Is libertarianism viable when robots/AI is going to take over jobs?

[casshern222]

I can't see how libertarianism or anarchism could work in a society where possibly over 90% or more jobs will be taken over AI and robots in the foreseeable future. Without something like basic income for everyone, corporations that make these robot or AI software, will become ultra rich and there is just no way to compete against that in a capitalistic society. When that happens, the only solution is to tax those companies heavily and pay a basic income. We won't need bartenders, tax accountants, bankers, policemen, most jobs will be taken over completely or to a big extent. 

 

This might sound like a sci-fi to you, but look at what most respected futurologists like Ray Kurzweil are predicting. Read about technological singularity that can happen in our lifetime.

 

 

When we will have seriously advanced artificial intelligence that's capable not only to do what's been preprogrammed but also learn from mistakes, most jobs will be taken over.

[shirgall]

There will always be a need to fight the imposition of unchosen positive obligations.

[dsayers]

the only solution is to tax those companies heavily

Of course somebody who can say something like "the ONLY solution is to steal" cannot envision a world where people don't steal.

 

Creative destruction isn't the end of the world, just as it wasn't all the other times as much has been predicted.

 

Unless you put this text on my screen by pushing a bunch of 1s and 0s yourself, I cannot take your pretending you hate technology seriously.

[Boss]

If robots take over then the cost of living will be ultra low. Maybe all you need is a 3D printer and you wont need to buy anything and there can be GMO plants that grow like bamboo anywhere in the world for food. Anyways with those repetitive jobs gone, You can probably be a singer, painter, dancer, do sports etc something humans want to see humans do to get inspiration for their own human potential. You will only need to work a few hours a week to fund the robots cost since its low maintenance compared to human workers.

Capitalism will save the poor even bigger this time around. 

[Cornetto97]

If you see basic income as the only way to stop it you have done exactly the opposite, you've made the problem worse by subsidising the companies not hiring human workers. So let's say yes 90% of jobs get taken over by AI/robotics, well then if you believe the unemployment will be an issue, then taking money from those companies and giving it to people is not going to give the companies any obligation to hire humans.

 

So let us say then that there is no basic income, no state, free market, and 90% of jobs are taken by AI/robots. The reality is the cost of production will be so low, also perpetual inflation won't be an issue, but production costs will be so low that the cost of the product will be unimaginably low, and if any company raises their costs to capitalise more on the low production costs people will simply move to a product from a competitor. Yes there will inevitably be higher unemployment if 90% of jobs are taken by AI but, the general wealth and prosperity of such a world, will cover it. Costs are much lower, people keep their money, and it doesn't get taken by taxes, inflation is no problem so you retain buying power, and if it is such a problem then 2 things can cover it and these aren't mutually exclusive.

 

1. If you are worried about such a thing then you can voluntarily donate to charity add so will others, you don't have to, it's voluntary, but generally there will be quite a large amount of people who will donate to private charities, and because of it inhernetly not being a state, it won't need to be continuously be relied upon. See you can do whatever floats your boat with this private charity money, and you will not need nearly as much becasue the cost of living is not astronomically high. If you are completely irresponsible then depending on the discretion of the charity organisation they will either stop giving you the money, or possibly provide you with wealth management lessons, or money management lessons, or even attatch conditions on the money they give.

 

2. If you have unemployment, you naturally have a demand for employment, meaning that small businesses can fill this void quite easily, providing part time jobs that are easily enough to get by in such a situation. Customers may even like the idea of what would then be the old style way of being waitered by a human, so now you have yourself a little niche market, it won't make you ultra rich, but again you wouldn't need to be at all.

[AccuTron]

...I cannot take your pretending you hate technology seriously.

 

I think the OP isn't hating the technology, just observing.  Such as "If cars are made and highways are made, what happens to Poppa's buggy whip business?"  I take the point as...and I think it's already showing itself...as technology proceeds, more and more jobs will no longer make sense for humans to do, and where's the tipping point where there's not enough reason to hire enough humans to keep the system humming.  

 

For example, already a paralegal staff can be partly replaced by document searching software.  My fund advisor is superfluous, it's software doing what is dictated by centralized fund managers far away.  Ordering kiosks replace fast food workers.  Factory work, agricultural, even road building and construction, in general always seeks more automation and fewer humans.  

 

I'm reminded of civilization eating into ecosystems.  The flora and fauna can handle it for a long time, but eventually there's not enough space for food or shelter, species start fighting that didn't need to before, flora changes make large wildfires a big problem, erosion sets in, species die off, food chain is mangled, etc.  Various systems may take lots of stress, but when they finally break, they may break dramatically.

 

Yes things get less expensive, but having no income makes all things prohibitively expensive.  

 

We already have "starving artists" and are already where a large flat screen on the wall, which in the future will probably be more like a paper poster, can display any work of the old masters, or anything at all that anyone anywhere did.  How many artists right now make money thru YouTube distributions?  I honestly don't know, but I doubt if many such performers are buying a Bentley.  And they get paid how?...with money somebody else got at a job that isn't yet obsolete, but may be soon.  Except, why do that, since already there's more free stuff than anyone could consume in their entire lifetime.

 

If someone wants to live a philosophical lifestyle, whatever it is, they still have to have a home and food on the table.  Money from where?  State handouts that can increasingly be only funded by taxing mega industries, because like so many former family farms or businesses, that very grand efficiency makes it impossible to survive unless at a mega level?  And even the mega businesses have competitive pressures, making that surplus taxable income, less surplus.  Down the rabbit hole.

 

It suggests that many people are put into a frontier situation, having to create themselves their home and hunt and grow their food.  Enough garden space is nowhere near possible.  (Tho' I see Asian projects of giant buildings which are giant greenhouses amidst a big city; still, the food ain't free.)  What gets hunted in dense human populations?  Ain't deer.  Rats? 

 

Charity money?  Comes from where?  The increasingly unemployed, or the increasingly taxed to fund the unemployed?  Making something from nothing.  And it would be a wavering pittance compared to huge and growing numbers of unemployed.  

 

Right now, we have amazingly inexpensive and powerful things like refrigerators and stoves and computers.  Yet we have high rent and transportation and infrastructure costs.  A person right now can choose to limit optional purchases, which begs the question of depressing the economy.  And if those purchases become even less expensive due to efficiency, then is that not also reducing the economy's cash flow?

 

Small businesses taking up the slack?  How's that working out now?  It will just get worse with the squeeze of ever increasing efficiency.

 

Masters raise their livestock for wool, or milk, or meat.  Machines are removing the value of, metaphorically, human wool and milk.  What's left?  "New!  Soylent Green Flavored Mom and Pop Tarts!"

[ProfessionalTeabagger]

Okay if this ever happens and you still need this basic income then we'll agree. 

[regevdl]

Sorry but this is absurd.  90% will be run by robots.  How can ANYONE even estimate that?

 

Robot manufactuers and the domino of jobs that preceed these AI/robots? Are robots going to create and design the materials needed to make the robots?  this is like the chicken/egg argument.  Which came first..the robot or the design of the robot created by the robot.  lol  It's absurd.  Humans will always be in control of how much is automated because it's at the extent of our intelligence to transfer to robot intelligence and capabilities and EVERYTHING that is needed in the robot needs a human behind it first and foremost.  The materials, the wiring design, etc.

 

Will it be the robots determining how to improve robots to serve humans or other robots?  

 

 Engineers, psychologists to map the human intelligence to transfer into Robot software, etc.  Robot repair....FARMERS will still be a required industry and all of the packaging materials needed, cars,homes, construction, electrictions, fisherman and boat manufactuerers and tool manufactuerers.  

Diapers, windows. 

 

It may take out the low-skill low wage jobs the more robots replace certain jobs, but honestly that's not always a bad thing. It just means society will be pushed to a new competition of more skilled/intelligence-seeking jobs than who can grab up the burger flipping jobs they are fighting to earn $15/hour.  

 

by you making the absolute claim that we won't need bartenders is implying that humans and the culture and society will make that demand.  Sure if someone invests heavily in a robotic bartender and tries it out.... and peole respond well to it, then sure.  But until then we have no idea.  I personally would like a human being pouring my drink, not AI or robot.  

 

I think many people would like to hold on and preserve SOME aspects of human interaction, espeially where there is low physical risk in the job-description.  Heavy lfiting, fork lift driving, etc...sure..... make an army of robots.  But bartending.... I mean.... that's a stretch.  AGain...people can try.  I won't stop them but I don't think it will pass the test of the free market as a highly demanded  source.   The only way it would is if the robot-bartender manufacturer is upset that his investment didn't pass the free market test of demand and runs to the gvt to force people to buy his product in exhange for tax breaks or subsidies.

 

And getting back to the libertarian question.... then you have exposed the flaw in libertarianism that even IT requires taxation, which is theft and cannot protect you in even the most extreme scenarios of inequality and why people graduate out of the Pampers of libertarians and take the highest level of consistancy and promote UPB anarchy because if robots dominate and the corporations behind them are profitable then they will need a HUGE supply of human employees still picking up the slack that the robots aren't filling and those people will have an income.  Why the gvt would need to be involved in that is perplexing because you are admitting that the society has willfully supported or demand that robots take over them and thus providing some value in exchange and improving their quality of life. Odd that in your scenario robots didn't take over human government.... Then you inject this weird dichotomy without making the case of how it would have occured and simply injecting the solution of 'high taxation will resolve that'.  makes no sense.

[rosencrantz]

Neural networks already do research where it's very profitable. They look for new drugs and molecules which are then tested. They are becoming more and more widespread in engineering too, specifically to test the durability. If the trend continues and they get better at creating programs we'll see a cataclysmic change in information technology.

[regevdl]

And..I'm always immediately skeptical when the quantitative measure in a prediction or analysis is referred as 'in our lifetime!'.  That means so much to different people depending on your age.  To my children, that may seem feasable....so is this prediction for the audience aged 5-10?  To post-college that means something totally different.  To eldery....something totally different.  So it makes the prediction vague and unscientifc yet they have this absolute quantitative measurement like '90% control by robots'.  lol   and if taxpayers are paying the salary of the 'futurologists' then I am even more skeptical  since he is providing perceived value that is paid by force...not by the demand of the population that is suppose to take his assessment as some higher authority.  If he provides his intellectual value/assessment of the robot situation that people voluntarily pay for then his words will hold more credibility and value since it's sustaining him and propelling him by the demand of people who exchange their money for the value his assessments provide.  

[Romulox]

I agree that this is becoming a big issue today, that many people are being put out of work by automation and are not finding their skill set to be particularly useful to employers.  But perhaps the problem isn't that robots are taking over jobs, as this should lead to greater production and lower prices, but rather that we have been and are still continuing to educate people to perform those obsolete jobs. 

 

In a libertarian/anarchist society, do you envision that parents will support an education system that prepares children to work on an assembly line?  Do you see parents who are raising their children by the ideals repeatedly advocated by this website voluntarily sending their children to a school that actively seeks to destroy a child's ability to empathize with the needs of others? Perhaps the problem is that our ability to adapt to a changing economy and identify the needs and desires of other people has been crushed and replaced with a mentality that says I am entitled to work because I have a piece of paper that says so. 

 

Also, given the ever accelerating pace of change in technology today, how can anyone possibly think they will have any clue what the jobs of 20 years in the future will look like?  If someone told me 20 years ago that a job called "Internet Philosopher" was a viable way to earn a living, I would have been laughing all the way until 2007 when I could see it with my own eyes. 

[Mister Mister]

I'm not sure what the presumption is here...that once rich people have built robots to build things and perform services, the State should take the robots from the rich people and make them build stuff and do things for the poor people who have no jobs because robots took them?

[Des]

I can't see how libertarianism or anarchism could work in a society where possibly over 90% or more jobs will be taken over AI and robots in the foreseeable future.

I can see how it can work.

Instead of telling people who have the technology to make everything abundant, that you plan to steal from them, you ask them to what extent "sharing" is one of their values.

We allow society to sort into small territories where people have similar values.

Specifically with the sharing value: if your level of sharing is: everyone contribute 10% of what they own at year-end, and share it out to all adults in the neighbourhood as 12 monthly payments, then you will join a 10% sharing community.

Otherwise join one with a different percentage, all the way down to zero.

If your concern is that everyone with something to share will go into the 0% communities, then you think all wealthy people hate sharing, but if that were true, there would be no taxes currently, because wealthy people would have paid mercenaries to eradicate all tax systems already.

 

If you think "those people are too mean", "those people are excessively generous", then don't hang out with them, go live with people compatible with your level for the value of "sharing".

 

No, you don't go door-to-door each month with your sharing cheque, you type in your authorisation code in your bank's software system, and they do the rest.

[AHBarbarossa]

I don't think that we are able to plan for a society after an artificial general intelligence was built.

The same way nobody in the 19th century was able to plan for the internet.

 

 

Specialized artificial intelligences, neural networks, knowledge base systems are great at their tasks, but horrible at other tasks.

I worked with decision support systems (DSS) in medicine: I would like to see them used everywhere, because they help to prevent mistakes due to omission of medical knowledge.

 

With DSS the doctor is reminded about everything ze has to know to make a correct decision. - But the decision is still made by the human, who has a better grasp about all parameters. You couldn't build enough sensors and codify enough research to let the machine decide correctly outside a very narrow band of medical conditions.

 

On the other hand a artificial general intelligence would be able to lern to be a doctor, not only to rate and sort relevant medical knowledge.

 

 

Neural networks already do research where it's very profitable. They look for new drugs and molecules which are then tested.

 

Still humans, even layperson, are better in protein folding:

Rosetta@home

https://fold.it/portal/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foldit

(TED Talk)

(SciShow)

 

 

 

Or in general pattern recognition:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Artificial Intelligence Singularity and Labor singularity

I believe we are getting there at some point in our future.

But I also believe that we are going to colonize other planets.

Both are things I can not empirically plan for.

 

What I can empirically (think industrial revolution, agriculture and luddites) say is:

Yes, we might not do all the boring tasks we do every day now;

but we sure as hell are going to do other boring tasks every day then.

 

[Des]

corporations that make these robot or AI software, will become ultra rich 

For you (for example for you) to hold wealth, it is necessary to have enough of the other existing intelligences (human or non-human), support the principle that you are the owner of that wealth. Currently, you do hold some wealth because they do support that principle (to some degree).

 

You (for example if you are the majority shareholder in a vast global corporation) cannot expect that support on a planet where 99% of 7 billion people are struggling to survive.

 

Your options are: Start killing other intelligences and somehow escape being killed in whatever ensues, or, help the other intelligences live, by sharing some of the wealth.

 

Notably, a key strategy for retaining wealth would be to hire other intelligences to assist you to persuade enough people that you own what you say you own, and, to hire some to physically defend your posessions from whoever has no regard for your ownership.

 

Being correct in the assertion that item x is owned by you, is important, but you cannot hope that your 100 day survival rations will last you 100 days on a desert island with 99 other marooned people and no other food.

 

No need to implement some grand scheme, people are already paying other people for time-wasting stuff, because when people have what they need, they think of paying for artwork on their fingernails, or a massage (not that all massages are time-wasting, but some are). So, the wealthy will share somehow, and I would suggest that they share by voluntary contractual basic income (as opposed to coerced taxation).

I think contractual basic income will free up some people from time-wasting activities that wealthy people will buy, and allow them to do something they prefer, for some of the time, with the resulting contentment (among the less wealthy) being good for the security of the wealthy people (meaning the security costs less if some security is bought from armed men, and some is bought by bribing the people who might otherwise rouse themselves to fight the hired men with guns).  All of this done, though, without lying to people about nations and states and gods and devils.