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Comment by munificent | Hacker News Reader

> human workers benefits in the long term from the elimination of tedious work.

Given how many humans currently work at tedious jobs, the conclusion to come to is that they prefer that over no income at all. So simply eliminating that job isn't doing them any favors unless there's some solution for how they will still be able to pay their bills.

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By eliminating tedious work, their bills would become smaller. That's the idea with progress, anyways.

I don't think you are looking at the big picture either. New technology is constantly creating new jobs at the cost of old ones. Just like self-driving cars may displace truck drivers, so did new machines displace 19th century factory workers. However, this is such a small problem because the long-term economic benefits are enormous.

I think people fail to see what "economic benefits" actually means for them. It means that you start spending less time fighting off tuberculosis, dying from an infection, dying from childbirth complications, lowering the cost of living, etc. These things ultimately make it easier for any given person to sustain themselves, if it benefits society.

Take GMOs. They increase crop yields, making it cheaper to buy food. Sure it may have eliminated some jobs along the way, but then those guys ended up getting cheaper food at the cost of a having to find a new job.

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