Interesting points, made in florid style. I'd make the point a little differently, though -- in the next n years, you want to be on the side of capital. Labor is in for a really tough time.
Missing from Daniel's analysis is total economic output, and I think this really matters -- when we think of Optimus launched and at scale, do we think of total GDP growing, shrinking, being stable? A lot of what someone thinks about this question will tie directly to their predictions and mental/emotional focus.
I think of GDP growing - we will be turning stuff into the ground into something that works for $1/hr on all manner of tasks - we're going to be able to do a lot more stuff than we were. As Daniel points out, a company is going to own a lot (by no means all) of that economic benefit. By some miracle of our modern markets, you too could own some of that benefit, just by buying into the company.
The "mercantilist labor" view is less rosy: if there's a limited amount of labor to go around then this will be directly siphoning off living wage and (to the point of the essay) excess capital that could go into building dynastic wealth.
From my viewpoint, I think Daniel's charts would get a little bit less alarming for the non-dynastic scenarios if they imagined GDP increases along the way. They probably push up the sharpness of an inflection point.
Hey thanks for reading and for leaving a considered comment. You might be right, we'll see. In my mind, GDP growing isn't really that reassuring:
1/ GDP has been growing steadily while people's happiness and overall satisfaction is flat lined or finishing (so even if this was true it won't lead to better lives lived at scale)
2/ it's more interesting to look at the ratio of labour wages / GDP. I actually make a prediction about this and that has been shrinking already. If it continues (which I think it will) even if everything grows ppl will be unhappy and unsatisfied bc a large part of our self worth is coming from comparing ourselves w the ppl around us in the wider society. This is why more equal societies tend to be happier as well.
Back at you! Writing's always work, especially with cool graphs.
1 - Agree this is true for real-earning-loss countries, recently. (as in last n decades)
2 - I agree this will keep shrinking. I moderately disagree with the 'comparative happiness' assessment.
It's that second bit that I think is an important prior for you to mention - there's an old (sexist, outdated, etc.) riddle: "A woman lives on Park Avenue and her husband makes $500k a year as a lawyer. She's miserable. Why?" Answer: "Her neighbour's husband makes $2mm."
I agree humans covet. On the other hand, there are real non-GDP type considerations for human happiness and comfort - for instance, I would guess nearly any French peasant in the 1820s would switch lives with 90% of western world residents. Maybe more. The peasantry in the early 19th century was, by population the vast majority. You can get at a lot of non-GDP quality of life benefits that genuinely impact people: anesthesia during surgery, GPS, air flight, ...
So, I propose generally humans want to be doing better than they used to, personally, and at least as well as their neighbors -- and if that's okay, they are historically totally fine with a ruling class, and susceptible to messaging that the ruling class is the ruling class for good reason. If they are doing less well than they used to, we have real problems.
To my mind if robots bring us bread and circuses, we'll have stability. (And super-wealth accumulation for capital). If robots bring us 40% unemployment, we'll have revolution. The funny thing is, those two outcomes are really just about social decisions by governments. So, I think we'll see a few different takes on this; over one hundred years, I think humans are going to figure this out. In the interim, we are likely going to see two early hot takes: US and China, and probably really different takes on how robots and AI can fill out the social contract.
Put another way - if we are headed to post-scarcity, what do we want to do with the excess?
Total GDP increasing isn't a good measure of economic growth or productivity because it doesn't distinguish between productive value creation and money just changing hands. If I cut your hair and charge $50 and you cut my hair and charge $50 then $100 is added to the GDP. Sure, value is created by the transaction, but value would be created if no money changed hands at all thus not even affecting the GDP! GDP can also rise even as most people are doing poorly. A billionaire buying a superyacht adds the same amount to the GDP as 500 families buying their first home. You can have a growing GDP even in a society where the top .1% have 99% of the wealth, but that's not a society I'd want to live in.
Missing from Daniel's analysis is total economic output, and I think this really matters -- when we think of Optimus launched and at scale, do we think of total GDP growing, shrinking, being stable? A lot of what someone thinks about this question will tie directly to their predictions and mental/emotional focus.
I think of GDP growing - we will be turning stuff into the ground into something that works for $1/hr on all manner of tasks - we're going to be able to do a lot more stuff than we were. As Daniel points out, a company is going to own a lot (by no means all) of that economic benefit. By some miracle of our modern markets, you too could own some of that benefit, just by buying into the company.
The "mercantilist labor" view is less rosy: if there's a limited amount of labor to go around then this will be directly siphoning off living wage and (to the point of the essay) excess capital that could go into building dynastic wealth.
From my viewpoint, I think Daniel's charts would get a little bit less alarming for the non-dynastic scenarios if they imagined GDP increases along the way. They probably push up the sharpness of an inflection point.