Clarification:
Take, for example, 2027, when humans in offices will be successfully replaced by AI, and robots will begin to replace construction workers and other workers. How terrible do you think it will be after 2030? And how much the level of depression and everything else will increase. I will also add that not everyone will be able to receive unemployment benefits, and some will die of hunger. Let’s be realistic and not console ourselves with rosy fantasies.
Let’s be realistic and not console ourselves with rosy fantasies.
Let’s take the most pessimistic view instead and project we’ll all get plugged into the Matrix.
It’s not a foregone conclusion that so-called AI and automation will replace all of those jobs. It’s also not a foregone conclusion that all these people will be destitute because they cannot be put in other positions. This is not the first time we as humanity have faced this big a structural change. We have largely gotten pretty good and are not dealing with a lot of bloodshed and poverty in the wake of such a big change. This transition will probably not be great for everybody but it won’t be a big human tragedy of the proportions you imagined. Worry more about our climate. The bigger threat of mass destitution will come from that clusterfuck.
robots will begin to replace construction workers and other workers
95% of all human labor used to be farming. Automating jobs is how we have gotten the prosperity we have today. Nothing we have done would be possible without automation. Increased productivity is far from a boogeyman, it’s something to be celebrated.
Devil’s advocate-- the Industrial Revolution has led to heaps of the ‘prosperity’ we moderns have enjoyed, while effectively destroying our future via various forms of pollution, directly because too few heeded caution and considered the importance of sustainability.
It became all about money at almost every level, and unchecked capitalism is ultimately a tyrant, as we’re now discovering via late-stage capitalism. While the rich get richer and fascism rises around the world, of course.
It’s over. Hopefully our politicians will be replaced with AI technocrats who will do a much better job.
That just means that whatever groups of interest are behind this “AI” (it won’t be AI, just called that way) won’t even have to bribe and contend with the (tiny, but possibly still present) humanity of our elected, and decision-making and power as a whole will be even more obfuscated!
The US Empire is dying, socialist countries like the PRC are rising, and partially thanks to the latter a lot of countries in the global south are escaping imperialism and are finally developing forward. Automation and AI are used in socialist countries already for the purposes of increasing production, not to destroy livelihoods. As the empire dies there will be chaos and death from its desparation (see Venezuela), but the long, queer, messy transition between global capitalism and socialism is well under way. We will win.
countries like the PRC are rising
China has a horrifyingly destructive demographics crisis on their hands. Even if they reversed course on that issue today, it won’t be solved for decades. And there is every indication their demographics issue is accelerating.
China is peaking. Them, South Korea, and Japan are the worlds case study on how to deal with these problems; all three are going to fuck up in 100 ways that everyone else will be able to learn from. Immigration is one of the main ways to deal with it, something that China is much worse off with as their poor wages and sheer size means they uniquely cannot attract enough people, unlike South Korea and Japan.
China has a horrifyingly destructive demographics crisis on their hands.
“Horrifyingly destructive” sounds a bit hyperbolic. Birthrates in South Korea, Japan, and some European countries are lower.
Immigration is one of the main ways to deal with it, something that China is much worse off with as their poor wages and sheer size means they uniquely cannot attract enough people, unlike South Korea and Japan.
Wages are not low in China when compared to the cost of living. However high wages may be in South Korea and Japan, people still can’t make ends meet because prices are high. And I don’t see how a country’s size would factor in at all. But in any case, I don’t think China is even trying to attract immigrants, making this moot.
Thing is, as the Western empire collapses, I think more and more people will start to move towards China just for the sake of stability and a basic standard of living. It’s already something I’ve been thinking about, and things are only going to get worse.
All that to say, I wouldn’t write off the idea of them attracting people. Immigration is a possible solution, it kinda depends on if the PRC wants it to be their solution.
China has a problem, sure, but it’s not a “horrifyingly destructive demographics crisis.” This is largely a cope narrative pushed by “China watchers.” Further, purchasing Power in 2022 was 25 times higher than 1978. China has decent wages now, and they are only improving. The latest five year plan is also focusing on improving domestic consumption, ie improvements in living standards, and as such has better prospects than either the ROK or Japan when it comes to demographic issues, as both are struggling economically.
Removed by mod
Impressive, ableism right off the bat.
The working class is in control of the state, and public ownership is the principle aspect of the economy, including finance. You don’t have to trust the government, you can trust the people themselves. The form of democracy and the mode of production in China ensures that there is a connection between the people and the state. Policies like the mass line are in place to ensure this direct connection remains. This is why over 90% of the Chinese population supports the government, and why they have such strong perceptions around democracy:
China does have billionaires, yes. China is in the developing stages of socialism. Between capitalism, which is characterized by private ownership being the principle aspect of the economy and the capitalists in control of the state, and communism, characterized by full collectivization of production and distribution devoid of classes, is socialism, where public ownership is principle and the working classes in control. China in particular is working its way out of the initial stages of socialism:
The reason China has billionaires is because China has private property, and the reason it has private property is because of 2 major factors: the world economy is still dominated by the US empire, and because you cannot simply abolish private property at the stroke of a pen. China tried that already. The Gang of Four tried to dogmatically force a publicly owned and planned economy when the infrastructure best suited to that hadn’t been laid out by markets, and as a consequence growth was positive but highly unstable.
Why does it matter that the US Empire controls the world economy? Because as capitalism monopolizes, it is compelled to expand outward in order to fight falling rates of profit by raising absolute profits. The merging of bank and industrial capital into finance capital leads to export of capital, ie outsourcing. This process allows super-exploitation for super-profits, and is known as imperialism.
In the People’s Republic of China, under Mao and later the Gang of Four, growth was overall positive but was unstable. The centrally planned economy had brought great benefits in many areas, but because the productive forces themselves were underdeveloped, economic growth wasn’t steady. There began to be discussion and division in the party, until Deng Xiapoing’s faction pushing for Reform and Opening Up won out, and growth was stabilized:
Deng’s plan was to introduce market reforms, localized around Special Economic Zones, while maintaining full control over the principle aspects of the economy. Limited private capital would be introduced, especially by luring in foreign investors, such as the US, pivoting from more isolationist positions into one fully immersed in the global marketplace. As the small and medium firms grow into large firms, the state exerts more control and subsumes them more into the public sector. This was a gamble, but unlike what happened to the USSR, this was done in a controlled manner that ended up not undermining the socialist system overall.
China’s rapidly improving productive forces and cheap labor ended up being an irresistable match for US financial capital, even though the CPC maintained full sovereignty. This is in stark contrast to how the global north traditionally acts imperialistically, because it relies on financial and millitant dominance of the global south. This is why there is a “love/hate” relationship between the US Empire and PRC, the US wants more freedom for capital movement while the CPC is maintaining dominance.
Fast-forward to today, and the benefits of the CPC’s gamble are paying off. The US Empire is de-industrializing, while China is a productive super-power. The CPC has managed to maintain full control, and while there are neoliberals in China pushing for more liberalization now, the path to exerting more socialization is also open, and the economy is still socialist. It is the job of the CPC to continue building up the productive forces, while gradually winning back more of the benefits the working class enjoyed under the previous era, developing to higher and higher stages of socialism.
In doing this, China has presented itself to the global south as an alternative to the unequal exchange the global north does with the global south, which is accelerating the development of the global south. China is taking a more indirect method of undermining global imperialism than, say, the USSR, but its been remarkably effective at uplifting the global working classes, especially in China but also in the global south.
