes major issues. Wouldn't it be the case that an unemployment rate is a requisite of a functioning society?

What am I missing here?

 

[Horatio Parker]

Can you elaborate on this a bit?

Thumbnail sketch, during the period Great Depression - WWII, it was discovered that govt spending could create full employment. This lasted until the oil commodity price shock inflation of the 70's. This inflation was attributed to the "wage price spiral" i.e. higher wages are inflationary. Ergo, in order to keep inflation in check, wages must be kept down, govt spending must be kept down. Thus the NAIRU (non accelerating inflation rate unemployment) was born, considered to be at that time, IIRC, 6%.

So while it takes less labor to do all the necessary stuff, that's a problem not a solution because only the private sector can absorb excess labor. Govt cant because for one, it must borrow to spend(untrue but that's the CW), and two employing the unemployed is inflationary because NAIRU.

Whereas one might think that there's lot of stuff that needs to be done, and there also people and resources to do that stuff, it can't happen with the above policies.

I would urge everyone to read this several times over. Especially anyone who thinks there isn't enough money!! for us all to have decent jobs and nice things.

If unemployment is used as a mechanism to control accelerating inflation, and inflation is typically unwelcome, then isn't the level of unemployment still just an aspect of society at equilibrium?

If you believe in monetarism and the nairu, then yes.

Say theoretically we have full employment and inflation causes major issues. Wouldn't it be the case that an unemployment rate is a requisite of a functioning society?

Now we've moved from a nairu to "any" unemployment? Certainly there will always be some unemployed, that's not the issue.

What am I missing here?

That there are other wisdoms than the conventional.

 

[Canard DuJour]

Can you elaborate on this a bit?

Thumbnail sketch, during the period Great Depression - WWII, it was discovered that govt spending could create full employment. This lasted until the oil commodity price shock inflation of the 70's. This inflation was attributed to the "wage price spiral" i.e. higher wages are inflationary. Ergo, in order to keep inflation in check, wages must be kept down, govt spending must be kept down. Thus the NAIRU (non accelerating inflation rate unemployment) was born, considered to be at that time, IIRC, 6%.

So while it takes less labor to do all the necessary stuff, that's a problem not a solution because only the private sector can absorb excess labor. Govt cant because for one, it must borrow to spend(untrue but that's the CW), and two employing the unemployed is inflationary because NAIRU.

Whereas one might think that there's lot of stuff that needs to be done, and there also people and resources to do that stuff, it can't happen with the above policies.

I would urge everyone to read this several times over. Especially anyone who thinks there isn't enough money!! for us all to have decent jobs and nice things.

Something doesn't add up with the critique, though, so maybe I need a bit more elaboration.

If unemployment is used as a mechanism to control accelerating inflation, and inflation is typically unwelcome, then isn't the level of unemployment still just an aspect of society at equilibrium?

Say theoretically we have full employment and inflation causes major issues. Wouldn't it be the case that an unemployment rate is a requisite of a functioning society?

What am I missing here?

Nothing. That is the critique - that there's something wrong with the idea that waste and misery are features, not bugs, of "a functioning society."

There are arguments that NAIRU-type policies minimise waste and misery, but they are based on absurd assumptions and contradicted by reality in almost every particular. They persist due to the same vested interests whence they originated.

 

[Harry Bosch]

It already is. The problem is that the employees in the wasteful positions aren't necessarily the same employees who work on the newer, more complicated projects.

Right, they of course don't have to be if they are not properly readying themselves for change. My dentist has gotten a laser drill, and just took a course on it during the summer, because he does not want to be left behind.

I know quite a bit about the dentistry world. I'd be shocked if there was a "laser drill"!

 

[dismal]

yup. Trump is selling the lie that immigrants are taking er jobs.. but the fact of the matter is, robots er.

You know it's not either/or right? Immigrants taking jobs is a good thing. The last thing we want is immigrants coming here and not taking jobs.

Preserving jobs is among the silliest of possible economic goals. We want to produce things efficiently.

 

[rousseau]

yup. Trump is selling the lie that immigrants are taking er jobs.. but the fact of the matter is, robots er.

You know it's not either/or right? Immigrants taking jobs is a good thing. The last thing we want is immigrants coming here and not taking jobs.

Preserving jobs is among the silliest of possible economic goals. We want to produce things efficiently.

I heard an apt analogy about this a few months ago.

Trying to 'keep jobs away from immigrants' is the equivalent of a basketball team limiting better players from joining them. You want to attract better workers to your country because those are the ones who build up your economy, and actually create jobs for less skilled people.

The reason a lot of economies across the world can't compete is because their smartest people emigrate to places like the U.S. Once those people stop coming, and people start leaving because your country is a trash-fire, that's when you'll have a problem.