It seems inevitable that factories, other labor-intensive jobs, and many service businesses will continue to automate. As a result, there will be a surge in under or unemployed folks, millions with too much time on their hands, difficulty finding work, but a continued need for a paycheck. With robots making (nearly) everything, fixing and driving our trucks and cars, flying our planes, manning our ticket counters, processing our borders, brewing coffee and serving donuts in our bakeries and restaurants, policing our streets, doing our dental check-ups, cavity fillings and even delicate surgeries, translating our languages, polishing our shoes, mowing our lawns, cleaning our houses, being our tennis and chess coaches or poker partners, teaching our kids at school, playing with and supervising our kids after school (hopefully parents will not overdo this), architecting and building our buildings, and even designing and producing the next generations of robots, there will be changes in the jobs available to humans and the roles we play, both at work and at home. How will we handle the resulting unemployment and leisure time?
To begin, there will be mass reductions in countless industries, but not in every field. I do not believe that humans will be fully replaced in most tasks, not anytime soon: A human’s mind, knowledge, and experience will be needed to supervise the robot mechanics and medics when the programming is not sufficient, and a sentient eye is called for where an electric eye will not do. I would not want to be in a hospital where only a machine answered the call button and heard my complaints, no matter the medical database at its disposal, the precision of its probing sensors and flawlessness in its dispensing pills. On the other hand, sleepy nurses and overworked doctors are a problem too, so the best course is the human-machine team.
Fully automated nano-medics, injected into the blood, will perform intricate micro-surgeries on tiny parts of the body that the human eye and hand are incapable of seeing, reaching or manipulating. In fact, floating through the bloodstream on high alert, they will nip hidden cancer cells and fatty arteries in the bud without our even being aware. Drunk drivers, sleepy truckers, road rage, and other behind-the-wheel stupidity will be replaced by vehicles able to travel at high speeds, inches apart down specially designed roadways. Perfectly executing their exits and entrances like ballet dancers at the Bolshoi, traffic jams will be nearly eliminated, crashes almost unknown. Computers are not perfect, but they will certainly do better than stoned teenagers and other intoxicated fools running stoplights.
Even if AI becomes better than humans at many tasks, I still want humans to be monitoring the systems and working out the bugs … until, of course, our AI is proven to be better than the humans at doing that too. Our planes today are the safest in history because AI and sophisticated instrumentation do some things more precisely than highly trained, but fallible human pilots and exhausted air traffic controllers. Nonetheless, I would still like a flesh and blood captain somewhere on board … just in case, at least for a while.
People shall continue to be called to jobs and careers where the human mind and, most importantly, human heart cannot be fully replaced … at least, for quite awhile. The list of these is to be determined. Roles such as novelist, comedian, nanny, psychologist and Buddhist clergy seem safe, at least for now. Check in again in 50 years, however.
Of course, the introduction of the internet and smartphone promised us a life of increased leisure and reduced working hours, but that did not prove to be the case, not for most of us. It seems that many of us are working harder now, often two or more jobs, to make ends meet, always tied to the devices we carry. Just 1% of the population has gotten fabulously rich. The promises of technology did not quite pan out.
But perhaps, this time, things will be different:
First, expanded parental minds and charity orgasms may cause our leaders and business owners to set labor standards and working conditions that treat people humanely and fairly, even generously, and to put in place guaranteed minimum income levels and a wider social net for all. It may also cause people to think up, plan, invest in, and work diligently for businesses and services that we might now call public service or non-profit, perhaps in areas where AI alone is not enough. It will be their pleasure and inner calling to do so because such work tickles the pleasure centers. People will compete for work to plant trees or teach kids basketball (robots could do both jobs, but many prefer the human touch, so will do so the old-fashioned ways.) Billionaires who own the automated factories will pay taxes willingly, and set up even better funded charitable foundations than they do now, because they too will have an increased libido for philanthropy. They will also feel called to make sure that their remaining workers receive a decent wage and good working conditions, based on enhance compassion and senses of fairness. And even if they do not, our suddenly more socially concerned politicians will pass wise laws to make the rich pay their fair share. As well, with genetically enhanced socially-conscious minds, first-world consumers will demand an end to oppressive conditions in the third-world that supplies their lives. Do you know where your tennis shoes come from?
With our enhanced capacity for charity, there will be increased demand to enter trades like doctor and nurse, school teacher and piano teacher, childcare worker and social worker, teeth cleaner and street cleaner, whatever helps other people. Even if a robot could do many of these jobs, people will themselves volunteer to do them because of the personal pleasure involved, for the great inner joy, with each recycling of a soda can bringing more kick than the sugar in the can.
One area where I hope to see greater unemployment, however, is the military. With a bit of luck, both automated soldiers and human soldiers will be less necessary due to a reduced human propensity to violence. Instead, government recruiting offices will overflow with volunteers for public service. I suspect that, since most wars are fought for land and resources, and given that most dictators rise up to grab power and wealth for themselves, a society in which every citizen has enough, is content with enough, is repulsed by violence and filled with joy at the well-being of others, will do more to eliminate war and oppression from the world than all the military campaigns, new weapons programs, treaties, mutual destruction threats and idyllic dreams of the past ever could muster up. There will be little to battle over, and even less desire to abuse or fight.
Soldiering is one career I would like to see go the way of public executioner and royal sorcerer.
However, in this reshuffled world of labor supply and demand, it is most certain that demand for work will far exceed supply, especially in certain industries. Many workers will be layed-off, while openings for new jobs may be far less than the number of available workers. For now, the cost of a robot is way above that of a poor, underpaid sweatshop worker making robot parts, but it is changing quickly.
If so, what will all the unemployed and desperate former restaurant, shop and farm workers, truck drivers and pilots, factory assembly line and sweatshop laborers do? With hungry families to feed, and no jobs, the result would be an unprecedented crisis that could lead to social unrest on a massive scale. Even in the first world, many workers with non-transferable skills will have problems finding new employ, while even highly skilled workers and professionals may find fewer positions open, including formerly high paid architects, dentists, lawyers, stock traders and accountants.
Without steady incomes, people will feel lost, concerned for their next meal, worried about how to clothe and educate their children, and even if not starving, adrift and undervalued without clear meaning in life.
There is one answer to this dilemma ...
... (to be continued next time) ...
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In recent interviews, a variety of knowledgeable commentators have warned of the economic and social disruption which AI may bring. I recommend these, all long interviews but well worth the time:
Mo Gawdat was the Chief Business Officer for Google X:
Emad Mostaque is the founder and CEO of Stability AI:
DeepMind co-founder Mustafa Suleyman and historian Yuval Harari:
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