[echelon]

> It’s not debatable; we have over 200 years of technological development to look back on and the trend is clear: the total number of jobs has increased at least as fast as human population growth over that time.

That isn't some immutable law of the universe. 200 years is a short sample size relative to geologic time.

Once we have robots doing the cooking, cleaning, heavy work, etc., what becomes of the Waffle House and Walmart worker? There will be a lower bound capability threshold, and automation will eventually exceed that.

I think a smart comparison would be to look at what job opportunities are available to the intellectually disadvantaged.

Then what happens when that lower bound inches higher?

[pixl97]

Ya, when people use this argument ask them "the population of humans always grows right?" Because up till recently that was the consensus unless something drastic or terrible happened. Then in the past few decades we see people having far fewer children then even replacement rate.

Upsetting the labor market is leading us into unpredictable territory, much like at the start of the 1900s and the automobile set off a string of events that lead to two massive world wide wars.

[coderenegade]

In principle, they could probably just buy their own robots and start their own businesses. Locality is its own quality for SMEs. Whether or not that happens in practice is anyone's guess.