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A review by jqb603
The Second Machine Age: Work, Progress, and Prosperity in a Time of Brilliant Technologies by Andrew McAfee, Erik Brynjolfsson
4.0
I picked up this book because I'd read a few this year about AI and the various impacts it may have on the future of humanity. Other than the obvious risk of unleashing superintelligent AI with poorly programmed objectives, the future of employment is my largest concern. The pincer of development in AI and robotics may not leave much on the table for humans to do. This doesn't have to be a dire proposition, but it certainly will be if we don't properly navigate the turmoil. My hope was that this book would be an in depth exploration of how we humans might find fulfillment and meet our material needs once most of the work we currently do can be done better by machines.
I was slightly concerned that the book was written in 2014, and unfortunately my concerns were realized. I would have really liked this book in 2014, because most of the book was spent convincing the reader that the path that we're on is one in which whole categories of employment fall into the gaping maw of automation and machine intelligence. The central problem is one of "bounty and spread", where developed nations have increasing economic output, but the median wage of workers are decreasing in real dollars. Wealth and income inequality are growing so fast that the rising average income is not raising all ships. Also, unemployment in low (or medium) skilled work that is routine in nature is being subsumed by machines. I was already convinced of all that. Only in the third (of three) part of the book do the authors discuss ideas for the future. The first chapter in this section gives advice to the individual job seeker (seek out non-routine work, or work that complements a machine intelligence). The second gives advice for policy makers (various tweaks to taxation and subsidization). Only in the last chapter of the last section of the book do they very briefly touch on the far future. But they don't go much deeper than putting forward a list of the ideas that they've heard for how we can sustain everyone when a small handful of corporations create astronomical wealth. For those interested, here is that clip from the book:
• Create a national mutual fund distributing the ownership of capital widely and perhaps inalienably, providing a dividend stream to all citizens and assuring the capital returns do not become highly concentrated.
• Use taxes, regulation, contests, grand challenges, or other incentives to try to direct technical change toward machines that augment human ability rather than substitute for it, toward new goods and services and away from labor savings.
• Pay people via nonprofits and other organizations to do ‘socially beneficial’ tasks, as determined by a democratic process.
• Nurture or celebrate special categories of work to be done by humans only. For instance, care for babies and young children, or perhaps the dying, might fall into this category.
• Start a ‘made by humans’ labeling movement, similar to those now in place for organic foods, or award credits for companies that employ humans, similar to the carbon offsets that can be purchased. If some consumers wanted to increase the demand for human workers, such labels or credits would let them do so.
•Provide vouchers for basic necessities like food, clothing, and housing, eliminating the extremes of poverty but letting the market manage income above that level.
• Ramp up hiring by the government via programs like the Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps to clean up the environment, build infrastructure, and address other public goods. A variant is to increase the role of ‘workfare,’ i.e., direct payments tied to a work requirement.
In summary, this was a good book, but not the book that I was hoping to read. If you find it hard to imagine that machines are going to exacerbate the growing trend of wealth inequality, unemployment, and falling real wages for several types of work in the 21st century, this book puts together a solid case to convince you.
I was slightly concerned that the book was written in 2014, and unfortunately my concerns were realized. I would have really liked this book in 2014, because most of the book was spent convincing the reader that the path that we're on is one in which whole categories of employment fall into the gaping maw of automation and machine intelligence. The central problem is one of "bounty and spread", where developed nations have increasing economic output, but the median wage of workers are decreasing in real dollars. Wealth and income inequality are growing so fast that the rising average income is not raising all ships. Also, unemployment in low (or medium) skilled work that is routine in nature is being subsumed by machines. I was already convinced of all that. Only in the third (of three) part of the book do the authors discuss ideas for the future. The first chapter in this section gives advice to the individual job seeker (seek out non-routine work, or work that complements a machine intelligence). The second gives advice for policy makers (various tweaks to taxation and subsidization). Only in the last chapter of the last section of the book do they very briefly touch on the far future. But they don't go much deeper than putting forward a list of the ideas that they've heard for how we can sustain everyone when a small handful of corporations create astronomical wealth. For those interested, here is that clip from the book:
• Create a national mutual fund distributing the ownership of capital widely and perhaps inalienably, providing a dividend stream to all citizens and assuring the capital returns do not become highly concentrated.
• Use taxes, regulation, contests, grand challenges, or other incentives to try to direct technical change toward machines that augment human ability rather than substitute for it, toward new goods and services and away from labor savings.
• Pay people via nonprofits and other organizations to do ‘socially beneficial’ tasks, as determined by a democratic process.
• Nurture or celebrate special categories of work to be done by humans only. For instance, care for babies and young children, or perhaps the dying, might fall into this category.
• Start a ‘made by humans’ labeling movement, similar to those now in place for organic foods, or award credits for companies that employ humans, similar to the carbon offsets that can be purchased. If some consumers wanted to increase the demand for human workers, such labels or credits would let them do so.
•Provide vouchers for basic necessities like food, clothing, and housing, eliminating the extremes of poverty but letting the market manage income above that level.
• Ramp up hiring by the government via programs like the Depression-era Civilian Conservation Corps to clean up the environment, build infrastructure, and address other public goods. A variant is to increase the role of ‘workfare,’ i.e., direct payments tied to a work requirement.
In summary, this was a good book, but not the book that I was hoping to read. If you find it hard to imagine that machines are going to exacerbate the growing trend of wealth inequality, unemployment, and falling real wages for several types of work in the 21st century, this book puts together a solid case to convince you.