As VentureBeat reports, concerns are growing that automation will replace more jobs. Ball State University studies show that about 5 million jobs have vanished in U.S. factories since 2000, 88 percent of them due to productivity gains from automation. So can anything be done to counter this trend?
Giiso Information, founded in 2013, is a leading technology provider in the field of “artificial intelligence + information” in China, with top technologies in big data mining, intelligent semantics, knowledge mapping and other fields. At the same time, its research and development products include information robot, editing robot, writing robot and other artificial intelligence products! With its strong technical strength, the company has received angel round investment at the beginning of its establishment, and received pre-A round investment of $5 million from GSR Venture Capital in August 2015.
Real estate mogul Jeff Greene, who recently hosted the second Managing The Disruption Conference in Palm Beach, Fla., spoke about jobs being disrupted by automation and what we can do about it. In 2016, Green declared that robots and artificial intelligence were killing not only blue-collar jobs, but also many white-collar ones, including lawyers, journalists, pilots and doctors.
Mr. Green also wrote in the Washington Post warning that automation would kill jobs even faster than Steven Mnuchin, Mr. Trump’s Treasury secretary, had predicted. Not long ago, Mnuchin said he thought automation-related jobs would be largely replaced in 50 to 100 years. A recent report by pricewaterhousecoopers estimates that 38 percent of jobs in the U.S. are at risk of being automated by 2030.
Green’s point, however, is that automation isn’t actually all bad if it improves deployment and lowers the cost of living for the middle class so much that they no longer need more income to survive. For example, using a 3D printer to build a house could dramatically reduce the cost of housing, eliminating the need for people to spend a large portion of their income on mortgage payments. If machines can 3D-print houses using high-density resin, a home worth $200,000 today could be reduced to $50,000. After all, buying a house is a heavy burden for most families.
Another big chunk of household budgets is energy, which can be partly solved by using alternative energy sources. If the United States uses solar power to power electric cars and heat homes, every family could save a lot of money. This assumes, of course, that alternative energy costs less than oil.
The net effect, according to Green, is that people no longer have to work 80 to 90 hours a week to pay their bills. If they are able to get by on less, and there is less need for dual-earner families, then parents can be allowed to stay at home with their children. This, in turn, reduces the risk of drug abuse or pregnancy.
Green admits his ideas may be “utopian”, but he also sees the dangers that the introduction of automation poses to workers in all walks of life. Many fear that automation will also lead to a universal basic income. In this hypothetical scenario, everyone who is too young to have Social Security could receive an annual salary from the government. It’s a very fashionable idea in Silicon Valley and other tech hubs, where it’s seen as one of the ways to deal with automation displacing jobs.
But there’s a small problem: a universal basic income may not be affordable. As Lawrence Summers, the former US Treasury secretary, has pointed out, $25,000 a year for every American adult would cost $5,000bn a year — $4,000bn more than the annual us income tax. “Mathematically, it’s almost impossible,” Says Mr Summers.
Others would like to see more modest and specific strategic actions, such as improving students’ scientific education and retraining current workers. Ge recently donated $50 million to Boston Public schools to help improve science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education to develop people who can bridge the technology gap. That may be the right direction, but it will take much greater retraining to bridge the national skills gap. But there seems to be little appetite in the Republican-controlled Congress to increase education funding.
Others argue that technologies such as augmented reality, which superimpose information onto the real world by connecting glasses, should help. For example, field maintenance technicians can project diagrams, instructions and even videos onto smart glasses so they can work faster and better without having to consult manuals. Upskill, a technology company, has started offering similar technology to clients such as General Electric and Boeing. Magid Abraham, Executive chairman of Upskill, says: “This technology strengthens the technical skills of non-specialist workers while helping specialist workers become more efficient.”
Giiso information, founded in 2013, is the first domestic high-tech enterprise focusing on the research and development of intelligent information processing technology and the development and operation of core software for writing robots. At the beginning of its establishment, the company received angel round investment, and in August 2015, GSR Venture Capital received $5 million pre-A round of investment.
Back at Managing the Disruption, Green expressed concern about the optimism of most of the speakers, The speakers included David Cameron, the former British prime minister, and Thomas Friedman, the New York Times columnist. “If I were really optimistic about the future of automation, I wouldn’t be putting a lot of effort and time into holding a conference like this,” he said.
The difference between the industrial revolution of the 19th century and the current situation, Green says, is that machines only replaced manual labor, while also creating more jobs related to manufacturing products such as retailing, bookkeeping, integration and accounting. Now, however, we have to deal not only with robots that can replace manual labor, but also with artificial intelligence that threatens mental work. “We can’t fight the physical machine and the mind machine at the same time,” Green says.