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Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by morgante on Saturday April 09, 2016 @11:25AM (#11461653)
None of the automation that we're seeing is making it possible for one person to make everything he needs. Automation is increasing the returns to capital and making it possible for corporations to produce things with fewer employees—none of that implies that you'll suddenly be able to make things yourself.

If anything, increasing automation increases the returns to scale. You might conceivably build your own torch. But you're certainly not going to purchase a million dollar torch-making machine.

Automation poses a threat to the traditional economic model, but on the supply side not the demand side—you'll still be buying as much as before, you just probably won't have a job.

Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by nickpinkston on Saturday April 09, 2016 @12:17PM (#11461886)
However, at Plethora (my company) and others like ReThink robotics, etc. are lowering the barriers to automation so that small entities (people / firms) are able to develop products - which will put competitive pressure on current firms - driving price down and/or features up.

Plethora does this by removing the setup costs of manufacturing so you can do short runs affordably and actually be "agile" in your production.

ReThink does it by making it easy to automate existing SMB production lines - meaning small firms can automate what they have or rapidly reconfigure with lower setup costs.

Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by wcummings on Saturday April 09, 2016 @12:29PM (#11461943)
I've had the opportunity to play around w/ Rethink's product. If this is the state of the art, I'm not even a little bit afraid of automation.
Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by nickpinkston on Sunday April 10, 2016 @02:23PM (#11467452)
Haha - yea, there's a lot of work to do for sure. I'd argue also that just robotics isn't enough - cell design and machine interfacing is actually way more time than the robot programming itself.
Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by the_ancient on Saturday April 09, 2016 @01:14PM (#11462158)
>>you'll still be buying as much as before, you just probably won't have a job.

how will one continue to buy at the same level with no income?

Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by mblode on Saturday April 09, 2016 @05:52PM (#11463518)
Maybe a universal basic income for the majority of the population which may become structurally unemployed caused by automation.
Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by the_ancient on Saturday April 09, 2016 @06:37PM (#11463706)
That would require a change to the current economic model, the comment I replied to seems to indicate that Automation was not a threat to demand at all, but if everyone is out of work, demand for non-essential goods will be 0, no one will want a iphone if they do not have food.

So Automation is a threat to both supply and demand...

Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by morgante on Sunday April 10, 2016 @02:25AM (#11465165)
Sorry, perhaps my comment was unclear.

Automation is not a threat to demand in the sense that people won't stop demanding products because they are making them at home (as OP ridiculously claimed). Rather, automation will drastically change the economics on the supply side.

You're absolutely correct that unless managed well this could lead to mass poverty (and hence decreasing demand). I'm optimistic we will eventually find some solutions, either in the form of basic income or higher-order work.

Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by the_ancient on Sunday April 10, 2016 @07:26AM (#11465765)
History would seem to indicate we will go the Way of Elysium not Star Trek....

Most of the world will live in poverty (just like today) and a increasingly smaller group of humans will live in extreme luxury.

While idea's like UBI would be nice, the point to implement them I believe is past... They should have been created decades ago. If we wait until 20% or more of the jobs are replaced by automation, it will be to late for most people... Poverty will be the future... Poverty is the future for most.

Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by smarx007 on Sunday April 10, 2016 @02:24PM (#11467455)
Poverty is actually the reality for many today.
Re:Self-driving truck convoy completes its first major journ... by RyanZAG on Monday April 11, 2016 @06:33AM (#11470613)
Poverty is the reality for most people 100 years ago, and for all of history.

It's just in the last few hundred years where we've actually moved people out of poverty that we've come to the idea that people shouldn't be in poverty. Before that, it was just assumed that everyone besides the rulers were in poverty. And if you read stories from the time, there's never any idea that it could change or that peasants could all be royalty.

Stories from pre-1500 that involve wealth are all generally about an extremely lucky peasant being married up to royalty, and that was pretty much the only way to move up from poverty. Well, that or war.