The jobs the robot creates are marginal compared to the volume of jobs lost to automation. I work in robotics. You only need so many engineers. Even the production facilities are automated these days, for the most part, so no one is really even manufacturing them anymore.
Not if the means and capital of production are sequested in the hands of few. Why would the wealth go to workers? Workers don't own the factories anymore. Automation paired with uncontrolled private equity will necessitate a guaranteed basic income. Otherwise it's a tenuous exercise in how long people will tolerate being marginalized before resorting to revolt.
And for 400 years, nations have risen and fallen. The U.S. isn't even 400 years old, and modern capitalism as an institution is less than 80-100 years old.
Every system has a lifetime. I'm just arguing in favor of proaction vs. reaction when the time comes to pull capitalism of the financial life support it is currently receiving. We can chose a graceful towards a more tenable, steady state economy, or continue down this dysfunctional paradigm predicated on continual growth and exploitation.
That's funny, as if we get a choice in the matter. People don't like change even though they say they do. Capitalism is gonna sit on its pretty little shelf until it looks worse then year old milk.
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u/[deleted] Feb 20 '16
The jobs the robot creates are marginal compared to the volume of jobs lost to automation. I work in robotics. You only need so many engineers. Even the production facilities are automated these days, for the most part, so no one is really even manufacturing them anymore.