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Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by andrepd on Sunday December 08, 2019 @02:00PM (#21737502)
>4. If I successfully automate it, all of my coworkers lose their jobs.

A failure of capitalism when less work and more productivity is a bad thing.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by beefield on Sunday December 08, 2019 @03:52PM (#21738226)
If there is one thing that confuses me, that is productivity.

You start doing the thing you were doing twice as fast earlier, thus your productivity doubles. Kind of, assuming that the price of your product does not change due to your increased productivity. If the price halves at the same time (e.g due to competitive pressure because you were not the only one to figure how to spend half the time doing same thing) your productivity measured in dollars did not change at all. Weird. You do twice the stuff at same time than before and now I claim your productivity did not change. Makes no sense whatsoever. So did your productivity increase or not? I have no clue.

Even further confusion. Your increased(?) productivity just caused that with same amount of money people can by more of your stuff, i.e deflation. Now, why the heck, given the massive increase in productivity(?) during the last century, we have seen inflation, not deflation? Makes no sense to me.

It looks to me like we would need to have more words for different kinds of productivity. Because at least I am confused as heck what that word actually means...

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by Sebb767 on Sunday December 08, 2019 @06:02PM (#21739054)
The problem here is that you measure your productivity in revenue instead of something like products per hour. This is not inherently wrong, but then the benchmark is keeping your revenue by not loosing it to your competitor, who is also automating.

Also, if your market isn't already saturated, you can even sell more of your product without dropping the price. It really boils down to the fact that selling is what brings money, not producing.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by analog31 on Sunday December 08, 2019 @11:34PM (#21740416)
Another way to look at it, is that your productivity equals your salary, i.e., marginal value added per unit of factor input. You work the same number of hours or years. You receive the same money. So your productivity is the same.

For the employer, the productivity of their capital investment has increased.

You might be able to increase your productivity if you can leverage a salary increase, or figure out how to sell the automation to your employer for more than your salary, or sell it to others.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by SiVal on Sunday December 08, 2019 @10:54PM (#21740288)
why the heck, given the massive increase in productivity(?) during the last century, we have seen inflation, not deflation?

Because the money supply increased even faster than the goods & services supply.

Goods and services are traded in an economy, but finding a way to exchange A (ex: shoes) for B (ex: chicken nuggets) is such a chore that economic activity is limited. Money is a solution, like a hub city for air travel: the easiest way to guarantee a route between all pairs of nodes in the network. Trade shoes for money, then trade money for chicken nuggets. You're still trading shoes for nuggets, but now it's much easier, which helps everyone.

Everything gets priced in money (say, "dollars"), but if something is mispriced, arbitrage takes place. Buy an underpriced thing for a few dollars, trade it directly for an overpriced thing, then sell the overpriced thing for a lot of dollars. Money for nothin'. But once others catch on, they demand trade terms that give them the profit, changing prices until they can't be arbitraged.

So everything gets priced relative to everything else, and all prices can be expressed in "dollars".

If the maker of dollars decides to increase the supply by a factor of ten and no change in goods & services takes place, You have ten times as many dollars being offered for the SAME goods and services as before. Arbitrage will quickly push all prices to where the goods and services still have the same value relative to one another but their price relative to the dollar has changed by a factor of ten. Everything is "ten times as expensive" in dollars but not in terms of what people really need: other goods & services.

If you make the same number of generic shoes, twice as many generic electronic widgets, and ten times as many dollars, shoes will be traded for ten times as many dollars ("price" goes up 10x), and even widgets go up by 5x, because although productivity made 2x as many widgets, the number of dollars went up 10x.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by JoeAltmaier on Sunday December 08, 2019 @11:42PM (#21740449)
Folks often assign the output of automated systems to the creator. This seems a fallacy. The output of an engineer creating an automated system is, the automated system. The output of the automated systems is the product of … the automated system. Who owns that? In a capitalist system, whomever paid for it.

This is quickly becoming an issue. As industrial output is rapidly becoming exclusively the product of automated systems, the 'worker' becomes irrelevant. The limit is, none of us do appreciable work for standard goods. And since we're not working, we're not getting paid, and we can't afford the goods.

We're gonna need a new system.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by iudqnolq on Monday December 09, 2019 @02:46PM (#21745729)
But isn't the value of the automated system the engineer produced to the business the sum of the value the system will create minus what has to be spent on it (compute power, maintenance).

(Emphasizing to the business to avoid a tired argument about value really being what the market will pay. In technical econ terms by value I mean the private benefit of the consumer of the automation)

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by JoeAltmaier on Tuesday December 10, 2019 @09:12AM (#21752546)
That 'tired argument' is how capitalism works. So like it or not, an Engineer is paid the going rate.

The value of the automated system is clear. The value of the engineer is the automated system. Which might be quite expensive, but nothing like the value of its output.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by iudqnolq on Tuesday December 10, 2019 @06:59PM (#21758155)
I was trying to talk about the value the engineer produces from the perspective of their employer, which is separate from what that employer is willing to pay the engineer. In economics terms, I'm talking about the consumer surplus (the employer is the consumer of the labor the engineer produces, and has a surplus because they get more value than they are paying).

I called it a tired argument not because it definitely isn't true but because I'm tired of people shutting down unrelated conversations with it to look smart.

A simple scenario that shows these are separate concepts:

Suppose we have an extremely dumb firm that pays the engineer a trillion dollars to create an product that can make whoever owns it a billion dollars.

Suppose we have an extremely dumb engineer that charges a different firm $1 to produce the same product.

Suppose both firms are trying to sell the automation to a third firm. Their expenses are a sunk cost; this firm isn't going to pay the dumb firm that overspent any more. The value of the product is (generally) separate from your cost of making the product.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by rfhjt on Monday December 09, 2019 @01:08PM (#21744845)
It's been like that since the Stone age. The reason it's like that is the fundamental forces that drive humans: greed, cruelty, ego and all that. Hard to expect someone in power to not get more power if he's blinded by greed. How many people do you know that voluntarily spend 25% of their income on those who are lower on the social ladder? I don't know anyone, myself included.
Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by odrekf on Sunday December 08, 2019 @02:45PM (#21737802)
Why is that a failure? I didn't know every job had to last a lifetime.
Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by bryanrasmussen on Sunday December 08, 2019 @02:57PM (#21737882)
it's a failure because that condition was one of the reasons that he did not automate his job. A success of capitalism would be if it provided some incentive to automate the job.
Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by odrekf on Sunday December 08, 2019 @03:05PM (#21737948)
Heh, good point. But still I wouldn't call it a failure, just a defect, or not optimal. The company as a whole probably works just fine.
Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by pytester on Sunday December 08, 2019 @02:53PM (#21737861)
If capitalism wasn't systemically geared towards creating an underclass of unemployed and desperate part time workers it might not be a failure.
Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by studentik on Sunday December 08, 2019 @03:17PM (#21738020)
Capitalism is only bad for those who do not share profits coming from better productivity. Government regulation is needed to balance inequality created by capitalism: progressive tax, competition laws, professional unions etc. Workers are also responsible to bargain deals that make them share more benefits and raise their bar. This is everlasting struggle.
Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by perl4ever on Sunday December 08, 2019 @11:13PM (#21740354)
Well, as others mention, you capture profits from automation when you automate your own job and don't tell people, so you only make your own life easier.

Of course, I'm sure there are people who did that and then lost their job when their boss discovered they didn't do much of anything any more.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by f2000 on Sunday December 08, 2019 @02:54PM (#21737865)
Very true. My brother lost his job at Blockbuster when they closed down. Since then he hasn't been able to find a job. When I mentioned to him that unemployment is at a 50 year low and maybe now would be a good time to try again to find a job he was dismissive. He went on to explain to me how due to capitalism he will never work again. Now I can't stop worrying that I'll lose my job and never be able to work again.
Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by bernierocks on Sunday December 08, 2019 @02:57PM (#21737886)
I really have a hard time believing that after your brother lost his job at Blockbuster (10 years ago?) that he will 'never work again'.

On top of this, Capitalism is what continues to create new jobs, and ensures, for the post part, that you will be able to find another job if you lose your current one.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by rumanator on Sunday December 08, 2019 @03:08PM (#21737964)
Blaming an economic system for one's lack of motivation to search for work sounds like a cheap deflection.

Moreover, it's not like Blockbuster was known for hiring skilled workers.

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by rumanator on Sunday December 08, 2019 @03:09PM (#21737970)
> A failure of capitalism when less work and more productivity is a bad thing.

Do you believe buggy whip manufacturers should be entitled to their old job even today?

Re:Learning to code vs. learning to automate by mofosyne on Monday December 09, 2019 @05:36AM (#21741609)
They may not be entitied to a job... but they certainly are entitled to not be screwed below the poverty line through no fault of their own, just because the the owner wanted an extra buck.

Hence the universal basic income.