Are people waking up to the fact that technological unemployment is a real thing?
Our view is that technological unemployment is a real thing. Many of our team members were drawn to the Manna project for this reason. Their backgrounds led them to understand how realistic an outcome this is.
Over the last couple years, there are many reports published that reach a similar conclusion: a large percentage of jobs are at risk of being eliminated due to automation. These reports are similar regardless of who does them. We saw ones from Wall Street banks and organizations like the World Economic Forum.
We are seeing the resistance to this idea starting to falter. More people are waking up to the fact this is going to be a reality.
The latest is an uprising out of the hospitality industry.
In Las Vegas, 50,000 workers of the Culinary Worker's Union are set to go on strike to protest the threat to automation.
Among the demands of the 50,000 members of the Culinary Workers Union are higher wages, better job security, and protections against automation. The workers, whose contracts are up on June 1, are employed by more than 30 of the city’s renowned resorts.
This is both encouraging and disheartening.
The encouraging part is that people are waking up to the threat of what is going on. This is the message that needs to spread.
What is disheartening is they are asking for protection against the automation. That isn't going to happen. The Luddites proved how fruitless a proposition that is. Technology cannot be stopped.
Another gaffe here is that they are asking for higher wages. While this might make sense on the surface, it only ensures that automation happens quicker. Corporations have greater incentive to automate a job if they have to pay $30 an hour versus $15.
This is the ironic twist in this technological age. Higher wages and more protection provide more incentive for a company to automate.
Since the turn of the century, this story keeps getting repeated.
The real-world impact of automation is tough to understate. In the decade after 2000, robots and A.I. were responsible for about 87 percent of jobs lost in the United States, according to one study. American jobs as a whole face cutbacks of 38 percent by 2030, according to another. The issue is significant enough for the Executive Office of the President put together a 55-page report outlining how technologies like A.I. And robotics could displace millions of workers.
Automation is also likely to affect workers across the board. Both blue-collar jobs, such as truckers and hospitality workers, and white-collar ones, such as attorneys and financial advisors, are at risk.
If these forecasts are anywhere near close to true, it will lead to massive layoffs. Automation is only getting stronger. Most of the damage was in the blue collar world but it is expanding. We are starting to see white collar jobs being put at risk.
So what happens when all these people are put out of work? Many already make the case that the employment situation, as presented by the government, is misleading. They are convinced things are actually very bad for most people, a fact confirmed by studies done by the United Way and the Fed.
Trying to deny what is happening never solves anything.
For members of the Culinary Workers Union, this strike isn’t so much a show of outright opposition to technology as it is an effort to integrate disruptive tech into a compatible role with humans.
https://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/las-vegas-automation-strike/
This is a noble approach but one that is certain to meet a conclusion different than what they strive for. History shows that workers only interact with disruptive technology until the tech advances. Once that happens, the workers are not needed.
The Manna project was started to try and get ahead of the curve. We realize that most people are not aware of what is going on. Political leaders are either equally unaware or do not want to touch the issue. This creates an environment ripe for everyone to be caught off guard.
Poverty is something we are trying to stamp out. We realize that we are not going to be able to help all people. Part of our role is to bring awareness and education to people.
We believe technological unemployment is a real thing. So do 50,000 culinary workers in Vegas. Many of the leaders of technology companies buy into this idea.
How about you? Do you think technological unemployment is something that will happen? Or is this nothing more than scare tactics?
If you are one who does not believe it, we have one question for you: what if you are wrong?
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My favorite video on the subject.
I think full unemployment is what humanity has been working towards since we stopped being hunter gatherers tens of thousands of years ago. If we can have our technology basically render most of our need to work as redundant we will have achieved a great milestone in evolution.
What needs to change is the concept of a job. I don't mean producing some meaningful work (value), that will always exist, but the concept of the forty, or fifty, sixty, seventy, eighty hour week. How bizarre that the less actual work there is to do, with some people unable to find any paying occupation, is conversely represented by the balance of 'workers' who are forced to work ever longer hours, and do multiple roles, or even multiple jobs.
I suppose this reads like some kind of socialist manifesto, but politics is far from my mind, this is merely about pragmatism. There is no sense in one third of people working too hard, while two thirds look on jealously for a lack of resources and self respect.
I don't know how the square can be made circular, but perhaps MANNA can aid the transition.
Automation is displayed as something that will be bad for us and take away milliosn of jobs. But nobody talks about the advantages and how it will create more possibilites and a shift of working force. The die-hard capitalist might think that few people will have all the robots and all the money. I think that form of dystopia is far from the truth. We will finally see some good efforts towards automated cities and automated farms which distribute to the community. I personally will surely go that way and give back to the people if I make it with crypto or somehow else and many other volutaryists will do the same. I see a golden future in which Manna has a place to ease our financial situation and so will tons of other cryptos. There is value in so much and companies will start to share with the customers or loose them to companies who will. I envision a Utopia and work towards making that happen.
Even if they don't want to wake up, what will make them wake up is coming on their door to get them sacked and replaced by bot cos bots are now doing what men should do and that's why there is scarcity of work and that's what world has become. Technology world
No chefs???
https://www.digitaltrends.com/cool-tech/spyce-restaurant-boston-robots/
I think with sufficiently advanced technology, employment will not be necessary. However, I am not convinced we are anywhere near that. You mentioned luddites and it's true that technology has been putting people out of work for hundreds or even thousands of years. Just think how many people with shovels bulldozers and backhoes put out of work. However, new technology tends to also create new jobs. It's not so much that jobs have been lost, it's that the types of jobs have changed and change, as always, will continue.
Having said that, I'm fully supportive of projects like Manna. As long as it is voluntary, it is a good thing.
one of the best ways to remain relevant in an increasingly automated world is to learn to fix, build or otherwise interface with your replacement. humans will always feel a need to supervise a machines work. that means if you are qualified you will prosper... until they automate prosperity lol