Mnuchin: Losing human jobs to AI “not even on our radar screen”

Early 20th cen farming jobs were made redundant by machinery and artificial fertilizer. They didn't see it coming! Oversupply led to all sorts of adverse consequences--worldwide depression probably being the least of them given that much of the pre-WWII build-up was embarked upon as stimulus for broken economies.

Old school automation (human-written programs and robots) has had just as large an effect on manufacturing--it's just that the transition has been smoother. International corporations are much better at preparing for change. They see these things coming, then merge/consolidate/cross-license/etc and adjust production to stay out of a race to the bottom.

For example, we have a single artificial sweetener plant here that produces enough to supply the entire world. They have a second facility in Thailand, though it's mostly there for redundancy/logistics/currency reasons, and this is just one example of many! Same can be said for most feedstocks and components, and even for some finished products.

If this is going to be the level of AI-preparedness for the next 4 yrs--especially when huge swaths of the interior have been employment dead-zones for over a decade now--deep learning is going to put us in even deeper shit.

"it's not even on our radar screen.... 50-100 more years" If he really believes this there is a huge disconnect between the belief system of Wall Street and Silicon Valley.

There are many things that are real and not on the radar of Trump's administration, including climate change. I'm not sure Mnuchin is doing anything but cheerleading here.

Meanwhile http://www.independent.co.uk/news/business/news/robots-artif...

I wonder how long til Trump starts using robots to clean the rooms in his hotels. 5 years? The reason Trump doesn't care about robots is they will increase his profits.