Comment by NemoNobody | Hacker News Reader

Comment by NemoNobody | Hacker News Reader

I appreciate that everyone is concerned with the effects that UBI would have on our current economic system but I don't think we should get hung up there. This is the future system - it's not ideal, it's necessary.

I know it's disconcerting but if you actually look into automation you'll realize that the only real reason we haven't already entirely automated several industries that employ millions of people - it just wasn't cost effective to do so. The tech has existed for years and years in many cases and no job is "safe" - try to find one, that's also disturbing.

I estimate the pandemic accelerated our adoption of automation by at least a decade - I'll spare the wall of text; I think only about 10% of the workforce employed today will be employed in 10-20 years.

I believe this is the most issue of our time.

We would literally have to fight to keep our jobs... is that really what we want?

I want the robots. I want to learn a the instruments and pickup more languages, watch all my shows and spend all my time with people I love.

All of human civilization has suffered to get us to this point - we owe all those before and after us to make the correct choice.

While I agree with your general notions on automation, I think UBI isn't necessary.

Some other alternatives include expanding the service sector, legislating human roles in workflows, and/or simply producing less humans. Not saying any of these are good ideas, but when the alternative is creating a permanent underclass that represents 90% of society, we may have to choose between least-worst options.

Personally, I look outside and see plenty of work that needs doing though, so I don't think these kinds of trade-offs really need to be made. We have entire cities that humans could be rebuilding, natural environments to restore, and call centers to man (so I can get actual customer service when I call my bank). Let's watch less TV shows and do that instead.

I think it’s questionable that automating everything will end suffering. While some will find meaning in a post work world, I imagine most will end up lost.

You see it a lot even here. People struggling to find a personal programming project because most ideas have already been done. Now scale this up to everything. People like to work on meaningful things. And we might just end up taking away meaning.

Would anyone bother to learn to draw when AI could do it better? Would anyone bother to learn other languages when your AirPods will translate any language in real-time.

Will people bother to socialise when their VR friend bots are easier and more accessible?

I don’t think we can just assume things will end up better when for hundreds of years, life satisfaction has largely gone down.

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