Robots Aren't Destroying Enough Jobs

[M76]

Sorry but you cannot say definitively that the graphic pictures three adults. It looks like an adult and his two children. You are stating your opinion as a fact.

Shahid Khan came to America from Pakistan in 1967 with little more than the clothes on his back. 50 years later he is a billionaire and an NFL owner. Classic rags to riches in America story. I'm sure he is glad that he did not listen to people like you.

Likewise I know very well who Robert Reich is and it would be very difficult for you to provide a less persuasive person than a Clinton Stooge like Reich...

You can't just pick out one example and establish it as the rule. If Shakid would've came with his three twins and they all worked equally hard they still wouldn't all be billionars. That's what it means that it's not just up to you, there are thousands of outside factors affecting your life. So you can't declare that everybody who didn't become millionaires are just lazy or stupid.

 

[thejokker]

Equity should not be the goal, the goal should be equality. To remain at the example everyone should get one box regardless of what they themselves bring to the table. If you're 4 foot don't expect to compete for a place on the basketball court.

Even if one is four feet tall there is no need for government intervention. For tens of thousands of years families, friends and neighbors have assisted one another for survival.

 

[thejokker]

When education becomes a cost factor, and jobs pays very little. You end up with a class based society where you more or less are born into your class. And the class mobility tends to go down. Lets be honest, the American dream is based on luck, not skill or effort.

Spoken like a European. Americans are a very different "breed".

When the new world was discovered it was colonized by those seeking to flee the rigid class structure of Europe. Penniless peasants sold themselves into *indentured servitude whereby they would be slaves for five years in order to finance their passage to the new world. The second, third and forth sons of aristocrats left Europe in the hope of building for themselves in America what their fathers and oldest brothers had back home. Only the most ambitious dared to come to America and face the wilderness and danger. Only the most ambitious dared to immigrate to the emerging cities to start a new life in a strange country. Only the most ambitious...

The Europeans of today are largely those who stayed behind. Those who would not leave their comfortable lives. Those content to be ruled by an aristocratic class with virtually no chance at upward mobility. Those who make excuses about luck when unwavering determination is the real key to American success.

*Interestingly it was a black man Anthony Johnson who sued to retain his black indentured servant for life ending the practice of indentured servitude and ushering in lifetime bondage.

 

[Gigus Fire]

You can't just pick out one example and establish it as the rule. If Shakid would've came with his three twins and they all worked equally hard they still wouldn't all be billionars. That's what it means that it's not just up to you, there are thousands of outside factors affecting your life. So you can't declare that everybody who didn't become millionaires are just lazy or stupid.

By providing an example of many rags to riches story, it goes to confirm that upward mobility is still alive and well.
Capitalism has winners (these rags to riches stories) as well as losers (lost a job and become homeless). They both must exist at the same time because there's so many spots for the rich as there are spots for the poor.
Working hard maybe isn't quite the idea here. Working smart is. Instead of spending all your money that you're making, saving up and then investing seems to be the key to success in almost all cases.
Working hard can be used in cases where talent was recognized through hard work and also luck and the person was promoted up in the company. Carly Fiorina worked from a secretary to become ceo of HP. I'm sure she had her fair share of lucky breaks, but it still shows that this isn't a class based society where upward mobility does not exist. Even taxi drivers (such as Bruce Kovner) can become billionaires. Hard work and smarts with some luck can net you a lot of wealth.
Even lawn care workers can save up and start their own company and start their own business and become successful.
I'm honestly just repeating myself at this point, there are too many examples to choose from.

Also a lot of people's goal isn't to become super rich. Being able to live a decent life is what a lot of people strive towards. Middle class is just fine for many. Also many people don't have the skills required to live being rich. Case and point are the overnight millionaires (lotto winners) who end up spending it all and making their lives miserable.

 

[M76]

You do realize that "fallible" humans program the robots? Garbage in, Garbage out. Human's are capable of intuitive "leaps" while robots descend into a cybernetic loops. "We" are the masters of the machines not vice versa.

I've seen this argument a few times now, and it still makes no sense. When people use it they forget that automation has been going on for decades and we're no worse off for it. In fact most of our goods can be manufactured to much higher quality standards because of robots.

1. If you give a set of instructions to a human depending on the day, he might do it reasonably well, or terribly. Robots will perform the task every day all day to the exact standards of the instructions.
   
2. Humans are not capable of the same precision as a robot even on their best day.
3. Yes, robots are programmed by fallible humans, with programs that are tested and re-tested then debugged, then tested some more, until they performs the task to exact specifications without error. And only then they are put into practice.
   
4. The point is to give those tasks to "robots" that need no intuitive leaps.
   
5. Intuitive leaps are the most unreliable thing to depend on. There is a very high chance that the leap taken will be in error. That's why we don't program robots to take leaps. Well actually we do if the situation necessitates it, but it's still based on predicting that the outcome will be favourable more times than the times it is unfavourable. A human making an on the spot leap has no capacity to determine if his leap will be beneficial in the overall scheme of things or causes more harm. Sure 1 out of 10 times he'll be praised as a hero, and the 9 other times he did something stupid we don't talk about it? There is no way that should be our goal.

 

[M76]

By providing an example of many rags to riches story, it goes to confirm that upward mobility is still alive and well.
Capitalism has winners (these rags to riches stories) as well as losers (lost a job and become homeless). They both must exist at the same time because there's so many spots for the rich as there are spots for the poor.
Working hard maybe isn't quite the idea here. Working smart is. Instead of spending all your money that you're making, saving up and then investing seems to be the key to success in almost all cases.
Working hard can be used in cases where talent was recognized through hard work and also luck and the person was promoted up in the company. Carly Fiorina worked from a secretary to become ceo of HP. I'm sure she had her fair share of lucky breaks, but it still shows that this isn't a class based society where upward mobility does not exist. Even taxi drivers (such as Bruce Kovner) can become billionaires. Hard work and smarts with some luck can net you a lot of wealth.
Even lawn care workers can save up and start their own company and start their own business and become successful.
I'm honestly just repeating myself at this point, there are too many examples to choose from.

Also a lot of people's goal isn't to become super rich. Being able to live a decent life is what a lot of people strive towards. Middle class is just fine for many. Also many people don't have the skills required to live being rich. Case and point are the overnight millionaires (lotto winners) who end up spending it all and making their lives miserable.

I can provide you countless examples of lottery winners, yet that doesn't mean everyone playing the lottery can get rich with it. Capitalism is a lottery. The way it is set up it needs poor people on the bottom for the few in the top to be able to be rich. And there are countless examples of extremely stupid people getting extremely wealthy. How does your rule apply then? Right, there is no rule, the american dream is a lie. Just because you work hard there is no guarantee that you'll make it. And if you're at the right place at the right time you can make it even without being particularly bright. Yes there are very clever people that became rich due to them being clever and exploiting the system to their advantage. But that necessitates a certain lack of empathy as well. So in reality to be successful in capitalism lack of empathy is more beneficial than pure genius.

"middle class is just fine for many"?

Do you hear yourself when you talk such dribble? There is no single person in the world that would say "Nope, I don't want a million dollars, I'm fine with being in the middle class, thanks"

 

[Gigus Fire]

I can provide you countless examples of lottery winners, yet that doesn't mean everyone playing the lottery can get rich with it. Capitalism is a lottery. The way it is set up it needs poor people on the bottom for the few in the top to be able to be rich. And there are countless examples of extremely stupid people getting extremely wealthy. How does your rule apply then? Right, there is no rule, the american dream is a lie. Just because you work hard there is no guarantee that you'll make it. And if you're at the right place at the right time you can make it even without being particularly bright. Yes there are very clever people that became rich due to them being clever and exploiting the system to their advantage. But that necessitates a certain lack of empathy as well. So in reality to be successful in capitalism lack of empathy is more beneficial than pure genius.

"middle class is just fine for many"?

Do you hear yourself when you talk such dribble? There is no single person in the world that would say "Nope, I don't want a million dollars, I'm fine with being in the middle class, thanks"

lol. This whole statement is laughable.
The american dream is based on opportunity. One can argue that opportunity is a sliding scale that is abundant at times and slim in other times, but it's silly to say it doesn't exist.
Capitalism is not a lottery. It's a system that allows for freedom. There is the freedom to succeed and the freedom to fail, and all sorts of in-betweens.
Socialism is the system in which everyone is a loser. There are no winners when everything is shared. There's no motivation to excel.
Working hard isn't just working more hours and hoping you somehow become rich. It's doing extra stuff in your off time. It's taking classes at night and saving up as much as you can. It's looking to the future and making smart investments.

Middle class is perfectly fine for many. I'm middle class. I'm happy with what i got. I don't have any dreams about becoming filthy rich. There are many in this category who live a comfortable life and don't have an urge to be a millionaire or a billionaire. It's not like that's the goal of everyone. Money doesn't equate to happiness.

 

[Gigus Fire]

I've seen this argument a few times now, and it still makes no sense. When people use it they forget that automation has been going on for decades and we're no worse off for it. In fact most of our goods can be manufactured to much higher quality standards because of robots.

1. If you give a set of instructions to a human depending on the day, he might do it reasonably well, or terribly. Robots will perform the task every day all day to the exact standards of the instructions.
   
2. Humans are not capable of the same precision as a robot even on their best day.
3. Yes, robots are programmed by fallible humans, with programs that are tested and re-tested then debugged, then tested some more, until they performs the task to exact specifications without error. And only then they are put into practice.
   
4. The point is to give those tasks to "robots" that need no intuitive leaps.
   
5. Intuitive leaps are the most unreliable thing to depend on. There is a very high chance that the leap taken will be in error. That's why we don't program robots to take leaps. Well actually we do if the situation necessitates it, but it's still based on predicting that the outcome will be favourable more times than the times it is unfavourable. A human making an on the spot leap has no capacity to determine if his leap will be beneficial in the overall scheme of things or causes more harm. Sure 1 out of 10 times he'll be praised as a hero, and the 9 other times he did something stupid we don't talk about it? There is no way that should be our goal.

There is a difference between dumb robots (assembly line robotics) and the more advanced "trying to mimic humans" robots that are coming out and displacing different jobs. Even the "AI" that goes through legal documents and does the work of junior lawyers is different to this point. There's no such thing as true AI, but that doesn't necessarily mean that different shades of AI won't exist in the future (self driving cars for example) that won't be better and more consistent than human counterparts.

 

[M76]

There is a difference between dumb robots (assembly line robotics) and the more advanced "trying to mimic humans" robots that are coming out and displacing different jobs. Even the "AI" that goes through legal documents and does the work of junior lawyers is different to this point. There's no such thing as true AI, but that doesn't necessarily mean that different shades of AI won't exist in the future (self driving cars for example) that won't be better and more consistent than human counterparts.

Actually they are already better and more consistent than the average human drivers, and they're not even market ready yet. Consistency is not a talent that humans have an abundance of. And sure there are drivers who are better in some aspects of driving. But the benchmark is not the best of the best, but the average of what humans show in driving. And we're years past that point with self driving technology.

As for junior lawyers, sure there are lawyers who can do it better, than an AI, but no human can compete with the near infinite computing power and data capacity and undivided attention of a machine. The question is do they even want to do that job? It's a shitty job, going over legal documents like robots.
Even if that part is taken by AIs that doesn't mean courts will be ran with AIs arguing. Well actually scratch that, we might be better off, because an AI has no bias, and it can't be bought, that would be truly equal representation to all.

 

[M76]

lol. This whole statement is laughable.
The american dream is based on opportunity. One can argue that opportunity is a sliding scale that is abundant at times and slim in other times, but it's silly to say it doesn't exist.
Capitalism is not a lottery. It's a system that allows for freedom. There is the freedom to succeed and the freedom to fail, and all sorts of in-betweens.
Socialism is the system in which everyone is a loser. There are no winners when everything is shared. There's no motivation to excel.
Working hard isn't just working more hours and hoping you somehow become rich. It's doing extra stuff in your off time. It's taking classes at night and saving up as much as you can. It's looking to the future and making smart investments.

Middle class is perfectly fine for many. I'm middle class. I'm happy with what i got. I don't have any dreams about becoming filthy rich. There are many in this category who live a comfortable life and don't have an urge to be a millionaire or a billionaire. It's not like that's the goal of everyone. Money doesn't equate to happiness.

Well then that is a new and revised version of the dream, than what I heard of. Because when I learned about it the mantra was that if you put in the effort on your end you can go from rags to riches, it's only up to you. There was no talk about sliding targets and luck needed to be at the place where there is an opportunity.
I don't know how socialism cropped up here. I'm sick and tired of this bullshit. "if it's not pure undistillied free market capitalism, then it must be full fledged socialism! " Stop thinking in black and whites, but more importantly stop thinking inside the box.

 

[Gigus Fire]

Well then that is a new and revised version of the dream, than what I heard of. Because when I learned about it the mantra was that if you put in the effort on your end you can go from rags to riches, it's only up to you. There was no talk about sliding targets and luck needed to be at the place where there is an opportunity.
I don't know how socialism cropped up here. I'm sick and tired of this bullshit. "if it's not pure undistillied free market capitalism, then it must be full fledged socialism! " Stop thinking in black and whites, but more importantly stop thinking inside the box.

I'll leave this here:
http://lifehacker.com/luck-is-what-happens-when-preparation-meets-opportunit-821189862
Sliding scales of opportunity is just being realistic about it all. For instance when the economy is going great and people have money to spend, then it will be easier to start a new buisness as opposed to a recession and people don't have any money to spend on whatever idea your business is trying to capitalize on. Another example is upward mobility in a company is easier to accomplish when a majority of the people in senior positions are at the retirement age. These are just obvious things that make it easier. There is never a guaranteed success rate.

I'm quite aware that there are different grades of socialism. The lighting socialist policies are welfare, universal healthcare, controlled/regulated markets etc, to full blown communism which involves governments dictating wages, governments dictating jobs, I get that full blown socialism is all about the state regardless of the individual. Even the US has certain grades of socialism. However how much more taxes should be paid in the US for social programs? We have more than enough

 

[TwistedAegis]

By providing an example of many rags to riches story, it goes to confirm that upward mobility is still alive and well.

Anecdotes prove nothing. Your father's income is much more related to your earnings in the US than in nearly any other OECD rich country. http://www.epi.org/publication/usa-lags-peer-countries-mobility/

So called "socialist" countries like Denmark, Norway, Finland, Canada, Australia, etc, have citizens with a higher probability of earning more than their parent(s).