Are jobs obsolete?
- Thread starter Wicked Ice
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They said the same thing 20 - 30 years ago when computers were new to business. Really, it did eliminate some jobs, but new jobs - like ours - have replaced them.
Computers and technology should make people more productive so they can get more done. In theory, a company should be able to do more with the same amount of people, and not do stagnate with less people.
I think the current situation may come out of growing pains. Things are changing fast, people need to get re-tooled. My dad did the same basic job for 50 years - I have worked for about 30 years (since as a teen) - and have had a few different professions - I'm ok with it though.
Godin talks about all of this in Linchpin, which I highly recommend to anybody who hasn't read it. Less than five years ago you used to see ads everywhere for data entry clerk and all kinds of monkey jobs. Those are all long gone. Even most white collar work isn't really "work" at all. Such a huge percentage of out population just sits and stares at screens for 80% of their work day, is it any wonder that farmville and all of that crap makes so much monies?
Hate to pee in your wheaties but affiliate marketing is dead. I got a job as a liberty tax sign spinner, I suggest you do the same before it's too late.
Me earlier this week after affiliate marketing died, see you can look kinda cool doing this and it pays alright. Good luck guys.
This.
I've been saying for a long time, but I believe the ultimate fate of humanity will be communism (even though we'll get there through capitalism).
What I Think Will Happen:
Robots will eventually exceed the intelligence of humans (I don't have enough time right now to say why I think so, but I've talked about it tons on Wickedfire). When that happens, any human, no matter how smart will be completely outmatched by a $1000 computer. This means that someone like Steve Jobs will be as useless to the economy as someone with an IQ of 60 working at McDonalds. Steve Jobs is certainly far smarter than the McDonalds employee, but both will be complete idiots compared to a cheap computer.
At that point, there would be no room for any jobs... anything that a human can do, a computer could do better. Computers will run companies, will serve as politicians, write novels, etc.
At this point, with everyone out of a job, the AI, who have no selfish desires of their own (because they were programmed to instinctively want to serve humans, just as humans through evolution were programmed to eat when we are hungry) would see the only way to keep humans happy as to provide them all equal access to the technology the AI is creating. Since the cheapness of AI and computers in the future would lead to everything being almost infinitely cheap, every human could not work, and have pretty much anything they could've ever wanted. Eventually, once sufficiently advanced virtual reality's are created, we will get everything we've ever wanted.
Another Possibility:
We continue along the same trend as above, except before all of the above happens we find a way to modify our own brains to increase our own intelligence at the same speed as AI so we don't get left behind. At that point it'd be impossible to guess what would happen after that as we don't have the intelligence right now to predict what we would do with the intelligence we would gain.
I very strongly believe, and I think science backs me up on this, that Artificial Intelligence will be able to think intelligently and independently. Not too long in the future, robots will be inventing new products, figuring out the best way to manufacture them, having the factory built, running the factory, handling the marketing campaign, etc. all on their own.
It is very naive and human centric to think that only we are capable of these types of things and there isn't a way to break intelligence into building blocks and teach it to a computer that will be able to compute far faster than the human brain can.
Its getting to the point where there is simply to many people in the world and not enough jobs for any economy to sustain. The only reason China is doing so well is because they are doing the cheap shit we don't wanna do, once it becomes cheaper for a computer to make all that crap then china is fucked. I think its whats gonna spark another world war. What are you gonna do when you have 1.5 billion people who can't even do cheap work to feed themselves or family. You either have to start exterminating people or like someone else said we have to switch to some kind of communism where we basically work to live.
I'm guessing at first it will get so bad that first world countries would probably try and place a ban on companies using robots and automated stuff and require a certain amount of people be hired to run things, But there is nothing they can do to stop it from getting to a major cross roads.
over population and efficiency do not work well together. The human race, religions and governments have basically all been run on slave power since the dawn of man. Once you take away the need for slaves then you have a bunch of people who have no purpose and can't do anything except waste space and resources.
Heres my wacky predictions for the next 50-100 years.
1. governments start killing off large amounts of people to save resources and prevent overpopulation. (my guess is some kind of virus, the important people will be vaccinated).
2. in 50-100years we become advanced enough that we can basically become cyborgs and consume little to no resources. We abandon trivial pursuits of todays world for wealth and glory and work together as a whole. Soon venturing out into space and becoming a super intelligent race. (pfft I wish).
3. Overpopulation keeps climbing and the world economys hurt because of it. Riots break out, nations like china feel the worst of it. Rather than give in and lose all they have accomplished they start invading other nations for resources. This has a chain reaction and basically starts WW3. Depending how bad the situation gets, end of the world through nuclear war, chemical warfare. Either way I'm guessing a shit ton of people will die.
I'm guessing at first it will get so bad that first world countries would probably try and place a ban on companies using robots and automated stuff and require a certain amount of people be hired to run things, But there is nothing they can do to stop it from getting to a major cross roads.
over population and efficiency do not work well together. The human race, religions and governments have basically all been run on slave power since the dawn of man. Once you take away the need for slaves then you have a bunch of people who have no purpose and can't do anything except waste space and resources.
Heres my wacky predictions for the next 50-100 years.
1. governments start killing off large amounts of people to save resources and prevent overpopulation. (my guess is some kind of virus, the important people will be vaccinated).
2. in 50-100years we become advanced enough that we can basically become cyborgs and consume little to no resources. We abandon trivial pursuits of todays world for wealth and glory and work together as a whole. Soon venturing out into space and becoming a super intelligent race. (pfft I wish).
3. Overpopulation keeps climbing and the world economys hurt because of it. Riots break out, nations like china feel the worst of it. Rather than give in and lose all they have accomplished they start invading other nations for resources. This has a chain reaction and basically starts WW3. Depending how bad the situation gets, end of the world through nuclear war, chemical warfare. Either way I'm guessing a shit ton of people will die.
Protip: Humans as sources of power are much more inefficient than burning food to run a generator.
^Both great possibilities. +Rep.
But don't forget to add the fact that the human IQ will SHARPLY drop once we are all constantly babied and no longer need to work. It'll turn into planet Zoo with AI as the zookeepers!
A lot of Indian Factories are much more Automated than a typical US based Factory, because the Labor laws are so Archaic, you can't run a manufacturing unit peacefully. Bajaj Auto, one of the largest manufacturers of Two wheelers in the world most employs Graduate engineers only. Bharat Forge, one the largest Forging companies in the world is fully Automated.
But the Robots are still manufactured in the US. US is one of the largest beneficiaries of Indian Imports despite the hullabaloo about Outsourcing. http://www.census.gov/foreign-trade/balance/c5330.html
Indian Manufacturing will have surpassed the Chinese long time ago but for the Govt. regulations
IT services was not regulated, and see what it's done to the world.