Wednesday, December 21, 2016

"White House: Basic Income Won't Solve Robot Automation"

The country had better figure-out this stuff soon.

I was about to post:
It Begins: Robot Kills Bride-to-Be 

From Inverse:
Robot automation will mean rethinking the social safety net to ensure American workers are protected against economic upheaval, a new White House report released Tuesday states. As companies switch to using artificial intelligence-powered machines instead of human workers, the U.S. government is considering how it should react to these changes. Other recommendations in the report include investing in A.I. to reap its benefits, and making sure Americans can train up for the jobs of the future.

Bad news for basic income fans, though. The report does not recommend the policy, which has become a common idea proposed by tech industry figures. It cites a July 2016 speech from CEA chair Jason Furman, who said that basic income won’t solve the biggest problem with automation: there will be jobs, but they will be high-tech jobs that many people won’t be qualified for. With that in mind, the solution is better training, rather than throwing in the towel and declaring that many will simply stop working.

“Accelerating A.I. capabilities will enable automation of some tasks that have long required human labor,” Kristin Lee, communications director and senior policy advisor in the White House’s office of science and technology said in a blog post published Tuesday. “These transformations will open up new opportunities for individuals, the economy, and society, but they will also disrupt the current livelihoods of millions of Americans.”...MORE