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Comment by ravi-delia | Hacker News Reader

Do you really think boredom is the greatest problem facing humanity? There are people starving, people who work paycheck to paycheck and can barely afford rent. And you think that a fully automated world of perfect abundance is a bad thing? I mean, clearly it would suck for you, and maybe it would suck for me a little, but I'd never look someone in the eye and say they have to work two full time jobs just to feed their family because otherwise I'd be able to read better books than I can write. That's already the case

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The problem is that those people you are talking about already are the first victims of automation. They have to work two jobs because just one doesn't pay enough when a company can automate it cheaper. The road ahead is not nicely paved, a lot more people will suffer before a fully automated abundant world.

So despite your disingenuous reading of my comment it is not "Oh, poor me I will be bored!", it's "Is the goal we're heading for worth the price?" and I don't think it is.

There are ways to fix people needing two jobs to feed their family that isn't spelled "automation" or "AI".

No, this is not how the laws of economics work. Right now the reason for two jobs is that inflating the money supply has caused a huge misallocation of resources. There are other factors, like that most jobs that are needed are gatekeeped artificially.

Having cheaper goods thanks to ai will improve our living standards

It isn't? So companies aren't trying to produce things as cheap as possible to increase their margins? And robots that are never sick, takes no vacation, needs no rest and are mostly an upfront investment aren't cheaper than people?

> Having cheaper goods thanks to ai will improve our living standards

Well, or at least we will have more cheaply produced goods.

When there is sufficient automation, a basic income for all becomes easier possible. Who will pay for that? Tax the usage of machines.

I agree that is the ideal scenario, but what are the actual incentives for implementing A system like that?

And you think the machine owners will just give up their big economic advantage without lobbying and running PR campaigns? If anything, prices on computers and chips sold to consumers will go way up because 'we must tax automation' so experimenters and new market entrants will be hit with a big fiscal moat while incumbents pay nothing. Dissatisfaction will then be blamed on government. (You can already see this dynamic operate on HN in regard to some topics.)

While there are certainly many factors contributing to the growth of inequality, it is fairly well established that automation has contributed heavily. There has been a ton written about this so I won’t bother citing here, but googling “automation and inequality” is a start

Yes, inequality goes up, but standards of living for the poorest also go up, the number of people in poverty goes down and most benefit is seen for people in the undeveloped economies. US population didn't decrease poverty rate in the last 4 decades, but that's because US rate was already very low.

What is happening here is enrichment by technological transfer. You can't copy research money but you can copy good ideas and buy the latest technology directly. Jobless people of the future will have incredible empowerment of this kind, maybe they don't need UBI, they need help to help themselves.

https://i.imgur.com/QFPRlYe.png

Increases in the standard of living are providing marginal gains to happiness. Happiness correlates with equality, not with income. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/21841151/

Waiters are already automated? Clerks? I wrote that with particular people I know in mind- they aren't paid less because their jobs have been automated. Are there solutions which don't involve more automation? Sure! But not only are those solutions compatible with automation, they're sort of besides the point I was pushing against.

You said that specifically automation would be bad even if it provided total material abundance. It's not there yet, and I suspect it'll be a while before it is, but if we grant its possibility boredom is just absolutely not enough of a reason to prevent it. There are lots of dangers on the road there, but the only cost you mentioned (and I replied to) was that we'd be "playing with cheats". Video games are one thing- in real life losing has a cost and if cheating prevents that there's no excuse not to.

Parent didn't say they are "paid less because their jobs have been automated." Parent said "they have to work two jobs because just one doesn't pay enough when a company can automate it cheaper." I interpret that to mean "their jobs could be automated for less than the cost of supporting them on the pay from a single job, so they need to take two jobs at less pay per job to stay below the cost of automation."

There are already many industries, including service industries, where there would be more employment if automation were a little cheaper and less automation if wages were a little lower. And sometimes it is a blend of automation and telepresence. https://gizmodo.com/want-to-order-food-from-a-minimally-paid...

There are other forces pushing the other way, especially in the past few years with various COVID-related disruptions in the labor market. But long-term the effects of automation on pay for low-skilled jobs is pretty clear. Only so many get to move up the value chain and yes they likely benefit. The rest are cut mercilessly.

> Do you really think boredom is the greatest problem facing humanity?

It's up there.

Lack of meaningful work is already leading to a lot of societal dysfunction. Our innate programming is to survive, solve problems, reproduce, and teach our offspring to do the same. Removing meaningful work as a source of significance and meaning for people is going to be a massive problem to solve.

Look at the rise in "depths of despair" in rich countries. Generally these people have food to eat and a roof over their head and clothes on their back, and probably even access to a lot of digital entertainment. But lacking meaningful work or defined social role they fall into depression, substance abuse, etc.

> Lack of meaningful work

When "having a job" replaces being a "member of the community", this definitely becomes a problem. People seek affirmation, relying on work to get it provides for a flimsy basis.

Being a member of a community has always implied having a useful role to fulfill in that community. Hunting, gathering, caring for children, healer, priest, leader, storyteller.

AI and robotics is on course to automate all those things. Then how will we define our roles in our communities?

Helping your neighbor with a repair, taking care of their children, doing some chores, organize a survival weekend. Those are not job titles, but things you could do.

It's pretty clear historically that this is contingent on other factors- landed aristocrats seemed mostly fine, and it's suspicious to me that these deaths of despair happen to be increasing as street prices of opioids drop. But ultimately I don't think that matters! Even granting that people wouldn't simply occupy themselves with the same signaling games they always have, that's still a great problem to have! I mean, at a minimum anyone who really feels like doing meaningful drudgework can just go join some kind of luddite community, but I find fully automated luxury gay space communism somewhat harder to come by.

a fully automated world of perfect abundance

Oh boy, are you in for a surprise.

Back in the early 1990s I was convinced that mass adoption of the internet and social media like forums/usenet groups in particular would lead to a renaissance of selfless cooperation, civic involvement, responsive institutions etc. I particularly expected that coupling this with news reporting and allowing people to comment on news about emerging issues would elevate public discourse significantly.

Oh I'm doubtful. But if it were possible opposing it would be heinous. The parent comment said that even if automation provided total material abundance it would be a bad thing

It will be soon.

Take a look at the obesity and opioid usage rates in the USA. Most people are not self motivated like the people you'll find in this bubble.

Obesity: 42%

Opioids: 3% [1]

[1] https://www.hhs.gov/opioids/about-the-epidemic/opioid-crisis...

If people want to sit around and shoot up, that's what they want to do. A world which permits it is, all else being equal, better than one which doesn't

Having ai that can replace coders doesn't translate to fully automated world of perfect abundance. I'm skeptical that the hypothetical bounty enabled by ai and robotics is going to be equitably distributed amongst the people.

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