Information Age automation is coming for your job

This new video by Kurzgesagt examines automation in the past (“big stupid machines doing repetitive work in factories”) and argues that automation in the information age is fundamentally different. In a nutshell,¹ whereas past automation resulted in higher productivity and created new and better jobs for a growing population, automation in the future will happen at a much quicker pace, outpacing the creation of new types of jobs for humans.

Their two main sources for the video are Martin Ford’s Rise of the Robots and The Second Machine Age by Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee.

1. The German phrase “kurz gesagt” means roughly “in a nutshell”, so this is a pun. Laugh now!↩

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• The Second Machine Age
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Rise of the Robots

From Martin Ford, a book due out in May called Rise of the Robots: Technology and the Threat of a Jobless Future.

Artificial intelligence is already well on its way to making “good jobs” obsolete: many paralegals, physicians, and even — ironically — computer programmers are poised to be replaced by robots. As technology continues to accelerate and machines begin taking care of themselves, fewer jobs will be necessary. Unless we radically reassess the fundamentals of how our economy and politics work, this transition could create massive unemployment and inequality as well as the implosion of the economy itself.

See also Humans Need Not Apply. (via Tyler Cowen, who thinks highly of Ford’s writing on automation and jobs)

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• Martin Ford
• Rise of the Robots
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