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Comment by _audakel | Hacker News Reader

> There simply isn't enough work to go around.

Dissagree. Technolgy works best when augmented with humans, however the training needed for ppl (ie truck drivers) may take longer to retool their minds then they have life left. So there may be a generation gap in jobs. Also consider space as the final frontier. How much work will be needed to build fleets of ships to colonize space and all that entails?

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Disagree all you want to, the market clearly finds your argument unpersuasive.

Yes, that's the point. "The market" is not a system that is suited for this. The market is not going to get people to make cool paths through parks, clean up the neighbourhood, etc. because the market doesn't derive shareholder profits from that at current wages. That work though is indisputably valuable stuff that could be done. Clearly, we have proven that there is plenty more work to go around and that the market is "wrong" about this.

I'm fairly certain that no proof of any kind has been presented that there is plenty of work just lying around waiting to be done. Idle speculation certainly, but proof?

It's trivially true. Garbage men could pick up the trash 5x as often. Individual people could come cook for everyone. Parks could be maintained 10x as much. Trash collectors could clean up the streets all the time. More people could help the IRS catch crooks. etc. All of those things happen but 5x more people could do those jobs as well, but that would make them unprofitable to shareholders i.e. not worth paying someone minimum wage to do it. So this system doesn't get people to do that work.

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