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posted by janrinok on Monday June 11 2018, @01:45PM   Printer-friendly
from the cheery-start-to-the-week dept.

Good news! Automation capable of erasing white collar jobs is coming, but not for a decade or more. And that’s also the bad news because interest in automation accelerates during economic downturns, so once tech that can take your job arrives you’ll already have lived through another period of economic turmoil that may already have cost you your job.

That lovely scenario was advanced yesterday by professor Mirko Draca of The London School of Economics, who yesterday told Huawei’s 2018 Asia-Pacific Innovation Day 2018 that the world is currently in “an era of investment and experimentation” with technology. The effects of such eras, he said, generally emerge ten to fifteen years in the future.

Innovation in the 1980s therefore sparked the PC and internet booms of the mid-to-late 1990s, and we’re still surfing [SIC - suffering?] the changes they unleashed. “Our current era of mobile tech doesn’t measure up to the radical 1990s,” he said, as shown by the fact that productivity gains appear to have stalled for a decade or more.

[...] “We predict that AI and robotics will lead to some sort of productivity surge in ten to fifteen years,” he said, adding that there is “no clear evidence” that a new wave of technologies that threaten jobs has started.

But he also said that it will once businesses see the need to control costs.


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  • (Score: 3, Touché) by JoeMerchant on Monday June 11 2018, @02:34PM (12 children)

    by JoeMerchant (3937) on Monday June 11 2018, @02:34PM (#691402)

    Where's my "predictable" mod option?

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  • (Score: 2, Insightful) by khallow on Monday June 11 2018, @02:42PM (11 children)

    by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday June 11 2018, @02:42PM (#691411) Journal
    Arguments don't become less true just because they've been said before.
    • (Score: 5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11 2018, @02:57PM (10 children)

      by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11 2018, @02:57PM (#691420)

      They also don't become more true just by repeating them over and over again.

      Most people aren't saving their money because they don't have any to save. The cost of living has increased massively when compared with the rate at which pay has increased. We've got asshats like Bezos hoarding huge sums of money in order to blow it on space travel at the same time that there are massive issues affecting the poor and the government would rather engage in more illegal wars than do anything about it.With the money we spend on the DoD alone, we could wipe out world hunger, end homelessness in America, provide free college to every citizen, wipe out student loan debt and have medicare for all.And even after all that spending, we would still be spending more than any other country on defense.

      We don't do it because the corporations that provide service to the DoD have bribed politicians.

      • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11 2018, @03:03PM

        by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11 2018, @03:03PM (#691424)

        But but but those poor people are all buying the latest iphones and signingbup for luxury car payments!!! And they have cheap high qualuty TVs! How can they complain when they live better than medievsl kings?????????

        /s just in case

      • (Score: 2) by PiMuNu on Monday June 11 2018, @03:15PM (6 children)

        by PiMuNu (3823) on Monday June 11 2018, @03:15PM (#691429)

        > The cost of living has increased massively when compared with the rate at which pay has increased.

        I always struggle with the "cost of living" arguments that float around. When I was poor (student) I quite happily lived off GBP 5k per annum. Even subtracting off a bit of sponging off parents and student discounts I can't imagine how things can be so much more expensive, and I didn't live badly - I still had beer money.

        In central London when I lived there, rent was ~ 5k GBP per annum for a cheap flatshare (okay, 10 years ago so it is certainly more now). I know there are "cost of living" indices run by people like Shelter (homeless charity), but I just really find them hard to believe.

        • (Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11 2018, @03:30PM

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11 2018, @03:30PM (#691435)

          10 years is a long time, right around the time of the depression. Things changed drastically afterwards. Also, in the UK you dont have to worry about medical costs, and being a young student is one of the only times you can afford to live so cheaply. Your solution is that fsmilies should pack in 3x to one house so they can afford rent? What if you got unlucky and had unexpected costs? What about the long term stress of not sering much of a way forward in life? These anecdotes are harmful, they downplay the hard times of others and expect that every life takes the same path.

          Wealth inequality is a real thing, and all the pussyfooting around about bootstrapping and personal responsibility only angers the majority of people who very much see the problems all around us.

        • (Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Monday June 11 2018, @03:42PM (2 children)

          by JoeMerchant (3937) on Monday June 11 2018, @03:42PM (#691438)

          I made it through two years of graduate school on $16K USD income plus another $3-4K sponge off of my parents (insurance, gifts, etc.) and that not only paid for my food, shelter, education and transportation, it also financed long overseas vacations in the summers. What it did not do was save ANYTHING for the future, no building of wealth/value in owned property, no ability whatsoever to weather any kind of hard times without outside support.

          When I signed up for $800 per month of PITI on a tiny scrap of land and pile of bricks with my name on it, that started building some modicum of value that I might dip into in the future. It also ended all hope of future 3+ month overseas jaunts, probably forever.

          As for the "cost of things" - in the 1980s I held a part time job in a grocery store stocking shelves. When my dad was at University in the 1960s, working such a job through the summer could provide sufficient income to pay for (I know it's free in the UK, but bear with our backwards economics for a moment) two terms at university, including room and board. By the time I was in Uni, that job stocking shelves would by itself pay barely pay for my rent, food and car, but wouldn't start to make a dent in tuition. Today, that same job pays maybe 50% more in hourly wages, but rent and food are up more like 100%, and I doubt you'd be able to pay for a car with insurance working part time stocking shelves anymore.

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          • (Score: 3, Informative) by PiMuNu on Monday June 11 2018, @04:39PM (1 child)

            by PiMuNu (3823) on Monday June 11 2018, @04:39PM (#691464)

            > I know it's free in the UK, but bear with our backwards economics for a moment)

            They started charging for university in the UK. I was in the first wave, and fought to stop them charging - almost got thrown out for it.

            > car,

            Car is a luxury in UK for most students. But we have a different infrastructure.

            I was doing "back-of-the-envelope" style calculation. For south of england (relatively expensive). For a family 2 adults + 2 kids

            1. Rent - 250 GBP per week
            2. Food - 100 GBP per week
            3. Bills - 50 GBP per week
            4. Car - 50 GBP per week

            I guess that quite quickly comes to 25k per annum (after tax) - i.e. you need to have two working adults or one working adult pulling a decent salary (not shelf stacking) just to live comfortably, without saving. So yes, I guess that confirms what others have said. The nasty one is rent. I guess that is why the UK has a massive housebuilding programme going on. Not sure it addresses the structural issues in the housing market, but meh.

            • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday June 11 2018, @08:19PM

              by JoeMerchant (3937) on Monday June 11 2018, @08:19PM (#691577)

              Just for fun, around here and "averageish" 2+2 family:

              Rent - $1200 per month
              Food - $500 per month
              Bills - $250 per month
              Car - $300 per month

              Of course, all of that can vary - usually the 2+2 family needs 2 cars so that the adults can both have jobs. Rent can be creatively lowered, and bills are highly subject to lifestyle but electricity, phone, garbage, etc. is hard to get away from. So, the US family is looking at $27K/yr post-tax - maybe 20K GBP. Oh, but now let's talk about healthcare insurance....

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        • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11 2018, @05:01PM (1 child)

          by Anonymous Coward on Monday June 11 2018, @05:01PM (#691474)

          I'm not sure at what time or place accommodation in central London was possible at £5k a year (assuming you mean zone 1 when you say "central") but I've been living in the big smoke for over 20 years and never managed to spend so little except when I was in student halls.

          I was lucky enough to be able to buy a house (well, a 2 bed flat) in London after living in the cheap house shares for 15 years. The only thing I've seen since becoming a homeowner is the disappearance of any houseshares that I could call cheap.

          In the last place I was staying about eight years ago, I was paying £400pcm for a double room in a house share in a zone 3 suburb 10mins walk away from a tube station - that was a very good deal for the time and under 5k/yr, but not remotely central of course. The same sort of room on the same street is now going in the region of £1000-1200pcm. There are practically no "shithole" properties left where you can get anything anywhere near this cheap since they've all been bought and tarted up by private landlords or property management companies in order to justify large price/rental hikes.

          In the zone 3 suburb I'm living in now, rents are cheaper but still in the order of £600-800pcm.

          To put those prices in perspective, minimum wage earns you about £8.75 an hour and "London living wage" (a voluntary recommended level of minimum wage for London workers) earns you £10.20. Assuming an 8hr/day 5-days a week on London living wage (although thanks to zero hours contracts most people in this situation would work considerably less than the typical 40hr work week) then on average you've got ~£1770 a month income, of which you could expect to end up with £1500-1600 after tax (assuming you're taxed at 20% on the ~£10,000 or so that's in scope for income tax, and also assuming you don't have any student loan repayments etc).

          You need to move a *long* way out into the suburbs before rents become reasonable for people who aren't on high wages, and then you're frequently dealing with a long and expensive commute (lots of my cow-orkers who live further out in e.g. Kent or Berkshire typically spend 5-10% of their annual salary on train travel).

          Some links with pages showing the vastly disproportionate rise in house and rental prices:
          http://www.cityam.com/259600/one-graph-explains-horrors-london-house-prices-and-why [cityam.com]
          https://www.homesandproperty.co.uk/property-news/how-londons-property-market-has-changed-in-20-years-we-chart-average-house-prices-rental-trends-and-a106401.html# [homesandproperty.co.uk] (requires JS and access to jquery)

          The second link in particular is especially revealing; house price increases of over 600% since 1996 are by no means unusual anywhere inside zone 3. Wages haven't remotely kept pace - if they had, the £18,000/yr I was earning soon after leaving university would be just shy of £100k/yr now. The same entry-level position today is actually more on the region of £25-30k.

          • (Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Monday June 11 2018, @08:11PM

            by JoeMerchant (3937) on Monday June 11 2018, @08:11PM (#691572)

            When I was at Uni in Miami, average low-end 1 bedroom apartment rent was $550/mo, and you could get that down by finding a roommate and renting a 2 bedrooom for $650 per month. I managed to do that one better and rent a room in a house that 6 of us got together to rent and my share was only $150 a month (average shares in that house were more like $200 per month, but my room lacked air conditioning - it wasn't as bad as that sounds.) Even when that lease was inconveniently non-renewed for the 6 of us I managed to find a studio apartment for myself alone advertised on a bulletin board for $250.

            Point being: if you dig, you can find safe, clean accommodation even in big cities for quite a bit below "market rate." Of course, those two cheap spots I lived in had their good and bad points, but nothing terrible - I did look at dozens of potential cheap places to rent that I walked away from... lots of crazy out there.

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      • (Score: 2) by suburbanitemediocrity on Monday June 11 2018, @05:49PM

        by suburbanitemediocrity (6844) on Monday June 11 2018, @05:49PM (#691505)

        Most people aren't competent enough to manage money if they had any.

      • (Score: 0, Flamebait) by khallow on Monday June 11 2018, @08:23PM

        by khallow (3766) Subscriber Badge on Monday June 11 2018, @08:23PM (#691579) Journal

        They also don't become more true just by repeating them over and over again.

        Most people aren't saving their money because they don't have any to save.

        Well, you convinced me on your first argument. Proof by demonstration! There's not really much point to the second argument when it's not true for starters.