So instead of improve their conditions we just fire them? Sure that won't have any negative repercussions...
That's even assuming this is actually remotely profitable compared to just using humans. Like a lot of this sort of automation it probably isn't, and it's true purpose is to be used as a threat against workers so they'll be even more "compelled to work without sleep to finish routes with tight deadlines"
> Sure that won't have any negative repercussions...
Does it suck for the truck drivers. Yes. Does that mean we should give them busy work even though their job can be automated? No. We don't know what the reprocussions will be. We do know, from 100% of past experience, that automating something opened new opportunties that ultimately resulted in more jobs that before. Whether that will be true this time as well no one has any idea.
The usual example is textile creation vs fashion. The loom put people who hand weave cloth out of business. But the abundance of cheap cloth created 100x the jobs in cloth making and fashion. It's why you probably have more than 3 shirts in your house/apartment.
On the other hand, the current administration is not interested in education or welfare though, or labor protections in general. Fired truckers don't have a whole lot of transferrable skills related to maintaining self driving vehicles, and they would all be competing for same openings anyway. You can't just get another job when you want it, and you need some way to take care of the bills until you can get hired.
To me, a vision of the future in which people do jobs robots could do, just to create jobs, is a dystopia. The future I want to see is one in which humans live lives of play and leisure while robots do all the labor, and the results of the robots doing labor are distributed equitably.
The problem is, there's no historical precedent for this, and we're still letting people who do almost no labor amass most of the results of other people's labor. If we follow the current trajectory, we'll have a society controlled by a few people who own the robots, and everybody else fighting over their table scraps.
The solution to this isn't rejecting automation to create artificial jobs: that's just fighting over table scraps by a different name. The solution is to stop rewarding generational wealth with more wealth, and distribute resources more equitably.
Software and automation has a long history of putting people out of work. Many of the truckers are delivering loads for large companies who put mom and pop stores out of business. It's the circle of life.
We should bring back elevator operators. And station a traffic guard on every corner instead of traffic lights. Let’s bring back tool booth operators. And let’s delete Google calendar and bring back secretaries while we’re at it.
This sort of response misses the point. If the goal is to have jobs for everyone, then yes, bringing back all those things is actually the right move, and you're not going to convince the person who favors job creation otherwise. You seem to be under the impression that those jobs went away for a good reason, but you haven't bothered to articulate what that reason was.
I think the better point is that having jobs for everyone isn't the goal. Equitably distributing the results of our society's labor so everyone's needs are met is. If people are able to live in a house and put food on their table, they'll be less concerned with whether they have a job or not.
But that requires that you care enough about other people to not let people hoard unlimited resources, so I suspect most of HN will have some objections, and you'll never actually address what monkaiju is concerned about.
Isn’t it true that truck drivers are the most common profession in basically every state?
I think it’s “funny” how corporate leaders in basically every industry are enthusiastically barreling toward a world in which they have no employed customers to buy their products created by their automated robot workforce.
Nobody in politics is coming close to addressing the societal problems that are incoming in the near future.
It’s not corporate leaders. It’s owners. We’re moving to a feudal environment. The billionaires are pulling sovereign capital from the Saudis. They need to keep their treasure, that’s the priority.
Politics isn’t pretending to address anything. We’re breaking the system to extract as much rent from the populace as possible. Caesar type stuff. Destroying the income tax means you’ll pay taxes based on consumption. We’ll be poorer. The overlords will be great.
Agriculturists enthusiastically barreled toward a world with no employed farmers to buy their food, and the societal problems took care of themselves because having lots of cheap food is good.
All of that unrest eventually resulted in the new deal. We have had relative peace in the postwar period thanks to a lot of pain being resolved over a long period of time, but that lack of friction is not guaranteed to last forever.
I would argue that America’s backslide into the election of a reactionary, dare I say fascist government is all about declining prosperity.
Yes? I would feel economic uncertainty and worry, but I’m not so egocentric that I would think that someone is raising hundreds of millions of dolllars and building factories in an elaborate scheme to make me work longer hours.
If you’re not a union shop, it’s easy. Divide and conquer. Like most employees, truckers in general are stupid and greedy. They are in one of the easiest to organize jobs, but get brainwashed by the firehose of right wing radio.
First step is to isolate the smart ones, which are the people with hazmat endorsements. Treat them well and praise effusively to build resentment. Then take the routes that are cost effective for robots, and offer premium pay and bonuses to the people, but with goals that can’t be met without cutting corners. Encourage reporting of rule violators.
Your goal is to create a toxic and miserable environment that pays just enough. Make them kill each other for a dwindling number of slots. You keep the people agitated and fighting each other, and they won’t notice their toys getting taken away.
I wasn’t arguing for a social good, I’m ambivalent on that.
I thought I was pretty clearly questioning the claim that the motivation of DreamCo is somehow to threaten truckers so they work harder, as opposed to (wisely or not) trying to sell trucks.
I wouldn't want to drive a truck. To be frank, I really don't want to answer Jira tickets and write plumbing code either. I sincerely hope that none of what most of us do today has to be a job in fifty years.
> The truck driver gets the next-least-undesirable job.
That the promise but is it the reality? Deaths of despair suggest it isn't.
Deindustrialization is an issue once you move supply chains overseas or to the robots, with it whole parts of country die. No truck drivers means less money spent on truck stops, motels (for sleep), and in their local economy (no pubs, bowling alley, etc.)
But the threat isn't just replacing drivers, it is replacing entire eco systems of jobs.
My brother is in this business. There’s overlapping jurisdictions that shady operators leverage hard to squeeze more out of people and equipment.
Chinatown busses are the perfect example, they’d run routes designed to avoid federal jurisdiction and adopt routes and schedules to avoid weigh stations and routine inspection. Busses were unsafe and drivers unlicensed in many cases. Most were owned by Chinese mafia organizations and killed people. When they weren’t doing that, they were huge human trafficking operations.
The federal motor carrier safety administration had a robust, science based program to improve safety and improve conditions in most scenarios. My understanding is that 80% of the staff was fired and resigned, so it’s a Wild West environment. The advice I was given was avoid the busy trucking corridors (I-81/85/95) at night.
> The federal motor carrier safety administration had a robust, science based program to improve safety and improve conditions in most scenarios. My understanding is that 80% of the staff was fired and resigned
When was that? And is there anything public we can read about these things?
That's even assuming this is actually remotely profitable compared to just using humans. Like a lot of this sort of automation it probably isn't, and it's true purpose is to be used as a threat against workers so they'll be even more "compelled to work without sleep to finish routes with tight deadlines"