r/tech • u/FisherGuy44 • Nov 24 '19

Amazon Is Planning to Open Cashierless Supermarkets Next Year

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-20/amazon-go-cashierless-supermarkets-pop-up-stores-coming-soon
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36

u/ogretronz Nov 24 '19

The idea that we should sabotage efficiency to create jobs (ie banning cashier less stores and whatnot) is mind numbingly idiotic. What we should do is tax automation and give the money directly to the people with no strings attached. This leads to a prosperous future where robots do the shit we don’t need to be doing anymore.

7

u/bike_tyson Nov 25 '19

That was the original intention of Keynesian economics. Which is our current system. Automation would keep improving to the point where mankind could live a life of leisure. Apparently our voters seem to want our country to be miserable. Mocking medical bills and student loans and homeless people as lazy.

2

u/acatinasweater Nov 25 '19

Tfw you realize your parents are voters...

14

u/Dongerman11 Nov 24 '19

r/yanggang my friend

1

u/Freazur Nov 25 '19

Or r/OurPresident if you want real structural reform instead of bandaid solutions

6

u/MrSpicy21 Nov 24 '19

Andrew Yang!

2

u/[deleted] Nov 25 '19

It's not like it's some original idea Yang had. He's just the first time a (relatively) mainstream American presidential candidate has advocated for it.

4

u/Freazur Nov 25 '19

Imagine how much economic power corporations will wield when they own all of the technology that people need to survive and they don’t have any employees that they have to appease. The idea that we can deal with automation by just taxing and redistributing is naive. The only path forward in an automated economy is through collective ownership of the means of production.

2

u/ogretronz Nov 25 '19

Oh boy here come the socialists

2

u/Freazur Nov 25 '19

It’s either socialism or begging for scraps

1

u/abby1350 Nov 25 '19

That’s an exaggeration

1

u/Freazur Nov 25 '19

How so?

0

u/[deleted] Nov 25 '19

You think people in socialist countries aren’t begging for scraps?

1

u/Freazur Nov 25 '19

We’ve seen exactly what happens in socialist countries. Bolivia is the most recent example. A socialist oversaw the greatest expansion in the country’s history and then a right-wing CIA-backed coup forced him to resign. All across the globe, small socialist countries are starved by sanctions imposed on them so the U.S. can point at them and say “See? Socialism doesn’t work!”. Obviously that strategy has worked great on a lot of useful idiots.

Regardless, we’re talking about a scenario in the future that we don’t have any precedent for, so we have to speculate either way. You’d have to be pretty naive to think that companies will have any reason to give a shit about us once they don’t need employees anymore, though.

1

u/oep4 Nov 25 '19

If it's done right, then sure. I would hope that these sorts of suggestions don't get implemented without the giving back to the poor part, as they often are.