Comment Re:Seriously (Score 1) 154
> First off, we don't know if AI and robotics are going to cause even field specific unemployment.
We can be pretty sure that it will happen, because: 1. For most goods, there is a limit of how much of it is needed. 2. Automation will increase efficiency, so less workers will produce more. 3. Required amount of workers for certain good = [required amount of goods] / [amount of goods that single worker can produce with automation] 4. Even if we can invent new products, like hologram games, those products almost always compete with existing products. E.g. hologram games would just take customers from video games and cause unemployment there. 5. In some fields there will be temporarily need for more workers. E.g. health care should be one of these fields as demand increases because the amount of old people increases. But that is only temporary. In the long run, automation will cause unemployment.
I agree with you that retraining won't help much.
I think your reasoning is largely correct, however there are some goods or services we can consume much more of then we are currently. You are assuming demand will remain constant. Take for example healthcare, education and research. These areas are hard to saturate. (1) There are a bunch of medical conditions we don't have cures for yet, not to mention better preventative medicine and slowing or reversing natural aging (prologing life avoiding death). (2) There is already a huge body of knowledge for people to learn, much more than can be learned in one lifetime. We could spend much more of our lives (or even all) as students - generating demand for education. (3) There are many frontiers in science, math, philosophy and many other fields that could soak up a supply of new research efforts. While AI will obviously do the bulk of the work in these three areas, I'm not convinced we will get to a stage in the near future where humans are unable to make a net positive contribution to them.
That said, I think we're heading into a rough ride. While every generation has its novel challenges to face, this AI thing is an absolute curve ball. I'm not sure whether to envy or pity young people today.