sl4shd0rk writes:
"Bill Gates says everyone needs to prepare to be out of work in 20 years due to Robots/software taking over most jobs. In preparation for this, Gates recommends people 'should basically get on their knees and beg businesses to keep employing humans' and reduce operating overhead for businesses by 'eliminating payroll and corporate income taxes while also not raising the minimum wage'. Bill Gates, you may recall, is the former CEO of Microsoft whose business acumen has brought the technology sector such things as Metro, Windows Phone and Xbox One.
BusinessInsider took a similar theme earlier this year."
(Score: 2, Interesting) by Hombre on Monday March 17 2014, @09:09PM
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Monday March 17 2014, @09:31PM
He does not say it will eliminate every job. Just that the vast majority will be eliminated.
1 repairman per unit on a widget manufacturing floor (way overkill, probably averaging 1 per 20 or more) still eliminated a dozen jobs and left one.
Multiply this by just about any labor/low skill job and you have a major problem. Add to that the many high skill jobs that can be consolidated into one employee and a computer such as the CNC milling example given earlier and you have an even bigger problem.
(Score: 1) by Hombre on Tuesday March 18 2014, @01:42PM
They may be beneath you, but repair jobs generally require a pretty high level of skill and a lot of training. Except for plumbing. That's just shitty work. I couldn't do your job without training, and you couldn't do mine. There's no degree for my field (though I do hold a BS), but I had a fair amount of formal education and training (over 300 university credits).
Back on point, there is a distinction between skilled labor and unskilled labor. As I was getting at in a previous post, many unskilled labor jobs simply are not conducive to being replaced by automation simply because of logistics. If you mean the guy who bags your groceries, stocks the shelves and takes your order at the restaurant, sure. Most other things, not so much. Skilled labor, which is frequently done in the field, is even worse. Until there's an iRobot (and I mean that in the Asimov sense, not the Apple sense), the logistics are just too costly to make it worthwhile.
(Score: 2) by Nobuddy on Tuesday March 18 2014, @11:37PM
I do not equate the two, I meant them in more of an and/or scenario.
I agree somewhat to your points, but I do not think they are set in stone. progress has eliminated many skilled jobs- welding, draftsman, miller being some examples. The technology advances as well as the will to eliminate the jobs. Bag boys are going to be a lower priority than an assembly line welder simply because of pay- a return on investment scenario.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by c0lo on Monday March 17 2014, @09:48PM
Within the assumption of a stron AI, other machines, of course.
(partially valid) analogy: imagining they need a repair MAN to fix them is like imagining the humans need divine intervention when they get down with flu (instead of another human nurse/doctor).
Besides, who is to say the machines will repaired at all when they break? Do you go to a repair shop with your broken HDD?
(Score: 1) by TK on Tuesday March 18 2014, @10:33AM
I do. I say they will be.
Say you have a welding robot. One of the servos that controls an axis of motion fails. You could either take the whole (several ton) apparatus off of its foundation and move it to the loading bay to be shipped back to the manufacturer to be repaired, refurbished or scrapped. Then you have to unbox a new robot (several million dollars per unit in inventory?), move it into position, secure it to the foundation (easy or not, depending on the tolerance of the holes for the foundation bolts/studs/j-hooks), calibrate its sensors, and do a test run to check its alignment. Keep in mind during this process the line is not running, so you are not producing on any of the machines that deliver parts to this robot or take parts from it.
Or you could have a maintenance droid (or human) swap out one motor, check calibration, and do a test run (if necessary). Total downtime could be as little as a few hours.
Now at smaller scales it may be become practical to swap out entire machinery assemblies, but that's more of a niche case. In the interest of reducing downtime, and minimizing your stock of replacement parts (lean manufacturing is all the rage right now), repairmen/repairwomen/repairbots are the way to go.
The fleas have smaller fleas, upon their backs to bite them, and those fleas have lesser fleas, and so ad infinitum
(Score: 1) by Hombre on Tuesday March 18 2014, @01:53PM
The major manufacturers do not keep spare CT scanners sitting around waiting to be ordered. The ones that are made are already spoken for. If you run Toshiba, you cannot replace it with GE. Your techs, and doctors, have to be retrained for it. Even if the manufacturer does have one ready for you, it'll take close to a week to get it to you, then another week to install it and get it calibrated. During that whole time, the facility is likely on bypass, meaning no ambulance deliveries. So the hospital is losing an awful lot of money. All because you didn't want to fly me out with a part that I could've replaced in under a day.
You guys really need to look at it as a larger picture. Thinking about everything required to get the part installed. A robot isn't going to do it.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 18 2014, @01:14PM
(Score: 2) by snick on Monday March 17 2014, @09:51PM
More to the point: Who is going to buy the shit that the machines are making?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 18 2014, @07:39AM
The robot factory will just build a new one to replace it? It does not have to be more efficient than a human, just less expensive...
(Score: 1) by TheGrim on Tuesday March 18 2014, @08:01AM
Who fixes you when you break?
Other humans - for now.
(Score: 1) by alioth on Tuesday March 18 2014, @12:24PM
The robot repair robot, of course.