Automation is inevitable and will end skilled and wage work

Technology and process doesn’t always progress society

Technology has enabled us to live longer, more enjoyable, and productive lives. As workers and consumers, we correlate those things as being net positives without analyzing the negative effects that technology can have on people’s lives. Technology inserts itself actively without asking permission. To understand the historical impact of technological development some simple historical parallels can be drawn.

The most touted historical advancement of technologies with positive and negative effects is the cotton gin. The cotton gin allowed from the expansion of the American cotton market, and for the easier collection of cotton. Subsequently, the demand for slaves increased. Similar developments occurred with development of the mill, and the creation of movable parts. Easier to manufacture product lowered the need for skilled workers and increased the need for non-skilled workers. In all of the above conditions, the conditions of the low-skilled workers decreased. As a pattern this continues up to automation and takes a predictable turn after the use of foreign labor.

The price of goods hit a historic low. The need for workers continues to decrease, as does the need for cheap markets and workers. The solution to this problem is to send the market, product, and brand to foreign entities. The cost of goods dipped relatively and the labor and market fallout was almost instantaneous. The transfer of first world culture was met with the transfer of third world poverty.  Trade agreements and nationalism help to cement a system of delayed innovation that makes human involvement. Price point delays automation, but only for a while.

Transfer of goods, localization of markets, availability of goods, and the development of cheaper technology makes robots more attractive than people as workers. Robots work endlessly, cost nothing, and are replaceable. The argument that people build the robots is only applicable till adaptive A.I. and machine shops build the robots.

So what is the modern worlds solution to the complete ejection of humanity in the workplace? The answer is twofold. The first is Sartian in nature, humans will engage in higher pursuits. The application of history says otherwise. The complexity of work and availability of materials and capital don’t lead to greater scientific or societal advancement. American colonialism failed to produce calculus, the Gutenberg Press didn’t lead to an immediate explosion of physicists, and the development of 3d printers has not produced synthesists. The second is reeducation. Workers simply need to find out what robots can’t do. For example, robots can build cars, recognize faces and behavioral patterns, clean an entire building, quantify logical patterns, drive cars, move objects, weld, do surgery, calculate complex equations, and build other robots. As technology develops workers just need to outpace what free arms with infinite brains and capability can accomplish, or learn how to write poetry. Humanity can’t become completely irrelevant.