Re:Not the autoworkers of our generation
by wildgift on Monday September 02, 2013 @10:36PM
(#6318410)
What if the problems to solve are becoming easier to solve, because we're more plugged-in into an infrastructure of information? That eliminates work.
Standards are a good example. We love them, but, in a way, they eliminate the creation of middleware jobs that transform the data from one format to another.
Good point, but it touches on a refrain I've seen in the comments: that it might be better to keep the world in an inefficient state. Standards rise up after the complexity of interoperability becomes too much to handle.
As to your point about information, the volume of data these days requires increasingly sophisticated analysis. There seems to be a shift in sentiment around Big Data, that algorithms are still too unsophisticated to provide useful output, and that's a good sign that not only is there a lot of work to be done in this area, but a large volume of information doesn't automatically guarantee quality insight.
Regarding your last point, I think a knowledge worker smart enough to automate themselves out of a job will be smart enough to capitalize on that discovery. Moreover, there will always be tasks people will prefer done manually, knowledge-based or otherwise.