Andrew Sharp opines that it may be a while before robots blend in at dinner parties, win an election, or discuss the nature of selfhood with their human handlers as envisioned in Isaac Asimov science fiction. But though they are yet to take over the world, robots are quietly taking over our jobs.
They do not look much like Asimov robots, but they aree working in manufacturing, warehouses, software. One example is the driverless trucks that could soon put millions of truckers out of work. There are even driverless tractors, as if we needed to get rid of more agriculture workers.
A study from University of Oxford researchers, in fact, estimates up to 47% of jobs in the U.S. are at risk of being automated in the next 20 years.
That is a long way from all of the jobs, of course. We will still need people to keep the robots in good working order, as long as they do not come up with a robot that can do that. But if the pace of automation outstrips the number of new jobs, and 47% in 20 years would, our lumbering economy may not able to adjust in time to prevent a crisis, just as it has done a poor job of adjusting to the changes in manufacturing so far. (For examples, see Rust Belt.) Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump campaigned against companies moving jobs overseas. But though that got the crowds excited, can we really go back to a golden age of American manufacturing? Manufacturing jobs are exactly the ones being automated.
Yet the idea of divorcing labor and income, guaranteeing money regardless of the work you do or do not do, grates against human values. For millennia, we have learned the truth of the idea that he who does not work, neither shall he eat. Just the thought of a guaranteed income raises the specter of lots of lazy people sitting around golfing all day, not bothering to contribute anything to society.
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