Ask HN: What Jobs Shouldn't Exist Today? | Hacker News Reader

Ask HN: What Jobs Shouldn't Exist Today?

10 pointsevo_910 comments

And therefore are ripe for disruptions and technical automation.

Estate Agent. They used to add value in 2 ways: 1) a shop window on the high street to display homes for sale, and 2) the ability to produce high quality photographs and printed brochures. Now 1) is a website and 2) is trivial thanks to digital cameras. The industry seems highly vulnerable to disruption, and while there are some promising alternatives out there [1], most homes are still sold through traditional estate agents. Why?

My best guess is that sellers feel uncomfortable showing strangers around their home and negotiating on price, and avoiding this discomfort is worth the agent's fee. But this feels like an unsatisfactory explanation.

[1] e.g: http://www.tepilo.com

Basically the whole real estate agents industry is structured in a way to make itself relevant. There is generally no incentive for the buyer to avoid using an agent, and in some cases it is hard for the seller to get enough exposure without an agent because other agents won't work with them.

http://www.realtor.com/advice/who-pays-the-real-estate-agent...

Estate agents still add value: be it writing good ads (not everybody can describe their property), spending time with lots of potential buyers, taking care of legal and financial matters.

What should change though is the pricing structure. In a lot of countries contracts are still exclusive, payment is a provision (let's say 3-5% of the total value and thus high incentive to upsell a property), the buyer has to pay the agent fee and while one service is to pre-approve buyers there's never a guarantee or money-back if the buyer turns out bad.

In my country to become an estate agent takes 1h and 35 Euro. Of course you can get certified. That's one weekend and 1000 Euro then.

A fixed fee with maybe a fixed bonus paid by the seller would be the best model.

Things we don't do frequently are very difficult to disrupt. Just look at the process for buying a mattress.

- Cashiers (already being replaced)

- Fast food chefs (replacement still in development)

- Janitors / toilet cleaners (Roomba and friends, still a long way to go)

- Window washers (bot exists, still not widely used)

- Fruit pickers (complicated, replacements are apparently happening a fruit type at a time, lots of development)

- Street sweeping vehicles (cars have to move out of the way, etc. Smaller bots would mean streets could get cleaned at any time)

- Manual garbage recyclers (work is being done in this area, but object recognition and separation still needs a lot of work, apparently)

Not a job, but still needs big improvements: litterboxes. The automated ones still have problems: can't use certain kinds of litter, noises can scare cats, you still have to clean the filters out yourselves. It would be much better if there was some kind of auto-disposal/self-cleaning system, or even a way to turn litter into energy.

Garment workers: http://www.softwearautomation.com/our-products/

But such automation will likely cause disruption -- real disruption like civic unrest -- in several countries.

Bangladesh's economy is predominantly textiles, which accounted for 80% of exports in 2013.

I wonder whether the Bangladeshi government would assassinate people working the field. That plot would make an interesting indie dark comedy anyway.

Cashiers. I know some stores have self checkout solutions, but it seem like manually scanning each object isn't the ideal solution. There should be some sort of array of scanners able to rapidly identify UPCs along a moving conveyor belt.

Some stores have started a pilot program where they give you a portable scanner gun and scan the items as you shop. Then you take the scanner to a cashier and pay. Works real fast.

This video basically shows them: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Pq-S557XQU

Data Entry should not exist because of such advancement in Software bots

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