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So with the UBI, what if we design the system so that everyone must learn the same skills and then we rotate the work force every x number of months so that no one feels like someone is working more than another. This would take away the tiered system of haves+/haves ++.
you misunderstood my post. It looks like welfare if you think in model of 20% non employment. If you think in terms of 50%, it's a different picture. There's a whole group on this thread who either don't believe the 50%+ scenario, or don't have the imagination to envision. Maybe best way to discuss would be to envision 100% non employment. What does humanity look like? How do we distribute wealth? Is there a reward for one person's leisure vs another?
I think having a flat system only works in a utopia.
Even if you do what you suggest, there will someone who will say "I'll work a double shift, if you pay me 50% of your BMI". Or some other method of making a business. "I'll sell you my food ration, if you give me your housing ration + something else". Or "let's room together, to save money". It might not be as drastic, but there will always be people who want to move up in the world.
My comment wasn't directed specifically at you. It was directed at all of us. It's such a complicated topic that we're all arguing different facets or hypotheticals that don't necessarily line up.
I think you said it well when you said that this conversation should be divided into discussions about labor supply outpacing demand and about BMI as a solution to that problem. But as you mention, there's a sliding scale in the supply/demand equation. 0%, 20%, 50%, 100%? It's complicated.
Having done some work and study in the machine learning realm, I can say that I see the potency of that technology being both overstated and understated. It has the ability to replace a lot of analytical tasks that we previous thought were solely in the realm of human minds. But it also has a lot of faults and isn't terribly close to replacing other tasks that we would assume should already be done. (Unload my dishwasher, please!)
Timeframes matter. I think some people are thinking about this year. Some are thinking about 5 years from now, and some are looking well into the future. Since the OPs poll includes timeframes over 100 years, I think that we should be talking within that realm. I voted ~40 years because I can see that being the timeframe whereby we've permanently replaced a lot of jobs, created a lot of rapid productivity, and the patchwork of social nets is failing.
I don't think that correlates to machine learning. And I think we will have something to unload the dishwasher sooner or later.
50 years ago people didn't think there would be a robot that would wash or vacuum your floor, it exists now.
There are companies working on applying the Roomba technology to lawn mowing (set it and forget it).
Sooner or later, a lot of the tedious/monotonous work will be replaced with machines. But that doesn't require a "true AI", which has the capability of doing things it wasn't programmed to. I think we're a ways off from that.
mspohr
Well-Known Member
The NYT editorial brings up several important points. First, we don't know how much automation will impact labor. But second, and more importantly, the real problem is that the benefits of labor and productivity are skewed to increase the wealth of the corporations and top 1%.
Lots of people have pointed out that most of the benefits of productivity have gone to the top over the past 20-30 years. The system is set up to transfer wealth from workers to corporations and their owners. That's why I always find it unnerving to hear people complain about "redistributing wealth" when we already have a system which has relentlessly redistributed wealth from the bottom to the top. If we had a system that didn't exploit workers with low wages and high taxes while favoring the wealthy with tax breaks and the freedom to exploit workers, we wouldn't be in this fix.
The neoliberal capitalism which we have been following has created this vast inequality (the richest 10% hold 76% of US wealth) and until this is addressed, there will be no peace.
The BMI is just throwing crumbs to the peons.
OT, but reminds me of a story friend told me last weekend. Dog at home over weekend. Despite walker's visit, dog violated indoors, roomba did its thing. Oops!
I think that 50% and 100% scenarios are _very_ different.
To be at 100% you're at the point where it's cheaper to automate everything than to have a human do it.
50% can leave tasks at the high and low ends, especially if you have partial automation. (Sometimes people think of it as human labor v robot/computer, when it's really human labour v robot/computer + less human labor.)
The 100% scenario is also, I think, much, much easier than the 50% scenario. In the 100% scenario no-one is working, so why would anyone expect anything more than egalitarian payment? But that still leaves resentment around the people with chronic illnesses due to poor diet and lifestyle. Maybe that would lead to peoples' jobs being looking after their health.
The 50% scenario is much more challenging. You need people to work, but then there's a large number of people who would be unemployed. And then you continue the resentment about laziness and idleness. Of course, the cheapest welfare system is to use a BMI and let people do what they want. If you want Dosomethingfare it's going to cost more and the same people who resent welfare will likely hate paying for the extra costs of a pushy system that tries to ensure that beemies* remain active. But you perhaps could save some costs by taking some of the beemies and have them help run the Dosomethingfare system.
* I'm coining the term now for people solely dependent on the BMI.
I agree the 100% scenario is remote and unlikely, but I believe we need to contemplate it in order to free ourselves from all our biases and predispositions... then we will be better able to craft a solution for the 50% scenario.
Uncle Paul
Well-Known Member
This situation is already existing in many Nations around the world.
Some African and middle eastern countries already have over 50% unemployment. The poor must struggle, but they make it, and their populations continue to grow at a rapid rate. What we consider poverty is a common way of life for them.
In the UAE, perhaps 80% of the Emerati citizens work for the Government. Most common labor is imported from other nationals for difficult work, in a stifeling climate, for subsistance wages.
Even in some American citys only about 50% of the eligible workforce is fully employed with living wages.
In totally, in the USA, already a tremendous number of the potential total workforce (17 years of age and up) is not gainfully employed.
Maybe the future is already here.
When I was a child, I had essentially a minimum income level of living provided by my parents.
Now as a retired adult, I have a government provided minimum income, as well as health care insurance provided by the Social Security Administration. Very few of my retired workers have gainful employment, but we seem to get by. Spend our days in search of entertainment, friendships, family and maintaining good health.
Some African and middle eastern countries already have over 50% unemployment. The poor must struggle, but they make it, and their populations continue to grow at a rapid rate. What we consider poverty is a common way of life for them.
In the UAE, perhaps 80% of the Emerati citizens work for the Government. Most common labor is imported from other nationals for difficult work, in a stifeling climate, for subsistance wages.
Even in some American citys only about 50% of the eligible workforce is fully employed with living wages.
In totally, in the USA, already a tremendous number of the potential total workforce (17 years of age and up) is not gainfully employed.
Maybe the future is already here.
When I was a child, I had essentially a minimum income level of living provided by my parents.
Now as a retired adult, I have a government provided minimum income, as well as health care insurance provided by the Social Security Administration. Very few of my retired workers have gainful employment, but we seem to get by. Spend our days in search of entertainment, friendships, family and maintaining good health.
Mycroft
Life happens
"The world's first artificially intelligent lawyer was just hired at a law firm" from May 2016
"IBM Watson AI is taking over white-collar jobs in Japan" from Jan 2017
"On January 7, 2017, IBM and Fukoku Mutual Life Insurance entered into a contract for IBM to deliver analysis to compensation payouts via its IBM Watson Explorer AI, this resulted in the loss of 34 jobs and the company said it would speed up compensation payout analysis via analysing claims and medical record and increase productivity by 30%. The company also said it would save ¥140m in running costs.[
"IBM Watson Brings AI to H&R Block Tax Preparation" from Feb 2017
A computer overwhelmingly stomped the best players at Jeopardy a couple of years ago. This involved "reading" and "understanding" hundreds of millions of pages of written, common language text and then answering riddles that boggle the minds of most people.
Computer processing power per dollar doubles about every 18 months. Watson is likely at least half the size and twice as powerful as it was back in 2011 and infinitely replicable!
Yes, the jobs of accountants, CPAs, and many lawyers are some of the next jobs to disappear. The lawyers can become politicians, so no problem there, but what about the rest? Retrain a $100k lawyer to be a programmer?
IBM is not sitting on their laurels. They are building Watsons in the cloud and farming the intelligence out to any startup that wants to build applications that include that kind of AI power. They don't have to be able to buy an entire Watson like H&R Block and the Japanese LIC did.
Things are going to get VERY interesting very soon.
"IBM Watson AI is taking over white-collar jobs in Japan" from Jan 2017
"On January 7, 2017, IBM and Fukoku Mutual Life Insurance entered into a contract for IBM to deliver analysis to compensation payouts via its IBM Watson Explorer AI, this resulted in the loss of 34 jobs and the company said it would speed up compensation payout analysis via analysing claims and medical record and increase productivity by 30%. The company also said it would save ¥140m in running costs.[
"IBM Watson Brings AI to H&R Block Tax Preparation" from Feb 2017
A computer overwhelmingly stomped the best players at Jeopardy a couple of years ago. This involved "reading" and "understanding" hundreds of millions of pages of written, common language text and then answering riddles that boggle the minds of most people.
Computer processing power per dollar doubles about every 18 months. Watson is likely at least half the size and twice as powerful as it was back in 2011 and infinitely replicable!
Yes, the jobs of accountants, CPAs, and many lawyers are some of the next jobs to disappear. The lawyers can become politicians, so no problem there, but what about the rest? Retrain a $100k lawyer to be a programmer?
IBM is not sitting on their laurels. They are building Watsons in the cloud and farming the intelligence out to any startup that wants to build applications that include that kind of AI power. They don't have to be able to buy an entire Watson like H&R Block and the Japanese LIC did.
Things are going to get VERY interesting very soon.
one big concept that you seem to neglect is that you paid for those payments over the years of your working career. this bmi would be just a plain old handout that you and I will will have to fund.
the big flaw in this utopian fantasy is ignoring where the monies to fund these handouts will come from. governments do not give their money away, they need to collect monies in order to redistribute it.
That's half true.
Forbes (sure it's slanted, all MSM is slanted) ran an article saying that the average person puts in about $300k into SSI, and gets about $280k out (give or take)
But most working adults don't put nearly enough into Medicare to what they take out. It's close to 3-to-1. So it's still a huge entitlement.
Sorry, Seniors, You Didn't Pay for (All of) That
I don't think your facts are correct, by far most people never collect what they put into it, that is the ponzi scheme aspect of social security. SS is based on the fact that more people will die long before they are eligible to collect.
the SS program has been expanded for political reasons to include more recipients, pay out more than was ever intended. this is one reason that SS is having financial issues. another huge factor is that people are living far longer than was envisioned by the framers of the SS scheme, 80 years ago the majority of people never lived long enough to collect large payments.
Care to share more accurate facts then?
I'm just going by the Forbes article, which has all the statistics listed.
I don't think that's what SS is based on... you think that of the working population, >50% will die before they reach eligible retirement age? I strongly doubt that.
mspohr
Well-Known Member
The "Ponzi Scheme" aspect is the concept that there will be more payers than payees over time. That's the definition of a Ponzi scheme - continually get more people to invest in order to pay out early stakeholders. However, as much as that term is employed to Social Security, it's not an accurate analogy. That only applies when you've got overpayments going to the early stakeholders, and we don't see solid evidence of that. Baby Boomers are a stress to the Social Security system, as are longer lifetimes and inflation. But calling it a Ponzi scheme is more of a disparagement of the program for political reasons.
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