"Basic Income" is a terrible idea

[Deleted]

Considering how some intelligent individuals have predicted that the technological singularity (the AI that can self-improve, thus being superior to man in every way -very- fast) will come to be within this century, it stands to reason that the automation and AI that precedes that will essentially wipe out the low income menial labour roles that the beneficiaries of the 'basic income' currently occupy.

That is a lot of people that the economy wants to be able to spend money in order to keep it going, and taxes flowing.. there's little opportunity for the vastest majority of those workers to suddenly turn to work within higher education without some gov assistance.

Who knows how many higher educated roles that there will actually be a need to fill for that matter? A human workforce could eventually be rendered ENTIRELY pointless in developed economies, and then what do we do with the old adage 'Get a job'?

[Theinquisition]

There's a huge difference when one industry replaces another. Automation will indeed create jobs. Maybe even 100s of thousands of jobs, bit it also has the potential to displace millions of other jobs. The whole point of automation is that it can easily replace people at an extremely.large scale.

It always happens dude, over and over again, a new invention replaces a labor intensive process while improving productivity. People learn new skills and the cycle begins anew.

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There will be no choice and no reason not to do so. It won't come from taxing your labor after all, but the income generated from the output of robots.

guess we will see.

There will always be industries that require humans.

[Tyrianth]

It always happens dude, over and over again, a new invention replaces a labor intensive process while improving productivity. People learn new skills and the cycle begins anew.

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guess we will see.

There will always be industries that require humans.

Yes and the job pool gets smaller everytime while our population increases. The major difference is that we've never job displacement on this magnitude at any point in our history.

[Theinquisition]

Considering how some intelligent individuals have predicted that the technological singularity (the AI that can self-improve, thus being superior to man in every way -very- fast) will come to be within this century, it stands to reason that the automation and AI that precedes that will essentially wipe out the low income menial labour roles that the beneficiaries of the 'basic income' currently occupy.

That is a lot of people that the economy wants to be able to spend money in order to keep it going, and taxes flowing.. there's little opportunity for the vastest majority of those workers to suddenly turn to work within higher education without some gov assistance.

Who knows how many higher educated roles that there will actually be a need to fill for that matter? A human workforce could eventually be rendered ENTIRELY pointless in developed economies, and then what do we do with the old adage 'Get a job'?

I think you're underestimating human potential.

[alexw]

If "shoot poor people" would mean be completely against my taxes going to pay for my next door neighbor to get free food, section 8, healthcare, etc for the rest of their lives? Than yea.

I guess I'm a dick. Then again, perhaps it's because I grew up poor, didn't have a father figure, and ended up working for "the man" from 18-22 when I started my own business and "made it" in life.

Yes you would rather have the economy collapse and your business destroyed because their won't be enough consumer demand if we don't do this. It boggles the mind that rich smart people like you (i'm kinda starting to doubt on the smart bit given your comments) would rather shoot themselves in the foot.

[Azadina]

Lol starve to death? Says the guy who was in the us military which is welfare for stupid people.

How exactly is it welfare for stupid?

[Glorious Leader]

Amusingly enough it was thought for a long time that all the advances in sciences and technology, all the improvements in production and transportation, all that advancements that we had made as a species would eventually one day lead to the elimination of toil and labor. Now with increasing automation taking away jobs we actually lament the boon that is freeing men and woman from tedious labor. We fret about numbers on a computer screen, debt and finance which in real terms mean squat.

[Tijuana]

It always happens dude, over and over again, a new invention replaces a labor intensive process while improving productivity. People learn new skills and the cycle begins anew.

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guess we will see.

There will always be industries that require humans.

^This

Someone has to maintain the robots. Someone has to engineer the robots. Someone has to program the robots. Someone has to dig the metal the robot is made of out of the ground. And it goes on, and on, and on..

[Theinquisition]

Yes and the job pool gets smaller everytime while our population increases. The major difference is that we've never job displacement on this magnitude at any point in our history.

Population isn't increasing that much dude, hell in most developed countries population rates aren't enough to replace the current population. The workplace will evolve.

If it doesn't, well I think we will have some bigger problems on our hands, once we reach the point of robots doing everything for us, we will have bigger problems than just employment.

[Glorious Leader]

^This

Someone has to maintain the robots. Someone has to engineer the robots. Someone has to program the robots. Someone has to dig the metal the robot is made of out of the ground. And it goes on, and on, and on..

The entire purpose of automation is increased effeciency. It would hardly be increased efficiency if you needed to employ just as many people to maintain the robots as their are robots. People will be unemployed by the millions, exactly as happened when computers began being used by business in large scale.

[Fayenoor]

^This

Someone has to maintain the robots. Someone has to engineer the robots. Someone has to program the robots. Someone has to dig the metal the robot is made of out of the ground. And it goes on, and on, and on..

Other robots.

There can be engineering robots, maintenance robots, programming robots, miner robots.

Everything can be robotized.

AI is the end of human society as we know it.

Here's Hawking on AI and death of mankind--
http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-30290540

Prof Hawking says the primitive forms of artificial intelligence developed so far have already proved very useful, but he fears the consequences of creating something that can match or surpass humans.

"It would take off on its own, and re-design itself at an ever increasing rate," he said.

"Humans, who are limited by slow biological evolution, couldn't compete, and would be superseded."

[Gamdwelf]

Sigh.

You do realize that it is harder to get into the U.s. military than most 4 year universities right?

I mean, who is the stupid one here? The guy who whines that he can barely find the motivation to get out of bed in the morning with a "woe is me" attitude, or the guy who will finish his 4 year degree in less than a year with not 1 penny of student debt thanks to the GI bill.

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Probably, im in a shit mood.

What a welfare babby you are we should have just let you starve.

[Tijuana]

The entire purpose of automation is increased effeciency. It would hardly be increased efficiency if you needed to employ just as many people to maintain the robots as their are robots. People will be unemployed by the millions, exactly as happened when computers began being used by business in large scale.

Funny, I don't recall millions of people being laid off and the world coming to an end. What year was it again, when the sky fell?

Look, the left needs to get over this notion that a job is like a diamond: forever. Sometimes people have to get new jobs; it's just part of life. The world did not come to an end when the tractor was invented, even though at the time 97% of the workers in the world were farmers. It won't come to an end when robots become viable either.

[Paranoid Android]

^This

Someone has to maintain the robots. Someone has to engineer the robots. Someone has to program the robots. Someone has to dig the metal the robot is made of out of the ground. And it goes on, and on, and on..

You do understand the steps would take less and less people to do jobs behind automation. Companies like Google and Amazon are great companies, but they employ less people than say General Motors did previously. While Google employs more skilled people and they get paid a very good wage. Yes, skill people can find new jobs in a new market since they can adapt more easily to a new skill. The problem is with high school grads or less.

[Gamdwelf]

How exactly is it welfare for stupid?

The military as a whole in the us is a way for people not intelligent enough to make their own decisions. So they become government slaves for pay.

[Tyrianth]

Well, I guess we can have that conversation in 2050.

Lol I hope the worlds politicans have more foresight than you...

[Theinquisition]

How exactly is it welfare for stupid?

He's just perpetuating a stereotype.

[Deleted]

This post is priceless. Shitload of people not understanding two cents about economics arguing.
Didn't know what to watch tonight, read this thread instead.

Just as glorious as political threads (even though economical theories are in line with political choices)

[Varvara Spiros Gelashvili]

Pretty gamdwelf is shit posting...

[Dug]

Funny, I don't recall millions of people being laid off and the world coming to an end. What year was it again, when the sky fell?

Look, the left needs to get over this notion that a job is like a diamond: forever. Sometimes people have to get new jobs; it's just part of life. The world did not come to an end when the tractor was invented, even though at the time 97% of the workers in the world were farmers. It won't come to an end when robots become viable either.

I think the point is that when AI reaches a certain point the vast, vast majority of people won't be employable. Will there be jobs requiring human input? For many more years to come. But with every advance that job pool will keep getting smaller and smaller and the population will keep rising.