Comment by zizee | Hacker News Reader

Comment by zizee | Hacker News Reader

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I often see this pessimistic prediction, and I don't get it.

What benefit would someone have to not pass on cost savings to consumers if they had a super effective robot to do something? And regardless of their motives, how would they stop it from happening? Patents have limited lifetimes and and techniques developed will be quickly replicated/democratized.

Perhaps someone could corner the market for a while, but not indefinitely.

In the end, the result of automated production will be downward pressure on prices, with consumables trending towards $0.

With this in mind, it strikes me that the pessimistic predictions stem from the idea that there is a secret cabal of the "wealthy" who take great pleasure* in keeping their fellowman down. Today, by many measurements people living in wealthy countries have a standard of living so far superior to that of kings of old. Has the secret cabal been just lying in wait until now to strike?

* sure, some percentage of billionaires are probably sociopaths, but I'm sure most are not.

In the very limit, at full, 100% automation, this might hold true. But right up until that point, there will still be some jobs that need to be done by humans. And if we don't fundamentally change our understanding/social contract of what it means to be a Valuable (TM) human being and member of a society, there will be huge conflicts arising from this.

Think of all the anti-welfare rhetoric around people just being "too lazy to work." If this continues to be a socially-accepted way of thinking about people without jobs, then automating away significant portions of the required workforce will be very painful for the victims of the process.

Interestingly the three responses to my comment are quite similar, which makes me wonder that I misunderstood what the grandparent was writing.

> That logic assumes humans want to share equitably the ownership of robots and their benefits.

I read that as the robot ownders not wanting to share, but now I see that perhaps the grandparent was talking about society as a whole.

I suspect the difference here is one of context. I live in a country that has a fairly strong social safety net when compared to the popular conception of the safety net in the United States of America.

1) Even if the cost of products approaches 0, consumers will still need some kind of income to attain them. UBI could help in that regard, but it's still a far way off.

2) The transition period might not be that pleasant. A lot of people will be left without any means to provide for themselves while the rest of society struggles to adapt.

3) Removing the need for labour will be a major game changer to our society. A lot of people will be left with a feeling of having no purpose and nothing to do. Fostering a culture of creativity to fill people's waken hours sounds like a good thing, but I fear there will be a lot of social unrest if people don't have anything to do.

This is exactly the fear of many at the moment. A solution being talked is to tax robots (or automation to be more specific). Expect more research to come out from Academia over next few years. Even Bill Gates has been advocating its consideration:

https://qz.com/911968/bill-gates-the-robot-that-takes-your-j...

> What benefit would someone have to not pass on cost savings to consumers if they had a super effective robot to do something?

Literal monetary benefit.

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