7 ms·
I think a more accurate headline would be "Banks to cut 200k jobs over Robots". Robots don't take jobs. Managers replace workers.
by pnongrata 7y ago
I think a more accurate headline would be "Banks to cut 200k jobs over Robots".
Robots don't take jobs. Managers replace workers.
- mac01021 7y agoThat's already how everyone is reading the existing headline, though. It's not like anyone is being misled (I don't think)
- Frost1x 7y agoThose robots can be quite the opportunists with their consciousness and all.
- jermaustin1 7y agoI'm tired of all these robots coming to this country and taking our jobs!
- pnongrata 7y agoIt's important to say it as it is. People tend to treat it as a 'natural' thing, instead of a business decision to cut costs.
- rejschaap 7y agoCost reduction sounds like a natural thing for a business in a healthy market economy.
- pnongrata 7y agoCutting hundreds of thousands of jobs seems very far from 'natural' or 'healthy'.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- Nasrudith 7y agoNature is pretty damn cruel and selfish at times. Just because it utterly sucks doesn't mean it isn't natural - similarly healthy has the question of healthy for who and when? Illness in herd animals is healthy for wolves by making them easier to kill without injury. The industrial revolution saw major growing pains and destitution but raised standards of living greatly.
- pnongrata 7y agoYour somewhat patronizing analogy misses the point. If our ultimate goal as a species is to survive and live well, then cutting hundreds of thousands (millions, actually, if you think about the implications of automation in other areas) is in conflict with that goal, thus 'unnatural'.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoIf the goal is to live well, that has nothing to do with doing jobs that a machine can do. Automation is not in conflict with the goal of people living well. If anything, it's the best tool we have to achieve the goal. The conflict with the goal of people living well is that we don't want to take wealth from those that have it and give it to those that don't, without making the ones that don't have wealth "earn it". Otherwise, there is nothing stopping societies from gathering up all the extra profits from automation, and using it to invest in education, healthcare, reducing number of work hours, increasing vacation time, i.e. living well. But we would rather not have that.
- pnongrata 7y agoI agree that automation should be (and many times do) helping people perform their jobs (and daily tasks). However, those who are 'in charge' financially are actively seeking ways to replace humans in a blind race for maximizing short term results. In a 'healthy' society, automation should be employed to make humans work less hours and with less risks. Somehow many people think this statement is absurd.
- Nasrudith 7y agoWith competition it is a red queen's race unfortunately. It is natural in an emergent sense even though the circumstances are synthetic. If they don't someone else will and even if they held existing jobs sancrosanct they will be displaced by a new party who doesn't have existing jobs to protect.
- pnongrata 7y agoI agree that that is the case. Somewhere down the road some kind of intervention will be necessary, as too much will be on the line.
- dropit_sphere 7y agoWe don't get to choose whether we're in the race or not, but we do get to choose how we run it. I get the "these are forces at work, not humans" argument, but I think it underestimates the solution space available to the humans in the scenario (to be fair, they probably do too).
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- nabla9 7y agoEven more accurate "Banks to cut 200k jobs over chatbots" Software agent aka bot is not a robot. Robot is physical device. ATM is more robot-like than chatbot.
- josefresco 7y agoSmall tweak: Executives at the behest of shareholders instruct managers to replace workers.
- lotsofpulp 7y agoExpand shareholders to people with savings such as 401k, 529, IRAs, HSAs, defined benefit pensions, etc.