Automation Job Displacement

Nope, it's history.Go back and look at any new technology. Each one put large numbers of people out of work, but they quickly found new jobs in areas that were opening up due to other new technology: telephone operators became television assemblers and so on. Same will happen here.

I don't think anyone claimed that the new jobs would be replaced one to one with jobs maintaining the new technology, just that some of the new jobs would be in maintaining the new technology and some would be in new industries that we haven't even thought of. For a big historical example of this, look at the decrease in labor usage for farming over the last couple centuries. Where did all the people who used to work in agriculture go to? Like 1% of them now remain on the farms, mainta

That's technology for you, forcing people out of their jobs!

Aren't you making a Luddite argument?http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LudditeDifferent jobs will take their place. There are a lot fewer farmers these days, for example. The real trick is to find effective ways for people to get the training.

Given that the number of people in agriculture declined from 90% to 10% over the past 200 years or so, I'm less worried about disruption like this. People are remarkably retrainable, and just because current jobs no longer exist doesn't mean we won't create new ones out of thin air (like marketing, or Youtubers, or film lighting specialists).

those jobs aren't lost - they are just not needed anymore!

You are being a Luddite. People will shift into cushy service sector jobs. Craft beer, massage parlors, landscape architects, mobile game programming, whatever wealthier societies might want more of.

Indeed. Cheer on the tech if you like, but don't be surprised when you're out of work for the foreseeable future next.

> You are uninformed if you believe these jobs are staying. There is no way, mark my words, that our economy doesn't experience a net negative in jobs during this next revolution.People were saying the exact same thing when sophisticated machines were introduced in automotive industry manufacturing. Sure, some people could not convert and lost jobs, but everyone else moved on to be productive in other areas.This prophecy of Doom is happening every 10 years or so.

Debating whether the number of jobs will actually go down or not is irrelevant.The fact is on the human lifetime timescale, jobs go away (farming from 1900-1940; various factory jobs in the late 1980s, coal mining 1970s-2000s etc). People with decades in these jobs may not be able to move into equivalent (in renumeration & status) replacement jobs as their skills are likely not transferable.Thus to the tractor manufacturer in her 50s it is irrelevant whether there is high demand for e