Free Trade

[mustafur]

Why? They have infinite free labor. If they want something, they can ask their robots that will do anything for free.

Yes, for them.

When someone is in a position of power why would you expect them to give it away from free, that would go against the ideals of Free market capitalism.

It also ignores the complex pattern in market behaviour that would be involved to even get into that stage, those that invested wouldn't be happy that their investment had no potential reward if it succeeded.

 

[Exorcet]

Yes, for them.

When someone is in a position of power why would you expect them to give it away from free, that would go against the ideals of Free market capitalism.

Philanthropy isn't against capitalism. I'd expect it to be more common place with additional resources as well.

It also ignores the complex pattern in market behaviour that would be involved to even get into that stage, those that invested wouldn't be happy that their investment had no potential reward if it succeeded.

I fully admit that getting there can be a challenge, and might not even be guaranteed. I don't agree with your opinion on the appeal of such a system though. Assuming this system comes from investment, charity could be part of the pitch to help shape brand identity.

 

[mustafur]

One word, Patent.

that one word will ensure it won't work like you say.

Plus humans base their life around desires, it's what makes us do what we do, you take that away what do you have, existence?

 

[Exorcet]

One word, Patent.

that one word will ensure it won't work like you say.

Can you expand on that?

Plus humans base their life around desires, it's what makes us do what we do, you take that away what do you have, existence?

Over abundance of resources won't remove human desire. It will allow people to explore more, set their own goals.

 

[mustafur]

Can you expand on that?

When someone makes a ground breaking technology a patent comes swiftly after it, so the only way others can be made using the same method is either by paying for the right to use it or they give permission.

But this will apply in every inch we get closer to that end goal, your asking for some mighty low odds for that all to be given for free.

Over abundance of resources won't remove human desire. It will allow people to explore more, set their own goals.

Not exactly what I was implying, more along the lines of if all your desires can be achieved instantly, they are not exactly desires.

of course everyone is different but say this did happen you would be surprised how little different we would be if there was no variance in situation.

And yes I understand Human interaction with each other would still exist, but if everything else was instantly achievable a massive part of human desire is missing, atleast compared to what we have today.

But you do have to keep in mind whilst all possible it also ignores what the people with that power have as their own desires to go ahead with such a thing.

It can be as Dangerous as it is Liberating.

 

[Exorcet]

When someone makes a ground breaking technology a patent comes swiftly after it, so the only way others can be made using the same method is either by paying for the right to use it or they give permission.

For a limited time.

But this will apply in every inch we get closer to that end goal, your asking for some mighty low odds for that all to be given for free.

Yes and it's been on going. It hasn't made living more expensive though, it has done the opposite. Along with the decreased living cost has come charity as well. With higher and higher production, you can afford to give away more without hurting profit. Or maybe put another way, let's say .5% of your earnings (charity) amount to more and more goods/services.

Not exactly what I was implying, more along the lines of if all your desires can be achieved instantly, they are not exactly desires.

It won't necessarily be that all desires will be instantly fulfilled. Building/buying a house might become trivial, but that gives you more time to do something like climb every mountain over 20,000 ft if that is something you want to do. What I'm envisioning getting cut is not necessarily the stuff if human dreams, but chores and drudgery. It is hard to predict with certainty what will happen though.

 

[JKgo]

When literally every job is automated, people win. Robots will work for free, they don't want money.

...This is an interesting assertion. How exactly did you arrive at this point, I wonder. After all, no matter how automated the world becomes, we as humans still need money to survive.

And last time I checked, companies go down the robot-everything route (exaggeration) they do it to save cost and modernize their production line and thereby maximising their profit.

In other words, I can't see a world where just because robots don't ask for a minimum wage, we wouldn't get charged by their owners for the products produced and consumed.

 

[ryzno]

In other words, I can't see a world where just because robots don't ask for a minimum wage, we wouldn't get charged by their owners for the products produced and consumed.

And that brings up the question again, what do we do for money when robots take over?
I doubt the robot owners will be like, here have some money every month since my robot took your job.
Are we going to have to have a robot or crew of robots to make money? Is there going to be a black market for workers, like illegal immigrants?
If anything all this does is make the rich, richer and the poor, poorer.

 

[Exorcet]

In other words, I can't see a world where just because robots don't ask for a minimum wage, we wouldn't get charged by their owners for the products produced and consumed.

I'm assuming that we get to the point where it costs nothing to produce what we need to need to live on a daily basis. The situation I have in mind is not well defined. I didn't explicitly consider who the owners would be, but I imagined the case where most people are able to be self sufficient rather than a small number of people who would then offer their resources to others. The reason for this is that I see automation as a gradual process. As it continues on, it will become available to more and more people.

I don't consider it unrealistic as an end but as I've said before, I don't know what the path there will look like. When people are able to produce such excess that meeting their needs is trivial, I don't doubt that the willingness to share with other will increase. It doesn't even need to be every single individual either.

Are we going to have to have a robot or crew of robots to make money?

This is an idea I've kicked around in my head a little bit. It would be an intermediate step to the end state of individual self sufficiency. When human labor is worthless, people can trade their resources in automatic labor instead.

If anything all this does is make the rich, richer and the poor, poorer.

I don't think anyone should care as long as the standard of living goes up. Being poor today is better than being rich yesterday.

 

[Danoff]

What happens when you have self driving cars carrying robots that deliver packages and are completely serviced by other robots who are managed by other robots, there will come a point in time when the market will have to artifically intervene to keep human's relevent from their own demise.

Yes, for them.

When someone is in a position of power why would you expect them to give it away from free, that would go against the ideals of Free market capitalism.

It also ignores the complex pattern in market behaviour that would be involved to even get into that stage, those that invested wouldn't be happy that their investment had no potential reward if it succeeded.

Kindof contradicting yourself here. What happens when the market is flooded with free labor... that free labor would charge for it? It's not free then, which puts people back in the market. If it's free, it's free. If it's not, well... it's not.

One word, Patent.

that one word will ensure it won't work like you say.

Plus humans base their life around desires, it's what makes us do what we do, you take that away what do you have, existence?

Patents encourage growth by protecting some portion of the intellectual investment for 20 years from the date the patent is filed (which is generally 2-3 years before the patent actually issues, and before the product is brought to market). Without Patents companies would resort to trade secrets, which are far messier.

And that brings up the question again, what do we do for money when robots take over?
I doubt the robot owners will be like, here have some money every month since my robot took your job.
Are we going to have to have a robot or crew of robots to make money? Is there going to be a black market for workers, like illegal immigrants?
If anything all this does is make the rich, richer and the poor, poorer.

"Take over" is a bit strange. So far robots in production have increased our standard of living dramatically. They have been a force for raising the minimum standard of living for everyone in the country. The concern is that people can be obviated out of every job. Ok, let's investigate that scenario.

Let's say you have a manufacturing plant that invents an amazing robot system. It builds cars from one end to the other, and is entirely serviced by other robots, who also service themselves. The plant is managed by robotics, it's repaired by robotics, it's maintained by robotics, and the service and maintenance robots are self-sufficient. The plant is also next to a pit of natural resources that robots dig up and use to create everything needed for the cars to be built. One guy owns the entire thing, so that one guy, doing essentially nothing, can roll out car after car with perfect manufacturing precision and place it into the market.

We're all doomed right? I mean car prices would crash, other car manufacturers would go out of business, everyone would have to buy a car from this guy - who'd become filthy rich, and thousands of people would lose their jerbs.

Actually no. This guy is greedy, so he'll charge enough to pull market share from everyone else, but not less than that which would maximize his profit. So if an equivalent car is going for $20k, he might charge $15k. That would move a ton of buyers over to him, but it wouldn't maximize his profit to just floor it to like... $2k per car. As a result, his greed causes the market to shift a little slower than it might otherwise. In addition, he has a limited amount of natural resources, so he can't just pop out cars for $1 each and expect to make money. That wouldn't even cover the electricity costs of his plant.

What effect would this have on Ferrari? None. It might actually increase Ferrari sales because people who buy the $15k car will have $5k leftover to play with. What does this do to the rest of the car market? It puts pressure on other car companies and can crater entire product lines in the vicinity of this plant. An existing manufacturer might restructure their lineup to a different segment of the market.

What effect does this have on the poor? Saves them $5k per car, $5k they no longer have to earn. Standard of living just increased.

Ok, so let's say he dropped the price to $1 per car. Now suddenly everyone can have a car essentially for free. They have to earn $1 for their car. That's far easier than earning 20,000 times that much. It increases disposable income, and still doesn't necessarily touch the high-end car market.

Let's say this happened to all products in all industries. Prices drop to insane lows... say 1/20,000th of what they used to be. So now instead of earning $40,000 per year, you'd need to earn $2 per year to have the equivalent purchasing power. But you couldn't earn any money in just any field. You'd have to generate $2 of value in a field that hadn't been fully automated - like music, art, writing, comedy, teaching - or just the creation of a new exiting thing for people to spend their spare time on like flying in a squirrel suit. Can you spend 2 hours per week teaching people woodworking, people who themselves are also only working 2 hours per week? Can you spend 2 hours per week taking care of children (which is something that cannot be automated)? Can you spend 2 hours per week showing people have to drive fast? Or how to do yoga? Or running a spin class?

Sure, machines can do some of those things, but there are a lot of areas - especially training - where people will be willing to pay for a human touch. Remember, you'll need to earn only $2 to get by in this scenario.

It surprises me that people would be concerned about a utopia where robots provide all labor for free. It would boost everyone's standard of living to the sky.

 

[Touring Mars]

But can prices ever really drop 'to insane lows' when there is massive (and growing) wealth inequality, ever more scarce resources and a rapidly increasing global population? I find that prospect to be quite unlikely... Labor is one cost of producing what the world's human population needs, but it isn't the only cost - and when resources such as fresh water, arable land and energy become more scarce, will those who can afford it not drive prices higher and higher?

 

[mustafur]

Kindof contradicting yourself here. What happens when the market is flooded with free labor... that free labor would charge for it? It's not free then, which puts people back in the market. If it's free, it's free. If it's not, well... it's not.

How is it contridicing what i said?

If everything in the market can be made by robots, who in turn are owned by say the few instead of the many if they charge money for things, people don't magically go back to a market that they are labour wise irrelevant in.

Apart from making babies or being used as slaves(or worse)their existence in a labour market is over.

 

[Danoff]

But can prices ever really drop 'to insane lows' when there is massive (and growing) wealth inequality, ever more scarce resources and a rapidly increasing global population? I find that prospect to be quite unlikely... Labor is one cost of producing what the world's human population needs, but it isn't the only cost - and when resources such as fresh water, arable land and energy become more scarce, will those who can afford it not drive prices higher and higher?

Oil was supposedly becoming more and more scarce, and yet we keep finding more. The more expensive it is, the less scarce it is because the more money can be spent collecting it. Likewise, the cheaper it is to collect (through robotics) the less scarce it is because more labor can be spent collecting it.

Energy is not really very scarce - we just choose not to produce it efficiently. When it costs a small fraction of what it costs today to build a nuclear power plant because you have a ton of robotic workers it may not be as scarce. Extra power means things like desalinization can be brought to bear for freshwater. I don't know that much about growing crops, but I think energy and water can boost crop development as well.

You're trying to describe a runaway train where the wealth of the rich keeps driving up prices so that most people can't afford anything. But if that happens the rich don't stay wealthy - because production is required to maintain that wealth - otherwise it just evaporates in the face of rising prices. The way wealth inequality grows (in a capitalist system) is via the market growing as a whole - which means everyone is benefiting (necessarily, according to them).

How is it contridicing what i said?

If everything in the market can be made by robots, who in turn are owned by say the few instead of the many if they charge money for things, people don't magically go back to a market that they are labour wise irrelevant in.

Apart from making babies or being used as slaves(or worse)their existence in a labour market is over.

What was contradicting was the notion that people can't afford something that is free.

 

[mustafur]

What was contradicting was the notion that people can't afford something that is free.

I never said it wold be free In fact I'm arguing against that, to say it will be free also ignores individual desire from said person who has the power to make that decision.

 

[Exorcet]

But can prices ever really drop 'to insane lows' when there is massive (and growing) wealth inequality, ever more scarce resources and a rapidly increasing global population? I find that prospect to be quite unlikely... Labor is one cost of producing what the world's human population needs, but it isn't the only cost - and when resources such as fresh water, arable land and energy become more scarce, will those who can afford it not drive prices higher and higher?

I'm not overly worried about running out of resources. Before prices skyrocket we'll probably set aside some of our less well founded fears to produce resources in abundance. Nuclear energy should be literally everywhere, but people are afraid of it. If oil dries up completely, I think nuclear plants will be common place before energy riots.

 

[Danoff]

I never said it wold be free In fact I'm arguing against that, to say it will be free also ignores individual desire from said person who has the power to make that decision.

Ok, so the scenario is that one person (not multiple people, one person) has robotics and puts tons of people out of work (because that person used to employ lots of people), but doesn't drop prices because he's greedy.

Ok, fine, but that's just one company. To have more than one company do it means they compete with each other, which means prices drop hard.

 

[mustafur]

or they collaborate if there are a few and make a oligarchy who is to say?

Your Simpleton approach to Free market ignores things that don't go to plan in a market fashion like Human desire and power grabs.

 

[Danoff]

or they collaborate if there are a few and make a oligarchy who is to say?

Ok, how is that different from right now? They could collaborate and make an oligarchy to charge 2x as much as they do right now right? What's stopping them.

 

[mustafur]

Ok, how is that different from right now? They could collaborate and make an oligarchy to charge 2x as much as they do right now right? What's stopping them.

There is far too much competition in today's market, we also don't have a market where humans don't make nearly everything, and even those things we don't make, we make those things that make that.

 

[Danoff]

There is far too much competition in today's market, we also don't have a market where humans don't make nearly everything, and even those things we don't make, we make those things that make that.

..and somehow oligarchy results from any of this?

 

[mustafur]

..and somehow oligarchy results from any of this?

Are all Oligarchs equal?

 

[Danoff]

Are all Oligarchs equal?

Would they need to be to support anything I said?

 

[mustafur]

Would they need to be to support anything I said?

Just saying there is a difference between ignoring certain stories on the news to push an agenda and plain slavery.

 

[Danoff]

Just saying there is a difference between ignoring certain stories on the news to push an agenda and plain slavery.

You can you connect the dots for me? Because I'm really not following at this point.

 

[mustafur]

You can you connect the dots for me? Because I'm really not following at this point.

*Comparing what we see today to what is possible if Oligarchs have more power(using US for example).

If one or few controls all production and needs for the entire society, say they collaborate they could if they wanted to go well beyond and government power branch,

That though today couldn't happen since production is heavily spread around society and organizing such an oligarchy with that levels of power would be basically impossible.

 

[Danoff]

If one or few controls all production and needs for the entire society

Explain to me how automation results in this?

 

[mustafur]

Explain to me how automation results in this?

When one company has the ability to take out several, multiple, most or all competition and own labour and production.

It's pretty easy to explain but impossible to prove it will be the result, only possibility.

When less people are the ones with the most power it really comes to how they react in which the rest will work going forward.

The point is everything that your saying can be true but so can what I'm saying, and it would all depend on who and what is at top and their desires to use that resource by either making it free or controlling it for them as a power grab.

I know this is like hypothetical future nonsense compared to where we are today, but that is the possible(but not certain) endgame when it comes to expanding automation.

 

[Danoff]

When one company has the ability to take out several, multiple, most or all competition and own labour and production.

Ok, so one company invents the holy grail of robots and uses that robot to put all other companies out of business. And the reason that nobody else can do it once one company has done it is because patents?

If you were sitting on a technology that could undercut everyone I'm not sure it would be advantageous to file a patent application on it. You have to disclose how you do it if you want patent protection - to the public. You have to explain to everyone exactly how to make that robot. If someone comes up with an improvement on that design they can patent the improvement, which denies you the ability to make that improvement. Plus, your monopoly on the patented work is only protected for 20 years. You can sit on a trade secret (if you're Coke) a lot longer than that. Especially if you can fire all of your employees.

If it was ruining the economy someone would probably come up with an argument for why that patent was invalid anyway. Patents are great incentives to innovate, but it'd be hard to come up with one that all of society couldn't band together to take down. A trade secret would have its own problems. Can't let one of those robots get stolen and reverse engineered...

Robots aren't being developed in that way anyway. Automation is coming in slow increments, being spearheaded by tons of companies each looking for automation is specific areas.