CDZ A World Without Jobs: Utopia or Hell?

[JimBowie1958]

Why?

Why is a "robotics tax" the thing we must have? To replace income tax? Does not the article you've cited propose that productivity will increase to the point that the cost of production becomes low enough to all but make everything free? How much revenue can government need in such an environment? Why will people need to make necessities in such an environment?

The economic and behavioral model that illustrates the scenario you've put forth exists around the world. It's called a household with children. What have we in those households? A situation wherein the kids have their necessities provided at no real cost to them and they do what they must to satisfy, purely for the sake of satisfying them, their interests. If we at some point arrive at a state whereby that is the circumstance of adults, I don't see much reason to expect terribly different behaviors and requirements.

Because:

1) the governments programs are not going to magically vanish. People will still need Medicaid, payments from the Social Security, we will still need a miltiary budget and with the ever growing "War on Terror" it will increase as well, etc.

2) The robotics tax would replace lost income taxes, yes, for each human job the robot replaces.

3) While productivity increases with robotics, that is not the sole consideration of the ipacts the Robotics Revolution will bring. People will still have needs that have to be met by the government.

4) Those products will never be free, but the costs of production will be very small. That equates to bigger profits, not free hand outs if the past is any guide on this sort of thing.

5) Most people will be able to make their own consumables but there will still be a perceived need for cash, but the less of the latter the better.

6) Adults often want what they see as just out of their reach FOR NO REASON AT ALL, and advertisers have used this for selling worthless crap for decades now. I doubt that that will change EVER.

I think you totally missed the point. The author proposes in his conclusion that where we're headed is a world in which the role of money is diminished to the point that price ceases to be a determinant in people's decisions about what to obtain and what not to obtain. In such an environment, what need be there for governmental revenue on the scale and of the scope we have today? One can't very well propose as grand a paradigm shift as the author did and then attempt to consider existence under than paradigm using the same models we have controlling the current paradigm.

I dont think I missed that, covered it under #4.

4) Those products will never be free, but the costs of production will be very small. That equates to bigger profits, not free hand outs if the past is any guide on this sort of thing.

 

[anotherlife]

But running upwards on a downward escalator is not a long term success. I predict ww3, as the 1st consequence of the jobless society. This is not that bad, because history needs a reset button anyways.

Do you want to live in a world where 90% of the people you love have been killed in such a war?

IT wont be a nice tidy little thing, these wars.

It seems that 21st century wars are messier and longer than 20th century wars. Without jobs, people will be without incomes. And that will send them to starvation, that started ww2. The communist invented that they can feed people but they couldn't. Plus also all kinds of conflicts are kept ready to go in every country, even in Europe. A jobless society can only survive with hermetically closed borders to immobilize the people. This alone is a reason for war to begin with. But I think the biggest reason will be distribution of goods, because although everything will be produced for free without work, assigning those goods to people is work and a privilege of power.

 

[320 Years of History]

Why?

Why is a "robotics tax" the thing we must have? To replace income tax? Does not the article you've cited propose that productivity will increase to the point that the cost of production becomes low enough to all but make everything free? How much revenue can government need in such an environment? Why will people need to make necessities in such an environment?

The economic and behavioral model that illustrates the scenario you've put forth exists around the world. It's called a household with children. What have we in those households? A situation wherein the kids have their necessities provided at no real cost to them and they do what they must to satisfy, purely for the sake of satisfying them, their interests. If we at some point arrive at a state whereby that is the circumstance of adults, I don't see much reason to expect terribly different behaviors and requirements.

Because:

1) the governments programs are not going to magically vanish. People will still need Medicaid, payments from the Social Security, we will still need a miltiary budget and with the ever growing "War on Terror" it will increase as well, etc.

2) The robotics tax would replace lost income taxes, yes, for each human job the robot replaces.

3) While productivity increases with robotics, that is not the sole consideration of the ipacts the Robotics Revolution will bring. People will still have needs that have to be met by the government.

4) Those products will never be free, but the costs of production will be very small. That equates to bigger profits, not free hand outs if the past is any guide on this sort of thing.

5) Most people will be able to make their own consumables but there will still be a perceived need for cash, but the less of the latter the better.

6) Adults often want what they see as just out of their reach FOR NO REASON AT ALL, and advertisers have used this for selling worthless crap for decades now. I doubt that that will change EVER.

I think you totally missed the point. The author proposes in his conclusion that where we're headed is a world in which the role of money is diminished to the point that price ceases to be a determinant in people's decisions about what to obtain and what not to obtain. In such an environment, what need be there for governmental revenue on the scale and of the scope we have today? One can't very well propose as grand a paradigm shift as the author did and then attempt to consider existence under than paradigm using the same models we have controlling the current paradigm.

I dont think I missed that, covered it under #4.

4) Those products will never be free, but the costs of production will be very small. That equates to bigger profits, not free hand outs if the past is any guide on this sort of thing.

Red:
That goes directly to the very point I made. The past cannot be used as a credible guide when it comes to paradigm shifts on the scale considered in the article and in this thread. That's why I've asked you to share the theory that describes the nature of human economic behavior under the situation you and the article's author predict.

You realize that what is predicted is a shift so monumental that it dwarfs the abolishment of slavery in the South as an economic driver? What you're suggesting is that two of the fundamental factors of production will no longer be controlled or performed by humans. That has never happened before so profoundly that it directly affects every man, woman and child on the planet.

 

[anotherlife]

The Jews will control it. (Dostoevski)

 

[JimBowie1958]

Red:
That goes directly to the very point I made. The past cannot be used as a credible guide when it comes to paradigm shifts on the scale considered in the article and in this thread. That's why I've asked you to share the theory that describes the nature of human economic behavior under the situation you and the article's author predict.

The lower 99% will start to produce their own needs, while the upper 1% will frantically use patents, copyrights and corruption to shut down sources of said designs and models.

They want to remain dominant so the lower 99% will still have to kiss their ass and pay far more than the manufactured costs.

Plus getting from here (capitalist system filled with career oriented people) to there (Chillaxing people making what they need) is going to be a tricky thing. People who are driven to succeed and excel will not so easily take to being just another subsistence Home Manufacturing worker bee.

You realize that what is predicted is a shift so monumental that it dwarfs the abolishment of slavery in the South as an economic driver? What you're suggesting is that two of the fundamental factors of production will no longer be controlled or performed by humans. That has never happened before so profoundly that it directly affects every man, woman and child on the planet.

Yeah the shift will be real in technology, production efficiency, etc, but not in THE HUMAN HEART.

People still covet power wealth and social standing and envy it for others, and that wont change after the Technological Singularity.

Sorry to harsh your mellow dude.

 

[anotherlife]

Red:
That goes directly to the very point I made. The past cannot be used as a credible guide when it comes to paradigm shifts on the scale considered in the article and in this thread. That's why I've asked you to share the theory that describes the nature of human economic behavior under the situation you and the article's author predict.

The lower 99% will start to produce their own needs, while the upper 1% will frantically use patents, copyrights and corruption to shut down sources of said designs and models.

They want to remain dominant so the lower 99% will still have to kiss their ass and pay far more than the manufactured costs.

Plus getting from here (capitalist system filled with career oriented people) to there (Chillaxing people making what they need) is going to be a tricky thing. People who are driven to succeed and excel will not so easily take to being just another subsistence Home Manufacturing worker bee.

You realize that what is predicted is a shift so monumental that it dwarfs the abolishment of slavery in the South as an economic driver? What you're suggesting is that two of the fundamental factors of production will no longer be controlled or performed by humans. That has never happened before so profoundly that it directly affects every man, woman and child on the planet.

Yeah the shift will be real in technology, production efficiency, etc, but not in THE HUMAN HEART.

People still covet power wealth and social standing and envy it for others, and that wont change after the Technological Singularity.

Sorry to harsh your mellow dude.

This may be true, but how will those independent manufacturers argue with a drone?

 

[JimBowie1958]

This may be true, but how will those independent manufacturers argue with a drone?

Why would they need to?

 

[anotherlife]

This may be true, but how will those independent manufacturers argue with a drone?

Why would they need to?

I figure that when patent enforcement and copyright enforcement fails, even at Sony records, then the drones will come out.

 

[anotherlife]

This may be true, but how will those independent manufacturers argue with a drone?

Why would they need to?

I figure that when patent enforcement and copyright enforcement fails, even at Sony records, then the drones will come out.

But you are right, there is an even bigger weapon against the independent inventor, and that is scholar manipulation. For example, when was the last time when high power technology was invented? Tesla? That was 200 years ago. And we are talking about space and transportation on TV? Interesting.

 

[Onyx]

There are a lot of utopian liberals that want a world where all workers are replaced by robots, and humans have all their needs catered for.

I consider that quite hellish. If that is the reality we are headed for, then Ted Kaczynski was right.

 

[JimBowie1958]

The era of robots: thousands of builders to lose jobs as machines take over, says construction boss

 

[Mac1958]

A world without work is coming – it could be utopia or it could be hell | Ryan Avent

To make a potentially extremely long post short - you're welcome! - somebody had better start looking at this pretty damn soon. The longer we wait, the rougher the transition will be. It could be great in the end, but it may be that none of us will still be around to see it.
.

 

[JimBowie1958]

To make a potentially extremely long post short - you're welcome! - somebody had better start looking at this pretty damn soon. The longer we wait, the rougher the transition will be. It could be great in the end, but it may be that none of us will still be around to see it.
.

The political, social and economic impact of the Robotics Revolution is ignored with an intensity I have not seen in quite some time, it is especially unprecedented given the obvious provable importance of the topic. The impact this will have on cheap immigrant labor is itself enormous and the question of how that ripples into the Democratic Party is profound as well.

IT is almost in the same status as Third Party Presidential candidates.

 

[jwoodie]

Positive and negative reinforcement (i.e., reward and punishment) are the primary of human (and nonhuman) behavior. Remove these and we will all descend to our lowest common denominators: Lethargy and greed.

 

[esthermoon]

A world without jobs would be like paradise!! Job is slavery

 

[JimBowie1958]

A world without jobs would be like paradise!! Job is slavery

So starvation is a good thing?

When has the general population NOT ever worked? The Oligarchs of every society have had labor for the rest of us, but at one time it was as slaves, at other times as peasants and at other times as share croppers.

Independent free citizens are none of those things, but as the system exists today and as the expectations of those citizens dictate, we have jobs to raise us up from poverty and to give us work that gives meaning to our lives.

But if the jobs disappear the hardest working element of society will become alienated, polarized and desperate unless we make comprehensive plans to accomodate the needed change to an independent citizenry that has a subsistence level of production in their own homes and the ability to barter for other goods as they see fit and are able.

 

[esthermoon]

In a perfect world you could live without working but this doesn't mean you're gonna die from starvation.
In the ancient times many people didn't work and they lived smoothly (for example Greece, Rome, China, etc.)!

 

[WheelieAddict]

Buckley is perhaps the most punchable person ever. Ignore him and listen to Friedman.

 

[esthermoon]

The era of robots: thousands of builders to lose jobs as machines take over, says construction boss

Robots should work.
We should LIVE.

 

[JoeMoma]

In a perfect world you could live without working but this doesn't mean you're gonna die from starvation.
In the ancient times many people didn't work and they lived smoothly (for example Greece, Rome, China, etc.)!

With the exception of perhaps royalty. People of "ancient" times had to work very hard simply to survive. Food and shelter didn't just happen.