[potatolicious]

> "whether we're saving time or cutting jobs"

Those two things are basically the same.

In a shop with only one accountant, you're saving her three hours a day.

In a shop with 100 accountants, 30 of them just lost their jobs.

The trouble with our work is not that we don't know whether or not it's doing good or bad, it's that it's almost always doing both at the same time. Determining whether the good outweighs the bad is both subjective, highly fraught with egotism, and treads uncomfortably close to rationalization and playing god.

[michaelochurch]

If the 100 accountants are smart, they'll spend half the day studying for their CFA exams and not let management know that they're overstaffed.

You're right, though. That's the fundamental problem. I can always get on board with automating (and thus "killing") undesirable work. I can't get on board with depriving regular people (below $100,000 per year) of an income if I can help it. I am aware that society needs to cut jobs and that that's a really good thing; I just wish it would train up before trading up.

[adamauckland]

Yes, in a simplistic world if you think that's all those accountants did.

Who tests the software? You need accountants.