[ritter]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('davep', 'S')o nobody's calling them iRobots yet?

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('OilFinder2', 'Y')ou paid absolutely NO attention to what I said. None. Did you even read it at all?

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', '[')b]Foxconn’s robot recruitment drive: the beginning of the end of labour?

I think if there’s anything to take away from this inexorable slide toward nigh-total automation, it’s that we can no longer sustain a global economy that relies on mass employment in the manufacturing industry to keep the money moving. I suspect there’s a tipping point in the near future (or possibly in the recent past) at which – barring existential-scale disasters that knock us back into pre-industrial ways of life – it will never again be cheaper to get humans to build things than it is to get machines to do the same work.

What happens after that point to the business models of tchotchke makers and Next Big Thing gadget creation, I have no idea… and the more economists and politicians I listen to, the more I suspect that no one else has a bloody clue either. If anyone can show me how this *isn’t* a big old zero-sum game that’s going to hit a brick wall sometime soon, please pipe up and do so.
http://futurismic.com/2011/08/01/foxconns-robot-recruitment-drive-the-beginning-of-the-end-of-labour/

[Keith_McClary]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('AgentR11', 'W')HY am I going to want to work hard enough to provide the goods and services for the remaining 95% of the population?

I don't need much income, I don't have a large family, my widgets will be just as cheap as the widgets bought by others..... If you are to appeal to greed, its apparent to me that if I were to use those funds for anything noticeable at all, I'd all of a sudden be characterized as that arrogant, nasty, rich SOB with the job Bob supposedly wants.

[AgentR11]

This exposes the flaw in taxing income and consumption.

Tax assets. Regardless of whether owned by Super Cool Corp or Sweet Innocence Trust.

Both ownership, and each time they cross a national border.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Sixstrings', ' ')You cannot have an economy of artists because even art is subject to economies of scale, automation and efficiency.

[copious.abundance]

And for Sixstrings' benefit I'm going to quote my original post in this thread.
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('OilFinder2', 'T')he problem with anti-utopian pieces like Vonnegut's is twofold. Even if were somehow true that all those workers could be replaced by robots ...

1. If most workers except a handful of engineers and managers lost their jobs to robots, not many people would have enough money to buy the products the robots manufactured. It would ultimately be self-defeating.

2. There is an alternative possibility that #1 would be overcome by vastly increased productivity coupled with a collapse in prices. Kublikhan above touched on this. Automation could make things so inexpensive that even part-time workers would be able to afford them. And society would become so productive that most people could work part-time and, with the help of automation, produce a very high value of goods, thus enabling high wages per hour and large paychecks for relatively little work. This could also free up a large segment of the population to work in non-goods producing sectors of the economy. We've already been seeing this phenomenon the past several decades. Imagine just 5% of the population engineering & producing material goods needed for the whole population, while the other 95% works as artists, bankers, real estate agents, retail clerks, government bureaucrats, etc. Even if the wages of the 95% aren't that high, the high productivity of the first 5% means that the goods they produce would be cheap enough for everyone to afford.

[Sixstrings]

Oil, why can't you just have a conversation.. you don't have to be right.. this isn't about peak oil or cornucopia or politics there is no right or wrong we're just talking about robots and what that means for employment.

And you did say artists, now I gotta go copy and paste it.

Here:

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'O')ilFinder2 wrote:
Imagine just 5% of the population engineering & producing material goods needed for the whole population, while the other 95% works as artists, bankers, real estate agents, retail clerks, government bureaucrats, etc.

[copious.abundance]

I did not just say artists. You seemed to think I was only talking about artists, when I had a whole list of other occupations in my list.

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('OilFinder2', 'I') did not just say artists. You seemed to think I was only talking about artists, when I had a whole list of other occupations in my list.

[copious.abundance]

Apology accepted.

It would be easier to go with the flow of the conversation if you actually *read* and *paid attention* to what I said. Once you start putting words in my mouth you're damn right the discussion is gonna go awry, and for good reason.

[peeker01]

you two fight like a couple of women

[AgentR11]

I hate you!
I'm gonna strangle you!
WTF you doing!
F U
Why you!

Wanna play bridge?
Sure.

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('peeker01', 'y')ou two fight like a couple of women

[prajeshbhat]

The computer was supposed to bring the 4 day work week. How did that work out?

[americandream]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('prajeshbhat', 'T')he computer was supposed to bring the 4 day work week. How did that work out?

[prajeshbhat]

When the steam engine came out, the luddites were saying these machines will make people completely obsolete and everyone will be unemployed. In the early 20th century we had people saying the other extreme. People were saying technology will be so advanced no body will ever have to work again. Of course all technology did was to make us better at what we have already been doing for the past 5000 years, accumulate material wealth and fight wars. There will never be a permanent vacation voluntary work utopia like OilFinder imagines.

[AdTheNad]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Sixstrings', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('peeker01', 'y')ou two fight like a couple of women

[Sixstrings]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('prajeshbhat', 'W')hen the steam engine came out, the luddites were saying these machines will make people completely obsolete and everyone will be unemployed. In the early 20th century we had people saying the other extreme. People were saying technology will be so advanced no body will ever have to work again. Of course all technology did was to make us better at what we have already been doing for the past 5000 years, accumulate material wealth and fight wars. There will never be a permanent vacation voluntary work utopia like OilFinder imagines.

[prajeshbhat]

It may be worthwhile to remember that we live in the age of economies of scale. Cheap energy allowed vertical integration of companies, especially energy companies. What basically happened was human labor was replaced by machines which were powered by cheap fossil fuels, so companies were able to save enormous amount on wages. After all, the only cost of production is wages. If energy also starts costing a lot of money, the vertical integration model will fall apart and so will the economies of scale. ConocoPhillips just announced it is going to break up.