> Self-driving cars, for example, could potentially put 5 million people involved in transportation jobs out of work. And creating 5 million new jobs for them seems impossible with net monthly job gains typically in the hundreds of thousands. “Five million jobs seem like a lot of jobs. It is a lot,” Andreessen says. But looking at the big picture shows that “every year in the U.S. on average about 21 million jobs are destroyed and about 24.5 million are created,” Andreessen says. “So the real answer to how do you replace 5 million jobs is, we already replace that in less than a quarter [of a year] today.”
This is disingenuous, bordering on stupid.
If a McDonald's closes and another one opens, 20 jobs are destroyed and 20 new ones are created, but they're the same!
What we are talking about with self-driving cars is an entire category of jobs being destroyed, and 5 million people doing the same thing, becoming unemployed at the exact same time (a time when their job doesn't exist anymore).
Very different from the normal life of the economy.
These 5 million transportation jobs will not disappear on the same day. It will probably take a decade or so.
This has happened many, many times over the 250 years since the Industrial Revolution. Each time, the old jobs have been replaced by newer and better jobs, and each time people have worried about mass unemployment and misery that did not happen.
I really think this time will be different. I agree it will take a decade, but those jobs aren't coming back.
One trend to consider: each "mega successful company" for the past 100 years or so (maybe longer?) has been extraordinary because of how few people were required to start the company, and how much profit per employee they generate. The unspoken side effect is "we need fewer people" (and they're hard to find AKA "90% of the people we talk to can't do the job"). As companies focus on these types of efficiencies, they're creating more value while providing fewer jobs. I think this is OK, but that's what's happening. So take this to its logical limit and you have mass unemployment. Now add A.I. as an accelerator to that and you have what will actually happen.
We're just going to have to start thinking about a society where 50% of the "eligible workers" are out of work at any given time. The way we're setup now, it'd be chaos. But there's a lot that can be done ahead of time to prepare, like expanding welfare until it looked more like a basic income and was socially acceptable.
In such a world, most people will have to be on the dole at some point in their life, and that will be OK. As opposed to now where our society thinks that's very much not ok and will punish you in various ways for it. Most people are simply not going to be economically useful and no amount of forcing them to be re-educated is going to change that.
> In such a world, most people will have to be on the dole at some point in their life, and that will be OK.
I don't think so.
If "most people are simply not going to be economically useful" for what reason, besides an appeal to utopianism, is it a good idea to strain the country's resources in chase of an ideal?
Basic income will pave the way to cementing this feudalistic class-inequality we possess today. Extremely simplified: Those who believe in virtue through "self-fulfillment" (leisure) will intermingle and breed with the same, and so will those who believe in virtue through industry.
The first will mimic the lower classes (maybe even the proletariat) and be "left behind," degenerating over the years into nothing more but grazing animals.
The second will mimic the higher classes and continue to consolidate power and seize freedoms for themselves.
Basic income is an idealistic idea, both impractical and separated from human nature.
> If "most people are simply not going to be economically useful" for what reason, besides an appeal to utopianism, is it a good idea to strain the country's resources in chase of an ideal?
Two very practical reasons.
A) People need to buy groceries. What will you do when they're at your door with pitchforks, pissed because you told them to "go eat cake"?
B) For the larger economy to function, there has to be bottom up purchasing pressure at the consumer level. Walmart has to be making lots of money so they can buy cool stuff from startups (some of which eventually turn into large companies buying from startups themselves). If you just give people money to spend, that will drive the economy at the bottom. It's basically like the opposite of trickle-down economics and I think it's much more sustainable.
Also, there's growing awareness that sociopaths aren't good for society, so arguments along the lines of "oh quit whining and suck it up you pussies" are starting to get a lot more pushback.
> A) People need to buy groceries. What will you do when they're at your door with pitchforks, pissed because you told them to "go eat cake"?
It's a good thing I have the police and military under my thumb to quell all uprisings. If I were smart, I would elevate them to the upper class and remove their current class loyalties.
But a more practical answer: What's stopping those with (economic resources) from continuing their views that those without aren't human. That they're causing upheaval in society and their plight is baseless. That they should be locked away, or worse.
> If you just give people money to spend, that will drive the economy at the bottom. It's basically like the opposite of trickle-down economics and I think it's much more sustainable.
This goes against your first point. Basic income is assumed to mean "just enough income to buy vital products, services, and utilities." Commodities don't drive the economy and innovation. Unless, you propose a "workless wage" where the average person gets something like 70k just for being alive.
Which then, why work? The average joe doesn't care about the same things most HN users do. They'll simply stop producing the labor that serves as the foundation for so many "innovative" and "cool" companies.
So on and so forth, the economy crashes.
> Also, there's growing awareness that sociopaths aren't good for society, so arguments along the lines of "oh quit whining and suck it up you pussies" are starting to get a lot more pushback.
I fear it's a similar situation to drug addicts. Crack-down hard on the, relatively, low-level crime, instead of starting from the top. Similarly here, crack down on the most obvious, and less intelligent, of the pack and you're just strengthening the sociopath's genome.
> Unless, you propose a "workless wage" where the average person gets something like 70k just for being alive.
> Which then, why work?
The same reason people already making 70K working a certain number of hours with a certain degree of effort expend additional effort to make more if they can do so: because wants are unlimited.
Of course the level of universal income an economy support varies by the degree of automation and other factors (including cultural factors), so it's best to start small, and set it up so it scales smoothly and naturally with the capacity of the system to support it rather than simply targeting a particular (basic or otherwise) level.
> The same reason people already making 70K working a certain number of hours with a certain degree of effort expend additional effort to make more if they can do so: because wants are unlimited.
Wants are theoretically unlimited, however in practice people have a few set of wants they need to have fulfilled to be "content." See: new video games, new computer specs, new car, etc.
You don't have a majority of spendthrifts among the labor-producing class.
> It's a good thing I have the police and military under my thumb to quell all uprisings.
Famous last words!
> If I were smart, I would elevate them to the upper class and remove their current class loyalties.
Until they realize they don't need you, kill you, and take control. See history of the Praetorian Guard. Or KGB.
> Basic income is assumed to mean "just enough income to buy vital products, services, and utilities."
It means a lot of things. Notice I said "expand welfare" because that's a lot easier and clearer than "introduce basic income". Basically financial security is high and will continue to increase, so the question is about solutions to that.
> Commodities don't drive the economy and innovation.
Actually, they kind of do because you have to look at b2b startups and how they really represent most of the interesting companies (and value) being generated by startups these days; if you're innovative and an entrepreneur and all that, odds are high that you might find yourself starting something in the b2b space. You'll be trying to sell to large enterprises that sell stuff like electricity, cell phones, food, etc. Commodities. The commodities that drive the economy.
You know who the biggest ad buyers in the US are? Procter and Gamble. AT&T. Comcast. Verizon. Commodities. And every ad agency is a b2b startup. Not to mention "ad tech".
Enterprise margins/profits are up now because of gains from automation, and they're driving the startup boom (plus an unhealthy amount of free money pumped into the top--instead of bottom which is what I'm proposing). Eventually, that will run out because bottom up consumer demand will drop (and free money will stop). That will cause a crash. Unless measures are introduced to give people money to spend so they can jumpstart the economy from the bottom up.
> Which then, why work? The average joe doesn't care about the same things most HN users do. They'll simply stop producing the labor that serves as the foundation for so many "innovative" and "cool" companies.
You can still get rich with a cool innovative company. But yeah, if you're not doing something interesting, why work? My answer to that is, "You shouldn't, and the cheapest solution to your resulting financial insecurity is for the government to give you money to go buy things."
> Similarly here, crack down on the most obvious, and less intelligent, of the pack and you're just strengthening the sociopath's genome.
Yeah, people have been doing that for generations and are starting to see the problem, therefore looking to the top.
> Until they realize they don't need you, kill you, and take control. See history of the Praetorian Guard. Or KGB.
Keep them at arm's reach and content, and their greed will keep them loyal. I've known of the Praetorian to assassinate emperors, but only those unwieldy that didn't indulge them.
> Actually, they kind of do because you have to look at b2b startups and how they really represent most of the interesting companies (and value) being generated by startups these days; if you're innovative and an entrepreneur and all that, odds are high that you might find yourself starting something in the b2b space.
You're conflating B2B startups with B2B businesses. One is a Remora fish and the other is a Shark. The first, aides the second and gets a little in return. The second, takes the lions-share (or should I say sharks-share?) of profits.
> You'll be trying to sell to large enterprises that sell stuff like electricity, cell phones, food, etc. Commodities. The commodities that drive the economy.
They do not drive the economy. They keep it running. The basic electricity, cell phone, food, etc. are just that: basic.
> You know who the biggest ad buyers in the US are? Procter and Gamble. AT&T. Comcast. Verizon. Commodities. And every ad agency is a b2b startup. Not to mention "ad tech".
You're stretching the term commodity too much here. AT&T, Comcast, and Verizon are not commodities companies.
> Enterprise margins/profits are up now because of gains from automation, and they're driving the startup boom
To be blunt, this is another leap of logic that isn't true. Enterprise profits may be up, but they're not funneled directly back into VC cash (or equivalent) for startups.
> Eventually, that will run out because bottom up consumer demand will drop
Why do you suppose this?
> That will cause a crash. Unless measures are introduced to give people money to spend so they can jumpstart the economy from the bottom up.
I'm not quick to insult, but this flies in the face of all economic theory (all the above as well) and is exhausting to refute. The economy does not need a jumpstart via cash infusion. The economy will not crash because of perpetual deflation (which you are arguing will happen via "cash running out").
> "You shouldn't, and the cheapest solution to your resulting financial insecurity is for the government to give you money to go buy things."
Where do you suppose this money will come from? What plane of the astral aether will this money come from? Value is perpetually created and destroyed everyday, if you implement a "workless wage" you will crash the economy by devaluing your currency.
I'm more worried about increases in gig economy type crappy jobs, further erosion of workers rights, underemployment, and degradation of the middle class.
There is regional variance, presumably for regional reasons, but on a global scale the last few years have seen more - not less - of new better jobs than ever before.
Not really. The effect of self driving cars may be larger than "normal tech evolutions", but we have been continually re-inventing ourselves at a pace that is not particularly different from what it has been over the last 200 years.
200 years ago 95+% of all people worked in agriculture. In developed countries, now barely 1-2% do so. 100 years ago the vast majority worked in manual labour jobs. Now people are moving on to service jobs. Macro-economically speaking, those were much larger and more rapid changes than what we're seeing right now.
This is not new. It's normal economic development. Nothing unusual at all. People have to stop portraying this negatively, and Marc is correct in seeing this as a positive to humanity.
His argument is that we need to manage this shift as a society. Some countries pro-actively do so (European social security comes to mind), others do not (USA). I tend to agree with him that it does need to be managed.
You're right that the Industrial Revolution was incredibly violent and cruel, but that's not the point "Marc" was trying to make. He was trying to say we're destroying and creating jobs all the time, so nothing to see here.
What we're doing, now, is destroying whole sectors of the job market.
It has happened before, yes! -- but it was horrible then, and it will be horrible now (and now we have youtube, which they didn't have in the UK or India in the 19th century).
And actually, 5 million jobs are just a tip of the iceberg, some estimates talk about 40% of jobs being automated - and even that may be a low-ball estimate, since it doesn't include jobs that would be indirectly replaced with something more efficient(meat -> plant based meat, cars that don't need maintenance , i.e electric vehicles, etc), and jobs that we don't know how the tech will look in 10 years(creative jobs, natural language, etc).
In developed countries 40% of the jobs from 40 years ago are almost certainly automated at this point. And we're richer than ever before if you look at absolute richness (not in relatives, but that's an entirely different discussion).
What is overseen most of the time is that mere job counting statistics are worthless. If 20 million jobs were destroyed where people could make a decent living, to create 24 million jobs where people have to work endless hours, live in vans and get no security, it's a net loss for the society.
> Self-driving cars, for example, could potentially put 5 million people involved in transportation jobs out of work. And creating 5 million new jobs for them seems impossible with net monthly job gains typically in the hundreds of thousands. “Five million jobs seem like a lot of jobs. It is a lot,” Andreessen says. But looking at the big picture shows that “every year in the U.S. on average about 21 million jobs are destroyed and about 24.5 million are created,” Andreessen says. “So the real answer to how do you replace 5 million jobs is, we already replace that in less than a quarter [of a year] today.”
This is disingenuous, bordering on stupid.
If a McDonald's closes and another one opens, 20 jobs are destroyed and 20 new ones are created, but they're the same!
What we are talking about with self-driving cars is an entire category of jobs being destroyed, and 5 million people doing the same thing, becoming unemployed at the exact same time (a time when their job doesn't exist anymore).
Very different from the normal life of the economy.