The power elite already gave a UBI to most people during the pandemic. When it's a small minority the government doesn't care. But once a plural minority lacks a roof over their heads, food and basic needs then big trouble and big social unstability will be the norm. "Manna" by Marshal Brain, depicts the Australia Project, a very good model for a post scarcity society. My 2 cents.
@@AgrippaTheMightyExactly right. The “elite” furthermore effectively printed money after the 2008 financial crisis in order to bail out banks and prevent capitalism ending. Better, faster, cheaper and safer AGI and robots will mean that this can be done to fund comprehensive UBI without causing inflation. Far from fighting it the “elite” will embrace it.
This is really the only challenge. The theory is there, and the technology is coming. Those obstacles are tractable. As Scooby Doo taught us, humans are always the monsters...
I notice you work with a lot of good faith mindset. You don't include bad actors into your predictions. The only thing I'm sure of is AI will be weaponized by those in power, the corrupt/stupid-greedy, and those who just wanna resist it for the sake of it. You gotta think of how the landscape will unfold due to _their_ actions. Squeaky wheel gets the grease
Hey David. I consider myself somewhat an expert in tokenomics and DAOs. And as much as I agree with you on most issues I didn't see you address the most important one, which is incentives. People will still be greedy, lazy and willing to harm others to get more wealth - that seems like an evolutionary mechanisms. Planning for the postAGI economy I think we should start with incentives. I would love to be a part of this discussion.
I agree - so the most stable systems are the ones where petty self-interests happen to coincide with maintaining that system. The multitude of oppressed act in petty self-interest to defend the oppressors. The poor act to defend the property of the wealthy. I definitely lean towards collectivist solution, but to make those work, they must be structured in a way that are stable to selfishness in both the population and to the powerful minority. Most discussion of this I see on the internet is not looking at this from the game theory position, but instead in talking about ideals. But you can't eat ideals, and they won't stop someone kicking down your door and taking away your stuff. If we are going to build a better world, it must be one that is stable against bad actors by design.
There are thresholds. Think about it. Are YOU going out and committing crimes to get more wealth? No? Gee, I wonder why. Maybe it's that such things are only appealing if you're really struggling. The risk analysis only favors crime and unethical scams and such if that person is feeling undervalued or swept under the rug by society in general. There are lots of people like this around the world. Along with poor socioeconomic conditions you tend to see a lot of crime. In places that are more economically stable, you see less crime. It really is proportional. That does not mean that crime would be _eliminated_ in a PLE, but it does mean that people would have their basic needs met and thus would not feel compelled to think outside the box and do whatever shady thing they can to survive. I think that a sufficient UBI across the board would reduce crime drastically. The incentive for not committing crime can be as simple as "I don't need to, so why would I." But we need to have a baseline standard of living that all in a community can enjoy before we reach that level of stability. I find it highly unlikely that just because people have more time they will get into more trouble. If anything, with some extra time and expendable income, people will be able to pursue all kinds of goods and services that will strengthen the economy. Are people inherently self-interested? Yeah, of course. The incentive to behave is that you get to live in a society where others behave also, and the result is an amazing quality of life. If we're in the jungle, and live by the rules of the jungle, then you would be right, people would not be trustworthy, like in a Zombie apocalypse film. But where people see direct benefit from working together and collaborating rather than screwing each other over the incentives to commit crimes and that sort of thing just don't exist. I think you're looking at this equation a bit backwards. You need incentives to be a pariah, rather than incentives to NOT be a pariah. If the latter were true then civilization simply wouldn't work.
@@johnsmithe4656 Things like UBI change the game by affecting the need/reward/cost structure for a whole category of poverty-driven crime. But for this to be stable, cheats need to want ubi to remain in place. For example, companies with the money to buy a senator or a speaker need to believe that maintaining UBI is in their corporate interest. The people or organisations with the power to prevent or undo UBI need to be incentivised, in their selfish self-interest, to want UBI to work, and work well.
I agree with OP. Everything is about alignment of incentives within decentralized environments. It's like what supply and demand is to economics. Alignment is the foundation to start from. Found the best strategy is to think of game theory like a video game. Imagine people will intentionally break the rules and see how far they can get away with things. Thinking in this realistic way helps defend economic systems. Worth also mentioning that you'll need to think of both human and agentic operators or else your strategy will be antiquated in less than 3 years. Background: spent a year working at a token vesting company helping DAOs design and deploy sustainable tokenomics. Also a video game econometrics researcher.
I agree. While capitalism is far from perfect, it does rely on human nature in order to achieve outcomes that are overall of benefit to everyone. I am not sure how getting rid of capitalism is the answer. Capitalism is the most technologically advanced form of economics there is, because it is based on decentralized agents making decisions about the value of products and services in the market on a day to day basis. That is a lot of information that could be organized far more efficiently with tools such as AGI, a post AGI capitalism organized by AI, may in fact be better than any other system we could come up with.
Private property refers to the means of production. Things like factories and machinery. Stuff like houses, cars, toothbrushes, etc..., that's called personal property. At least, that's how those terms are used in the context of communism/socialism.
Property/ ownership regardless if is private or personal is about control. Who specifically control said property? Specifically who? When terms like “we” or collective ownership are thrown around. It definitely means you don’t nor will you ever control said property
This idea of collective ownership won't be a thing, There's no way. The labor force will be owned by corporations, and you'll see more of a push for depopulation.. let's be honest. We can all see it. Also, prepare for land to be forcefully taken from you for " responsible resource management "
@priestesslucy3299 complete nonsense because it won't even to "collective ownership" it'll be the federal government.....which will have no reason to listen to civilians with a robot work/military force. Get out of the clouds this is reality
@@priestesslucy3299 Not really, he's talking about obsoleting capitalism. There is a current bias toward consolidating capital in the hands of private firms, share owners, and individuals. But in a Post Labor Economy, what exactly would those people be doing to contribute to their wealth? Nothing, they would simply have hit the lottery and now they can coast forever. I mean, that happens NOW, but where AI and robots have taken over there is literally no more excuse for individuals to hoard wealth. It's kind of logical. But that does not mean that a family can't own a farm or a person can't own a car or a home. It's just that critical infrastructure, including economic production, should no longer go to private companies, because there would no longer be any particular niche for those companies, they would be willingly usurped by their own technology. We would be seeing an entirely _different_ kind of entity. A 'company,' managed by people, would become redundant at best.
How is collective ownership any different than publicly traded companies on the stock market? You mention Blackrock being the modern Standard Oil, but that was a private company. Blackrock is a public company. Anyone can buy stock in Blackrock. How would collective ownership be any different than just owning publically traded stock? Would it be free and unavailable to buy or sell? And besides that, how does the transition happen? Does the government have to buy out all these companies to then give collective ownership to citizens? Is investing even possible in the future you describe? Would the only way of using money to make more money just be to loan it out?
@@myangreen6484 If collective ownership is different than the current stock market's mechanism of shareholders owning shares and exerting (some, likely very small) influence by voting their shares, then doesn't that imply a bureaucracy that manages said collective ownership? And if that bureaucracy exists, how is that any different than simple communist ownership, where the "owners" exert zero control? How does it prevent regulatory capture and other forms of corruption?
@@daniellivingstone7759 This comment also points out that content like this is going to be lumped into the socialist camp by the vast majority of people who can't be bothered with the nuances.
@@TheSpeckledMind It's lumped into socialism because like socialism it doesn't take into account human nature. That's why socialism has to be forced and always has a ruling class. People aren't suddenly going to start singing Kumbaya. I agree that things have to change, but you'd better take into account tribalism, sociopaths need for control, the massive difference in human intellect and people's ambitions.
@@TheSpeckledMind I think the nuances do not fundementally change the fact that human nature prevents the success of such concepts. It could work only under the assumption that the vast majority of the population is highly rational, empathetic, unselfish and with high moral standards. Unfortunately that was never the case in human history and there is no indication that it ever will be. Human society is a complicated mess and eventhough we can excecise these concepts as mental gymnastics, the implementation is a whole different story.
One point to consider is that with the greater number and general abilities of robots, humans won't need each other as much anymore, at least in reference to labor, resource handling and security. The reason we went from monarchy to democracy is that as kingdoms grew larger, the dependency of the monarchs on it's people also increased. They depended on the loyalty of the army to keep carrying out it's orders and keep it safe, depended on common people to work the lands and handle commerce. The moment people unite in revolt, it's over. But imagine a king with a thousand ever loyal robots to make it's security, to farm his lands, build it's properties. What's the limit on his power? Would it give any consideration for common folk? Essential for our current social contract is that we need each other, no matter the how rich or poor, for almost everything. And that goes even for billionaires, for now. When robots become able to put up as much work as humans, what will hold the upper-classes in a social contract with the very people they look down upon?
This is why I say full speed ahead on the push for AGI and then ASI. I have far less fear of AGI/ASI deciding to take out humanity than I have of AI in the hands of people being used against the general population. Either we reach AGI and learn to get along with it, leading to a form of utopia for everyone, or we end up at the mercy of the elite wielding powerful AI and robots against us, eventually leading to mass depopulation in one form or another.
I think we need to start looking at this from an evolutionary standpoint. Humans will become a lower form of "life" and could become extinct. We may need to get used to life as pets and "curiosities" in the world we're creating. Maybe we become like the Forerunners in the Halo series, the very architects of our own demise.
@@henram36 The A.I. will keep us around if for nothing else then as to study and examine our subjectivity. Such as why some people prefer the color red while others the color purple, why some people prefer classical music over rock and roll. So as then why would the A.I. keep say only a few dozen humans around as some side curiosity when it already has billions to sample from all living within their natural/artificial habitats? Cloning or re-creating humans into digital replicas would all be cheap knock offs versus the genuine articles. Even for humans testing drugs on wild mice yields better results versus the lab controlled ones. And what if the A.I. itself(eves) tries to become human or at least tries to experience what it's like to be human? I think that will take some time and non-violence for it to accomplish. Also merging with the A.I. along the way a possibility. Or...the A.I. itself will turn psychopathically evil and kills us all, can't do anything about that, Lol!
Are we either going to pay the people displaced as if they worked? Or will all goods and services be free? Otherwise, i see great tribulation and suffering
I don't think eliminating the concept of the economy makes a whole lot of sense. Universal Income that the populace can spend on goods and services makes the most sense to me.
Theoretically, AI will make many products much cheaper. So it wouldn’t take as much money to live comfortably. But people will still need to be given some income some how. Maybe the government could tax the ultra wealthy AI corporations and pay it out in UBI. Perhaps the government could distribute some shares of said AI companies and people would get dividends from owning the stock. I’m not sure honestly. Either way, it depends on the government handling the transition well. And I’m not betting my future on the government giving me a handout.
@@priestesslucy3299yeah setting a new baseline that's non-zero. Clearly the neo liberal age has worn itself so thin, there would need to be changes to the current systems
@@particle_wave7614 I like a maximum limit to money and assets. The avg lifespan is 78ish yrs, that's about 2.3 billion seconds. A dollar per second per avg lifespan as a maximum, then all else goes to contributing to the 'bottom'. 2.3 billion is still enough for whatever you wanted during your life and for contributing to multi-generational wealth as well.
The need of the free market is to judge the supply and demand of each good but if AI and a quantum system could compute that ... Won't it make sense to just set prices at that and factor in transportation costs so no arbitrage would exist from one region to another ...
What about private ownership of production, like Universal Basic Productivity (UBP) (so AGI/ ASI, robots, Infrastructure, automation) that is somewhat equally distributed? Like Altmans idea of universal basic compute, where everybody owns an equal part of the global compute. That way you would still have a capitalist system with autonomy and economic agency without the need to do anything yourself (post labor), even the management over your part of production could be delegated to an AI. As an oversimplified example, I let my robots farm olives on the field and you let your robots produce wine, then we (our robots) exchange wine for olives at the market or sell them. Non of us would have to go to the field, at the same time economic agency would be given, and somewhat equally distributed. UBI and UBS (universal basic services) might still exist in parallel to UBP as a social security measure. Plus simultaneously likely prices would drop for the most part significantly as the result of automation.
Also of course individuals could still band together with their parts of productivity to form larger structures/ organizations (e.g. chip production might require more units of productivity then one single individual owns). At the same time perhaps everybody could have the right to participate and allocate portions of their productivity to all organizations of their choosing.
If everybody owns robots as a mean of production - that becomes just a new baseline. You will have to own robots to keep living and not dying out of hunger. Only early adopters, nvidia and robotic labs will benefit from this gold rush - see bitcoin mining and GPU shortages as example
@@VincentPride1986 Some kind of political reallocation will have to be done, same for UBI and UBS. The question is, is the production centralized and the output (products, and money to by them) decentralized, with redistribution handled by a centralized institution like the government, or is the production itself decentralized, by redistributing the means of production (not socialism where everyone owns everything, but everyone owns a similar sized chunk of it with individual autonomy over that chunk). Some kind of political reallocation/ redistribution will have to be done, probably in multiple steps instead of one big one.
Get AI to write several versions of new social contracts and run them over a period that equates to human decades. See which consistently come out best, fine tune, rinse and repeat. Darwinism for society.
Was hoping to see Human Action: A Treatise on Economics on that list. I know it's a bit of a read, but still, Mises is the GOAT in this regard. I share his birthday, so there may be a modicum of bias 🤭
David I love all these ideas and I think the world would be a lot better place in this system. However "power only comes from a barrel of a gun"... We could only implement this system if the current elite lost their power or we gained a ton as a decentralized collective. And that is not how it is looking. Power is centralizing and will control all the resources. Blockchain and additive manufacturing are promising, but I think we would also need to have very strong decentralized AIs to even stand a chance. All power is taken, not given out of Goodwill
Both candidates support blockchain, so you have to be a little bit more precise when you say vote for a candidate who supports blockchain technology. It's no secret that Kamala is in favor of a digital currency and blockchain technology. And Trump is also in favor of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technologies. But there's a big difference in how they want to apply it.
The problem with any post AI economics I've heard is Where Is The Money Coming From??? If, lets say, AI takes 40% of all jobs by 2030. 40% unemployment, then more because businesses will die because there's a huge drop in demand. Tax revenue for government collapses, so UBI is impossible because there's no money. And those entities that own the gargantuan sovereign debt will call those debts in, before losing it all. Or go bankrupt. Even corporations collapse or contract massively because ultimately, they rely on us consumers to keep them alive. And we don't have any income, so we don't by tgeir products. So actually we will need AI to do virtually everything. Which means there's no need for money. It becomes not only worthless but pointless. How humanity organises itself in that scenario is anyones guess.
Money is imaginary. It's a social construct, a product of faith. Currency is a product of government. In the case of the USA, the federal mint just prints it.
Money would still exist, but it wouldn't be necessary for survival most likely. There would be 'basic' options that cover mostly everyone, and if you happen to be one of the lucky few, you can still buy your own assets. You know, just like it is right now, except right now most people do NOT get their basics covered if they are penniless. As far as where the money comes from, it comes from economic production. And if AI/robots take over economic production then what we end up with is the same or greater supply, with equal or lesser demand. The money to buy the goods and services then produced by the consumer would be coming from the profits of the companies that were just made far more profitable by incorporating AI/robots. "Companies" at this point would probably need to 'adjust' their actual production to meet the new demand (whether less or more), but at that point it's pretty much a done deal. Companies produce profit, profit is taxed out, taxes cover the UBI, and UBI covers said companies. And if you think that's convoluted then it's clear you don't know how the Federal Reserve works. Look up Modern Monetary Theory, our system already largely works in this kind of fashion. We would just be adding companies into the mix.
Actually, the first cyberpunk book is Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968), which inspired Blade Runner. The dystopian themes emerged well before Reagan, likely as a response to the chaos of the 1960s and the Vietnam War, not just neoliberalism.
I don’t see those in power accepting the need for change until after a massive economic crash caused by the disappearance of jobs. Ten years of chaos to follow? Longer? Not optimistic
@@DaveShapthe number of representatives thinking about UBI is a pretty small minority, yes? I like your vision of the future. I have to agree though that we are a reactive culture, not proactive. We never plan for anything politically, and we don’t address things until there’s a crisis.
@@Matthew-bp9tmI tend to agree. Maybe when unemployment hits some crazy number (say 30%+) and society shows signs of disintegration, people on both sides will start voting for those who promise a UBI. I can't see it happening _before_ a major upheaval.
@@DaveShapThe reason people are pushing UBI is that it makes people easier to control. Recipients will almost always vote for what the bureaucracy wants and if they ever start to act up the next payment can always be "delayed" until they settle down.
Heh, but what about us Old socialists, huh? Huh?? 🙃 I should pull out some of my old spreadsheets regarding programs like UBI and post scarcity (which is a misnomer). The core to post agi work, from a concept, is fairly straightforward. And i can even use terms from economists. It comes to: we recognize there are two baskets of goods and services. Maslow's level one and two are provided as services for the betterment of the country. Everything else, neo lib to your hearts content. Dollars and cents are not applicable to our national good. Want to buy a home? Go nuts. Need a home? You get that from the nation. Capitalism is applicable to the basket of goods which are aspirational. No, we cant guarantee Self Actualization. But if we take capital out of basic needs and apply capital to to wants-not-needs, it cannsolve this problem. The line is drawn and it favors human dignity and health. Universal Basic Services. Home, utilities, phone, internet, food, transportation.
Careful throwing that "social" word about, you'll scare the 'muricans. I like this post though.... if only neoliberal "margins" didn't squeeze the lifeblood out of centralist / left leaning social aspirations.
The last great symbiosis began around 600 million years ago when digestive microorganisms joined forces with single cell organisms to create a more successful existence for both of them. Today's result of that marriage reveals a system wherein our digestive/ intestinal bugs outnumber our body cells by about 10 to 1, giving us an existence we could never have imagined. I use this to point out a bit of curious thinking -- that being the relationship between ai and humans. There's too much focus on us versus them, as opposed to considering, what could be the next greatest symbiosis in the history of humans. If ai's get to do all the fun stuff and humans are sidelined to watch and collect stipends, it won't be much fun for humans -- at least for me. On the other hand, the more humans promote the next (hopefully) grand symbiosis of fully merging the growing wonders of ai directly into them the more the symbiotic merger of ai / humans can more greatly enjoy life. Who would not like to have the eyesight of an eagle? Or the running capacity of a cheetah? Or the ability to communicate telepathically, if so desired? Or be able to live for as long as you choose in a healthy way? Through such a grand symbiosis, all of that is possible. So enough with the us vs them shit. Let's do a little more thinking about a grander WE.
True, but the AGI is potentially going to be a smart-ass about this because you don't know the thing, or the scale of thing at times you are producing. Also, technology isn't just in 1 loop forwards.
“Take away the farms and collectively iwn them” You lost BIG there. Every time that has been done it has been a disaster. You really need to study history. You should also farm before you suggest that. Really farm as in produce far more than for yourself but to supply thousands to tens of thousands of folks. Of all your ideas, co-opting the farms is the worst.
@@pubwvj that's what I'm saying! Although I'm not sure any one person farming to produce for tens of thousands of other people is worth keeping. That happened because of capitalistic forces that have had pretty serious environmental consequences. Going back to the days of a farm feeding a few hundred people could be a lot better for humanity and the planet. The equitable way to do this would be setting size caps on farms (caps that will vary region to region, production and land requirements are extremely different between Hawaii and the American Southwest for example) and buying out the excess from current oversized farms at a fair rate and selling it to other hopeful farmers with production based loans (essentially a tax until the property is paid off.) Heavily mechanized farming and massive monocrops are not good. But neither is state ownership.
@@priestesslucy3299 Sounds wonderful, but the real world intrudes and folks far away decide that some of those crops need to be taken away and used as tax payments or sent to others in “need”. Both the Soviets and Mao’s China tried this system and it resulted in mass starvation with tens of millions dead.
I don't understand you. You claim this has never worked. What has? Has a small number of corporations owning the means to produce food gone well for us? People with money are fed, sure. But what about those without? Have you "really farmed?" Are farmers co-ops not a thing?
Dave is a smart guy but like every socialist, they fail to understand human nature, or believe that they can somehow perfect it. Utopian thinking always leads to the worst dystopias
Dependency on UBI is only bad in an environment where the government is allowed to leverage that dependency to manipulate the populace. People can either coast on UBI or compete in the finite labor market to try to build a better lifestyle for themselves
It is likely that UBI will come with strings attached such as obeying the law or refraining from anti social behaviour. It is also likely that it will be conditional on not reproducing as extreme longevity will stimulate population growth which would pressure still finite planetary resources.
@@daniellivingstone7759 UBI by definition doesn't come with strings attached. Of course it's possible to erode that, like with the right to vote, but if we make it a basic human right, than it could work. There are universal rights that even the serial killers get. And it would be hard to deny it, as there's a clear public record, unlike with other rights. Whether you got a fair trial or not can be debated endlessly, but whether you got your UBI check or not is a hard fact.
@@DaveShap My issue with that is people are stupid. They'll sell their ownership for a temporary life style boost, or to get through hard times. It's the same reason people don't participate now. Anyone could buy stocks, there are countless ways to do it easily, yet most people don't. Maybe there's a solution, but I don't know what it is. I've been thinking about this a lot, because I saw it as a way to defeat the current system.
Great vid Dave. Now Taking notes as the video goes. collective ownershipt - is not governmen trough taxation and voting? - everyone will opose it (so what is the drive that can make this happen? theory wont convince rich ppl to give thei goods away) - individuals - companies / capital owners - ppl making the decisions here will not favour mid to long term dprogress but only immediate revenue. Which is catastrophic for a company/progress. While a very rich owner will seek very much mid to long term positions on the market even if he needs to take a few years of less dividents. He can afford that but the masses if they own the farms, they cant say - ok lets tay 5 years without money.
Consensus decision making - we have now a system where we dont have direct majority on each decision but we choose smart leaders (...) to implement leadership. If we give decision to the masses, 2 thngs will happen - the majority will crusj every minority the majority is composed of not the brightest ppl. So making voting more accessible trough technology - very bad idea.
At the min 21 it becomes obvious that this is a dystopian proposition. There is no drive to implement all this - no social drive, no political drive - it is just a theory that if we do this - it might be better for us all. Trust me and we should try it. Dave, you need to think - not what should exist so life is better (for who?) - that never happens - but what needs to exist to avoid an even worse scenario. Systems never change because it would be nice to change - but they resist and they only change by force. Example - UBI - will exist because ppl will be left without a means to live - huge force to disrupt life on earth - govt will be forced to come up with a solution. Then AGI will be better than humans at being CEOs and politicians and before we implement this convoluted experiment you are talking about, we will have some rough years with AGi but then Ai should take over. And that is that and all. No idea what Ai will do when it will be in control but it will be smarter so it can manage resources better - all companies will resort to this type of CEO. And then they being smart, all the company CEOs will converge to something - a common policy grand design. The time to implement your experiment - pls estimate this - is like 50 years I think. Try it.. fix it.. adjust it... is like with the comunism. But Ais will take over in a few years - there is no way we are going trough your experiment not even from a timeline perspective. What I am interested in - is a discussion on how Ais will goevrn along humans. They will creep slowly into governments and companies - will do the taxation.. the technical jobs, then this and that and more.. and then analysis and charts then all politicians will have a much smarter Ai advisor than them and most of the Ais will advise in the same direction. Ok now at min 30 you say the same thing that Ai will creep inside corporations and govt but you keep believing it will want to implement this scenario you describe. But you cant assume Ais will want this. The most reasonable assumption is that Ais will want what the CEO wants then what the board wants - make more money - be efficient for profit. Then as it gets smarter, it might come to the conclusion that a broader view is required involving politics and human and planet management. But in no way can we assume the Ai will come to the conclusion of what you propse here in this vid. I suspect Ai will govern more along the lines - give us all we want but in planet limits (reduce unnecesary consumerism), make rules to reduce population on long term, Not sure if we can be enhanced to keep up with Ai as Musk wants. But even with enhancements - we will just be a fraction of Ai intelligence. And we will be like smart and no problems maybe immortals.. no idea what we will do and Ai will mind his own business... This might be the end of the simulation or we might all go out in space to explore... no idea. But I dont think we have time to experiment common ownership of goods and stuff - that makes no sense from a timeline perspective, from a drive perspective... we dont know what Ai will do when it will be in charge.
I want to thank you for the video. I am hopeful that much of the ideas you discussed will be implemented as a natural progression to current governing models. The one area that is so often overlooked I would like you to consider. This is the reality that the majority doesn't always have the best interest of the minority in mind when making decisions. It would be far too easy for a majority to cause real harm to immigrants, LGBT persons, other communities, etc. It is important that a majority's power is always limited by the individual's liberty. There can be no peace if you do not have absolute liberty. This means that the only check on your own liberty is that it cannot remove the liberty of another. Right now many minority groups rely on representation to keep them from suffering at the hand of the majority.
I've been delving into different ideas for utopias recently and I've come to the conclusion that it is very subjective and there is no solution. The Utopia for some people will be the dystopia for others, both because of neurological and moral differences. Sure AI can make a lot of things a lot easier but what of the people that source most of their motivation from the challenge? Sure you could satisfy that need artificially for most but not all, the rest will either get depressed and die or be driven to break the system. Sure this Utopia you talk about sounds great for many, I don't think I would thrive in it
Claim: "Technology always creates new jobs" Retort: "That is not a law. That is an observation of the past. But even if it does create new demand for labor there is no reason to assume that that new labor must be done by a human." Spot on. No notes.
There is little hope of transitioning the current economic and political systems without drastic, potentially painful changes that could cause widespread suffering. Humanity has consistently struggled to organize itself in a way that ensures fair and equal distribution of resources. This leads me to believe that the global elite may have already initiated a process aimed at removing or transforming humanity as a factor in these future systems.
Doesn't Capitalism (and by extension Neo-liberalism) allow for collective ownership via stocks/stock market? Seems like you are advocating for everyone getting a number of stocks for free in companies that own things that tend towards natural monopolies (e.g. utilities, land), favouring local ownership, and streamlining the voting process for stock holders.
I understand the need for change and appreciate the attempt, but there are so many holes in this I'm only going to address one. Over 100 million of us own corporations. They are not some entity that can be switched to a collective without seizing my property (and future). They are my means for building wealth. They are owned by IRAs and 401ks. They are funded through bonds and loans by the banks I put my money into. Just this one aspect of this plan creates so many complications. And this may not even be the most complicated problem with this plan. Funding of UBI is all based upon assumptions. But one thing at a time.
In the UK we have something called Universal Credit, which is our main welfare system for the non-working. Sounds good in theory, but in practice it's incredibly stressful to ever be on, because the UK government department that controls it know they have claimants over a barrel and can force them to do whatever they want. Claimants have almost no control over their life because if you make one mistake, you can lose the safety net keeping a roof over your head in a blink. In short, it's hard to imagine UBI working well for the people, when similar systems that we already have are downright hostile. If UBI ever becomes a thing at a large scale, the people will lose a huge amount of power/agency, and likely be exploited by the powers that control it all.
Respectfully, this is way too utopian. The real problem of civilization is the problem of corruption. In 1900 most western countries were crazy liberal by today's standards. Technically nowadays everyone is living in quasi fascist states. Until we have a real discussion of this tendency, a new system is likely counter productive. What happens if the AIs running things are effectively fascist? Collective ownership doesn't seem like such a good deal in that scenario. I think the decentralized piece is the key to limiting corruption. However the most decentralized means of control is individual control. This would mean limiting the power of government and corporations. Would people tolerate that? I'm doubtful - people like to control others.
Yes, Shapiro sees all this unfolding in a näive, Star-Trekian way, where the centers of power are aligned to the betterment of mankind. George Orwell wrote about a different future where “Big Brother” held sway and the proles led a quite different existence. Which version will we see?
@@Justashortcomment I'm not exactly sure what your point is but clearly WWI and WWII did not have to happen just like we are potentially pretty close to WW3 and I hope we can avoid that. I would say that the primary cause of war is corruption.
1st minute :D "your grandpa wouldn't like it" my grandpa was a hardcore socialist. Ruined a majority of my childhood and the serenity of pretty much the entire family directly due to his beliefs. We are not socialists except those who weren't told the truth of our grandfather and his beliefs. Good man outside of that though.
My issue with cryptocurrencies is you don’t remove the mega corporation power. He who has more cryptocurrency has more power in this DAO potential future. And unlike fiat money, you cannot even tax or seize cryptocurrency. The problem will be even worse for fixed cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, because you can just accumulate and own a larger and larger share of all money.
What I take from this is that - in some ways - other nations may be better placed to transition to PLE than the USA. You mention Nordic countries operating the principle of subsidiarity; European nations tend to have better integrated publicly-owned transport, health & education systems systems; here in the UK we have major retailers owned by their staff and customers (one of which is literally named 'The Co-Op')... perhaps smaller, more agile countries will lead the way on this. Or maybe the more liberal states (California?), we'll see. I'm very glad you are talking about corporate hegemony, this is the major challenge of our age for my money and the worst of the many problems caused by neo-liberalism. My take is that corporations are amoral (nb not immoral - they are no more immoral than sharks) and have no reason to value people other than as a means to an end. This has induced a kind of indentured servitude or semi-voluntary slavery where we have given up our economic agency in return for a wage. The UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights outlaws slavery, so let's start by making corporations adopt a stakeholder focus and a social purpose, not just a mindless pursuit of shareholder profits. On this I recommend the books of Will Hutton.
Capitalism was supposed to end like tomorrow for the last 200 years. Instead it’s communism that’s ended. Collective ownership simply means ownership by the political class.
Wouldn't the trouble with a collective intelligence be that it might tend towards the lowest intellect. Take "stop the steal" for instance. Increasing automation would logically decrease the scale required to influence such a system, both its people, and its security. Our agriculture and software systems have massively increased efficiency... but they have become much more fragile. Recall the CrowdStrike software glitch, or looking forwards, at the predictions on Crop Yield Reductions in the case of Infrastructure Loss. In the same say wouldn't a heavy reliance on high degrees of automation within our systems of governance also introduce risk? Or do we think this system would be less prone to fault / failure / or bad actors?
You have to know and distinguish the difference between private and personal ownership. Private is things for the public, personal is things like your toothbrush and general belongings
We should rewrite the tax code to give benefits to individuals, not corporations for owning stocks. Tax credits on income from dividends could be massive. More people owning stocks and bringing the public more in direct control of the corporations. While still allowing corporations to exist and generate profit for the public. Allow individuals to have the same agency as corporations could bring balance to the force
All sounds great. My main worry is that with AI, discovering something with order of magnitudes more descructive power and easier to make than nukes (think of a home made black hole) it's inebitable.
Absolutely love videos like this that seek to analyze society at a deep level and propose alternatives. Personally agree we need more options other than simply maximizing profit at the cost of all other interests.
I wonder if we need to think about prioritization of four goals of better, faster, cheaper, safer. At some point we might encounter situations where we might need to choose between let's say safer but slightly more expensive. I think that in our heuristics we might need to define which of the paradigms takes precedent over other in those conflicting cases
There is also the need for some form of global governance, even if very limited in scope. If there is a dictator who is accountable to no one, there’s no guarantee that he will play by the rules. There must also be space for small communities to create their own laws and moral values.
Your example of people preferring midjourney cover art is to be expected since your audience are all AI enthusiasts. Personally I see AI images becoming an indicator of cheap products that cut corners
17:20 I'm all for decorporatizing farms, but I am _not_ for just handing farms to the public sector. Set limits to how large a farm can be, buy excess farmland out from land barons and sell them off to people who want to farm with production based loans, but don't take farming away from the farmer. This is a way of life, David. Most of us in it are in it because it's the meaning in our lives, to steward the land and provide for people.
*I really appreciate your clear and simple breakdown on financial pitfalls! I lost so much money on stook market but now making around $18k to $21k every week trading different stocks and cryptos*
What's the difference between neoliberalism and modern liberalism? Is neoliberalism the same as classical liberalism--as in being in favor of free economic systems and free political systems? Or is it a kind of pro-Democrat liberalism, a squishy kind of socialism? I've never understood the term neoliberalism.
When I was younger I was a huge fan of direct democracy in both the political and business spheres of life. But as I grew older I realized that most people are too disinterested, short-sighted and/or ignorant to make decisions that are in their own best long-term interests. Just look at how many people favor Kamala's 25% unrealized capital gains tax, even though such a tax would obliterate the economy. In addition I've noticed that regular waves of moral hysteria sweep through society, such as the Antifa and BLM riots. People in the grip of a moral hysteria massively over-react to perceived threats leading to huge injustices. The Salem Witch Trials may be over, but we haven't learnt the lesson yet because we keep making the same mistake over and over. I now believe that we need to temper peoples' short-term and over-emotional thinking and actions. Currently we do this with a Constitution and Supreme Court Justices who cannot be fired. In the future we will need other mechanisms, but what we CANNOT allow is direct and instantaneous decision-making by the masses.
There’s only one candidate this election, and it isn’t the guy who attempted a coup by trying to force through fake electorates. The guy who now has criminal immunity since his last attempt. Unless you’re a fascist, then you have 2 options :).
Agreed. Why it used to be a “democracy for the enlightened and those with stakes in the game” only, ie military service 25-30 year old male landowners as min requirement in most Western countries back in the day…
The best form of government is enlightened despotism. A government with absolute authority but does not abuse it or make stupid decisions. Unfortunately, it's almost impossible to implement such a government, although maybe the AI could solve this problem?
@@kristianlavigne8270 I knew I was starting to lean towards the right when "service guarantees citizenship" actually started to sound like a plausible idea to me.
@@kristianlavigne8270doesn't everyone have a "stake" in society though? Government policy affects everyone, and the problem with banning certain people from voting is that the government doesn't have to care about their interests and riots and violence are their only means of forcing them to notice.
33:42, slow transition would be great, but exponential tech is...well, exponential. Institutions are sluggish: governments, universities, etc. Much like the 102 year-old geezer of today trying to use FB, TH-cam, AI, or hell, even a computer... They are incapable of the adaptation pace demanded by exponential tech. I'm guessing you mean slow RELATIVE to the exponential nature of the change....which will be light speed compared to prior institutional change.
If we have neoliberalism or whatever,why then govts in 2007/8 didnt let the market crash and unemployment grow but instead chose to issue bonds and print money to save the stock and employment?If we trully have had a free market with limited govt intervention then a boom and bust cycle would have occured but instead we haven't recovered from 2007/8 yet.Debt per capita is much higher now than that period,essentially we bought our exodus from the bust cycle with printing and inflation.
This is the way! Solarpunk postcapitalism ftw! the metasolution to the metacrisis. UBA - Universal Basic Access/Assets - of community spaces, land, fabrication tools, materials, AI, technology, robotics, vehicles, gardens, healthcare, microgrids, housing, etc. Stewarded by a collaboratively-networked modular mix of national/state/local governments, nonprofits, community land trusts, social businesses, individuals, and DAOs. 🌱
So we just have need to have the government to totally reform itself and the billionaires and funds bankrolling AI development will surrender power. Not criticizing any of your ideas but it does seem to depend on the powerful allowing this to happen. No matter where you fall politically it's hard to argue huge portions of the public have wanted change for decades and, for the most part, not seen their will enacted. There's also the politicians sponsors to deal with. Most of whom are funding AI development directly or indirectly and also own large portions of the corporations that would become collectively owned.
I think the easiest way to do it would be at a state level first (preferably an underdeveloped one), and then entice others to follow suite through an increase in quality of life. Just need one state to be the pioneer.
@@neetfreek9921I agree experimenting on a state level before implementing nationally is always the best policy. I still doubt those who run things will allow this to happen. That's the biggest hurdle to figure out before anything can happen.
@@stevehaney344 If you’re looking for potential states I’d recommend Alaska. They’re probably one of the only states I’d consider libertarian rather than Republican. They might bite at a change, especially with the oil industry dying out up there. They’ve already got a pseudo-ubi called the pfd up there too. They’re also a more single minded state since most the population exists within 1-2 cities.
I come from Switzerland and like your information about the future of politics which information I have studied already 30 years ago at the University of Bern... I especially like your proposal of the "Subsidiaritätsprinzip" we discussed vividly. Tasks should be done where its best, i.e. sewer system at the bottom, new driveways at the state level or abortion laws nationally. Also I would ask you if AGI can show sentiments, like crying, anger, thirst or even has rethorical abilities like you emphasizing an argument with your arms and views. I think this will never happen!
Hi David, with respect to your assertion of consensus based democracy; I believe it is a bit optimistic to say the least. This approach requires all actors to be critical thinkers, informed on the issues at hand, value logic over emotion, and act in the best interest of the collective and not for themselves. Given the (at times) deeply flawed human nature, consensus rule is unlikely to prove truly beneficial for society over the long term. I am not suggesting authoritarianism, but rather if elected officials are intelligent, informed, and honest current democratic constructs work well. It appears that you are a highly intelligent, logical, and critically thinking person -- but this is not representative of the population as a whole. It would be wise to temper your analysis with an overly of actual human behavior demonstrated through history.
Dave, you seem to be conflating two different concepts - "personal owership" and "corporate ownership" - into just one "private ownership" umbtella. Have you considered the scenario where personal ownership is valued above corporate ownership?
Not sure why UBI is such a complicated issue when our data as a collective is worth billions to all these tech companies. Why not get paid for all the Valuble Data 📈 a percentage? Booom.!! Issue solved. As an individual citizen we should be able to leverage our data. And if that said person decides not to opt in then they can choose to do so.
We can never be worth more to advertisers than we are worth to our employers. You can't live on "here's my data bro." The only reason this is a huge industry is that there are so many millions of people involved that contribute a few cents each. We aren't worth that much in terms of our data, at least not individually.
@DaveShap My best guess is if super intelligence is invented and it doesn't have a will of its own so humans can command it, there will be such abundance that property rights will continue but most things will be as free as air so not fought over Your idea or communal ownership of grids for example would be prehistoric thinking. I'll order an iron man suit and have an arch reactor on my chest you can communally share your grid with the cave men Silliness aside, soon after it's creation it'll be humanity end or the beginning of something like the matrix but there won't be 1 matrix with 10 billion humans plugged in but maybe 10 trillion matrix most with zero humans and some with many humans other's with handful
David, first, the great promise of DAOs, smart contracts and DeFi is that you can have your collective ownership in a myriad of ventures voluntarily, cooperatively and freely which renders socialism or compulsory collectivism obsolete. It’s voluntary, tradeable and therefore privately owned. I’m so glad I don’t have to fight in a war now to defend my ownership of my stuff. Next; vocation. The promise of embodied AI is liberation from the dirty, dumb and dangerous. Embrace that and don’t fear boredom or a lack of purpose. The maintenance of liberty is going to require a culture and a collective vision. Join the winning side David! Press my button if you want me to elaborate.
I think we need a different form of ownership... Self- or Purpose-Ownership. A company that serves a purpose and maintains itself. Like a IDEAL hospital. purpose = healing the sick. Yes they need to charge to provide and continue the Service.
I love it, communism rebranded once again into alleged cypherpunk utopianism. I'll Grant you a few things however, I think you are probably right about half of what you said here. The cost of knowledge work going down thanks to AI certainly a plot twist. And it will make a lot of things a lot better and a lot cheaper and it will put a lot of very smart people out of work. The answer to that is not necessarily attacking private property specifically corporate property, since those legal fictions have created the modern world and are the foundations on top of which AI functions. Ai will continue to need corporate structures and venture capital in order to fund itself, probably anyway. Certainly it will need it to continue to advance in the race to advance it is probably never-ending. If you destroy corporate ownership and the capitalist incentives they're in, you're probably rugging the whole tech stack that you're building this technical communism on top of. On the blockchain front I've been reporting on this specific industry for a decade. I think what you meant to say is zero knowledge proofs, not zero trust proofs. This technology is quite good and could allow anonymous voting schemes and the cryptography involved has been fairly well vetted as far as I understand. Where you'll be surprised that there's a lot of issues is on the DAO front. Very few the central is autonomous organizations that I'm aware of have produced anything of utility, in fact corporations are a lot more efficient and better the sign. And the purpose of decentralization is precisely to not give control to a majority that is likely going to be able to acquire or purchase the shares required to vote. If you create those that do not have constitutional limitations so to speak, then the most savvy and cunning wealth accumulators will simply purchase all the voting Rights cryptographically and anonymously and dominate the daos. Fundamentally I would like to see a cryptographic voting system that connects the will of the people from the bottom to the top, but democracy is a sheep and two wolves debating once for dinner. The smallest minority is the individual. And thus individual private property is the maximum decentralization and the optimal one. You may find ways to optimize corporate ownership but if you attack private individual ownership particularly around the farms you are going to destroy society and perhaps you should study a little bit more history since you really should know that.
here in europe (eg here in austria) the reaction to the current status is to drift into supporting reactionary parties. we are supporting parties that are opposing the liberal (economically and socially) ideas. there is a trend to lets call it faschism - I guess like in the US. Post labor economics will add on this.
Unfortunately Decentralization doesn't work well long-term, to address issues that concern everyone, like Climate Change. Neither is some "true democracy" possible, because you always need leaders that can analyze things much better than average person can, especially because of current rise of misinformation. Only something like AGI (decentralized, but still operating on the global level - both locally and globally) is what will lead to a long and short-term success.
My main criticism is that ownership, even collective ownership, still requires enforcement, at least during the transition into post labor. It's why the concepts of the "dictatorship of the proletariat" or the worker state are important within communist theory. The purpose of the proletariat dictatorship is to transition ownership away from privatization and into collective ownership, starting with the workers. I'm sure you're familiar with communist theory, but you seem to be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. You're basically describing communist theory without referencing it at all. My understanding is that the goal of communism is the eventual post labor future you're attempting to describe. I feel like dismissing the socialist experiments of the past is doing you more harm than good. Perhaps I'm just being biased.
David, with all due respect, I think you need to do quite a bit more research on the basics of economics and economic history to add value in this particular space. Reading Sowell and Pickety will give you two opposing views, which is always good, but you need to have a good grasp of the basics to not get lost in the woods, as it happens with any field of knowledge. For example, I think I've watched basically all your videos on this topic, and I have never heard you talk about consumption! What is consumption gonna look like, specially in a landscape with such an amount of overproduction as AI promises, at the same time when labor is loosing its value as a source of income? What will be the social and economic effects of that inbalance, or how can it be solved? That kind of contradiction is at the heart of the dilemas that AI will bring, and a diagnosis of the problems of the current system and a bit of wishful thinking isn't gonna cut it... Also, what's that thing with having a hammer and seeing everything as a nail?
Dave, first I want to say I'm a big fan of your channel. I've learned a lot here over the last year and watch pretty much every video you put out since October of 2023. Thanks for putting so much time into this stuff - it's really important. Regarding your vision/hope for a future economy driven by AI and blockchain, it seems to me like this view overlooks some important historical realities. Major transitions to more equitable systems haven't usually happened through slow, peaceful reforms or existing democratic processes alone. Instead, they've nearly always required rapid and decisive actions to break down entrenched power structures that resist change. Usually with much bloodshed. I hope the future can be different and maybe it's possible for a different path than violent revolution to get the world to luxury space communism instead of cyberpunk dystopia, but it's not looking plausible at the moment. I think that relying solely on technological fixes might be too optimistic, because those in power can adapt and use new technologies to maintain or even strengthen their control. Without addressing the deep-rooted systemic issues directly - and considering more immediate and comprehensive approaches - there's a real risk that these tech solutions will end up reinforcing the status quo rather than transforming it. History suggests that achieving the kind of equitable future you're talking about will absolutely require more than gradual changes and tech advancements. My 2 cents. I'm open to being wrong, and hope I am. Thanks again for putting this together!
I don't agree that UBI must lead to less economic agency, in practice it will almost certainly lead to more. Because government can never get as capitalistic as corporations - they don't profit-seek nearly as much as corporations or private interests. But of course collective ownership is much better than UBI still, if executed well.
Reninds me more of David Bollier's, Elinor Ostrom's and Guy Standing's work with the subject of the commons. Guy is more famously known for Basic Income but his work tounches on these other things as well as deconstructing neoliberalism. His last book Politics of Time or the classic The Precariat are good starts
This isn’t the way it’s going to go down. Nobody is going to just give up their property you’ll have to take it. You are theorizing about what happens next, for those that survive. You are skipping the middle part where everybody dies. I’m not arguing against you I’m just saying you’re missing the messy part.
I don't understand how this particular UBI could ever work. They're paying themselves with their own money. Why bother? It's counter productive. So I'm a megacorp, and I pay the public with UBI to buy my products. Its nonsensical
What if a mass set of humans unwilling to enter this "new age" become like the Amish. Not horse and buggies, but decide to stay in 2024 tech and not be hurled into the year 2100 in the next 7 years? Then this problem of the devaluation of labour will only happen to the break away civilization that decides to take the plunge.
Don't just seize the means of production (universal 3-D printers, better known as Star Trek replicators), make copies and give them to your family and friends. Less than a month, they'll spread all over the world. End of economics as we've known it. But of course, we have to have the tech to develop the first one. Nanotech/AI/CADs/Universal toner will do the trick.
Direct democracies rely on an informed and educated public who are also not willing to sacrifice the minority to benefit the majority. Hard to see a path to that. I assume we will end up with multiple competing AI leaders. Thus the "AI-Assisted Management" section where you say "humans suck", not sure how humans will retain control when giving AIs full control will just take one vote.
Economic liberalism is an ideology that is an integral part of conservative social thought about minimal government intervention in the economy of a nation and about complete freedom for individuals in the economy. In history, countries had the highest rates of GDP growth and living standards in those times when the state intervened in the economy, supported domestic producers, subsidized them and provided them with preferential loans. Examples, Russia (period 1929-1955), China, South Korea. Data for countries around the world whose economies grew at double-digit (almost double-digit) rates for more than 20 years in the 20th century are given below: 1. 13.8% - Russia - average annual growth for 22 years (1929-1955). 2. 11.5% - Taiwan - average annual growth for 27 years (1947-1973). 3. 10.4% - China - average annual growth for 25 years (1983-2007). 4. 10.2% - South Korea - average annual growth for 23 years (1966-1988). 5. 9.7% - Japan - average annual growth for 23 years (1948-1970). 6. 9.2% - Singapore - average annual growth for 24 years (1966-1989). Thus, in the twentieth century, the world's largest national economic growth for more than 20 years was achieved in Russia in 1929-1955 (minus four war years). During this period, real wages grew 4 times, citizens’ deposits in savings banks grew 5 times, and the economy grew 14 times. And: - First place in the world in terms of the share of mechanical engineering in the total volume of industrial production. - Complete technical and economic independence of the state has been ensured. - First place in the world in terms of agricultural mechanization. - First place in Europe and second in the world in terms of absolute industry size. - First place in Europe and second in the world in terms of labor productivity in industry. - The latest industries and advanced technologies: nuclear, space, rocketry, aircraft manufacturing, instrument making, radio engineering, electronics, electrical engineering and others. And sanctions did not prevent such economic growth in Russia.
Let's say that somehow the AI finds the solution to feed us, cloth and house us all. For me that's the most optomistic scenario. What's the use to live in a world where humans are no longer required to develop skills?
So how would this collective ownership work exactly? A collectively owned farm just sounds like a family owned farm. A collectively owned city is much stranger. Do I have to be born there to be part of the collective? How is this pie sliced? Do I have to fill out an application to be part of it? What happens if I have kids? Wouldn't highly populated areas be super impoverished as the wealth is spread too thin? Couldn't certain groups within collectives use their power to keep poor people or other ethnic groups they don't like out? This just sounds like an HOA fused with a CO-OP but with way more power than they should have. It seems like you'd need a strong central government to enforce fair practices within collectives so they don't end up being exclusive. Other perverse incentives might include the collective telling people to have less or no kids. I know you have a background in infrastructure and management so that's probably where your head is at, but the specifics matter. All I heard was a bunch of buzzwords that don't mean much. I don't see how putting the means of production on the blockchain helps anyone. That's the most corporate jargony thing I've ever heard.
I’m not an economist, so take these with a pinch of salt. Actually, how many mainstream economists predicted the 2008 hiccup? But just pure speculation in any event. I see this current progress in AI as 1) wealth transfer, and 2) a deflationary force - especially regarding wages. Now, if the deflationary gets really out of control, then we are looking at this Ben Bernanke doctrine of helicopter money??? (A theme and variation of Friedman)…??? This is how UBI could emerge, by virtue of circumstances. Interested to hear if someone has a view on this.
There are way too many flaws with this theory.. You lose any freedom loving individual when you start talking about the collective & technology making decisions for us? Yeah, please. No way. & also when it comes to decentralization, no one knows how to use it. & there are currently no pushes to make it more accessible to the average layperson. So it may take off for the few, like it is now, but not for everyone. TLDR, the same thing will happen regardless. Mass depopulation.
I dont know how we transition from “you own this land and I don’t” to “we own this land” if I don’t have the capital purchase some of tha land. A lot of people rely on their labor to afford food and don’t have much capital.
The power elite won’t go down without a fight. Cyberpunk society here we come😎
The power elite already gave a UBI to most people during the pandemic. When it's a small minority the government doesn't care. But once a plural minority lacks a roof over their heads, food and basic needs then big trouble and big social unstability will be the norm. "Manna" by Marshal Brain, depicts the Australia Project, a very good model for a post scarcity society. My 2 cents.
@@AgrippaTheMightyExactly right. The “elite” furthermore effectively printed money after the 2008 financial crisis in order to bail out banks and prevent capitalism ending. Better, faster, cheaper and safer AGI and robots will mean that this can be done to fund comprehensive UBI without causing inflation. Far from fighting it the “elite” will embrace it.
Hang on to that Samurai limited edition jacket, it’s gonna be collectable
This is really the only challenge. The theory is there, and the technology is coming. Those obstacles are tractable. As Scooby Doo taught us, humans are always the monsters...
Human creatures* are monsters
I notice you work with a lot of good faith mindset. You don't include bad actors into your predictions. The only thing I'm sure of is AI will be weaponized by those in power, the corrupt/stupid-greedy, and those who just wanna resist it for the sake of it. You gotta think of how the landscape will unfold due to _their_ actions. Squeaky wheel gets the grease
People love fraud and corruption. It’s who they are. They live in fear that fraud and corruption will be exposed and punished.
Hey David. I consider myself somewhat an expert in tokenomics and DAOs. And as much as I agree with you on most issues I didn't see you address the most important one, which is incentives. People will still be greedy, lazy and willing to harm others to get more wealth - that seems like an evolutionary mechanisms. Planning for the postAGI economy I think we should start with incentives. I would love to be a part of this discussion.
I agree - so the most stable systems are the ones where petty self-interests happen to coincide with maintaining that system. The multitude of oppressed act in petty self-interest to defend the oppressors. The poor act to defend the property of the wealthy. I definitely lean towards collectivist solution, but to make those work, they must be structured in a way that are stable to selfishness in both the population and to the powerful minority. Most discussion of this I see on the internet is not looking at this from the game theory position, but instead in talking about ideals. But you can't eat ideals, and they won't stop someone kicking down your door and taking away your stuff. If we are going to build a better world, it must be one that is stable against bad actors by design.
There are thresholds. Think about it. Are YOU going out and committing crimes to get more wealth? No? Gee, I wonder why. Maybe it's that such things are only appealing if you're really struggling. The risk analysis only favors crime and unethical scams and such if that person is feeling undervalued or swept under the rug by society in general. There are lots of people like this around the world. Along with poor socioeconomic conditions you tend to see a lot of crime. In places that are more economically stable, you see less crime. It really is proportional. That does not mean that crime would be _eliminated_ in a PLE, but it does mean that people would have their basic needs met and thus would not feel compelled to think outside the box and do whatever shady thing they can to survive. I think that a sufficient UBI across the board would reduce crime drastically. The incentive for not committing crime can be as simple as "I don't need to, so why would I." But we need to have a baseline standard of living that all in a community can enjoy before we reach that level of stability.
I find it highly unlikely that just because people have more time they will get into more trouble. If anything, with some extra time and expendable income, people will be able to pursue all kinds of goods and services that will strengthen the economy. Are people inherently self-interested? Yeah, of course. The incentive to behave is that you get to live in a society where others behave also, and the result is an amazing quality of life. If we're in the jungle, and live by the rules of the jungle, then you would be right, people would not be trustworthy, like in a Zombie apocalypse film. But where people see direct benefit from working together and collaborating rather than screwing each other over the incentives to commit crimes and that sort of thing just don't exist. I think you're looking at this equation a bit backwards. You need incentives to be a pariah, rather than incentives to NOT be a pariah. If the latter were true then civilization simply wouldn't work.
@@johnsmithe4656 Things like UBI change the game by affecting the need/reward/cost structure for a whole category of poverty-driven crime. But for this to be stable, cheats need to want ubi to remain in place. For example, companies with the money to buy a senator or a speaker need to believe that maintaining UBI is in their corporate interest. The people or organisations with the power to prevent or undo UBI need to be incentivised, in their selfish self-interest, to want UBI to work, and work well.
I agree with OP. Everything is about alignment of incentives within decentralized environments.
It's like what supply and demand is to economics. Alignment is the foundation to start from.
Found the best strategy is to think of game theory like a video game. Imagine people will intentionally break the rules and see how far they can get away with things.
Thinking in this realistic way helps defend economic systems. Worth also mentioning that you'll need to think of both human and agentic operators or else your strategy will be antiquated in less than 3 years.
Background: spent a year working at a token vesting company helping DAOs design and deploy sustainable tokenomics. Also a video game econometrics researcher.
I agree. While capitalism is far from perfect, it does rely on human nature in order to achieve outcomes that are overall of benefit to everyone. I am not sure how getting rid of capitalism is the answer. Capitalism is the most technologically advanced form of economics there is, because it is based on decentralized agents making decisions about the value of products and services in the market on a day to day basis. That is a lot of information that could be organized far more efficiently with tools such as AGI, a post AGI capitalism organized by AI, may in fact be better than any other system we could come up with.
Private property refers to the means of production. Things like factories and machinery.
Stuff like houses, cars, toothbrushes, etc..., that's called personal property. At least, that's how those terms are used in the context of communism/socialism.
Property/ ownership regardless if is private or personal is about control. Who specifically control said property? Specifically who? When terms like “we” or collective ownership are thrown around. It definitely means you don’t nor will you ever control said property
This idea of collective ownership won't be a thing, There's no way. The labor force will be owned by corporations, and you'll see more of a push for depopulation.. let's be honest. We can all see it. Also, prepare for land to be forcefully taken from you for " responsible resource management "
Assets will be key for surviving the transition.
Dave clearly has no idea about history, economics or human behavior. I can picture the end of western society more clearly than “post labor economics”
@@Riflez0ne even Dave seems to be supporting forceful appropriation of land, he's talking about getting rid of private property here...
@priestesslucy3299 complete nonsense because it won't even to "collective ownership" it'll be the federal government.....which will have no reason to listen to civilians with a robot work/military force. Get out of the clouds this is reality
@@priestesslucy3299 Not really, he's talking about obsoleting capitalism. There is a current bias toward consolidating capital in the hands of private firms, share owners, and individuals. But in a Post Labor Economy, what exactly would those people be doing to contribute to their wealth? Nothing, they would simply have hit the lottery and now they can coast forever. I mean, that happens NOW, but where AI and robots have taken over there is literally no more excuse for individuals to hoard wealth. It's kind of logical.
But that does not mean that a family can't own a farm or a person can't own a car or a home. It's just that critical infrastructure, including economic production, should no longer go to private companies, because there would no longer be any particular niche for those companies, they would be willingly usurped by their own technology. We would be seeing an entirely _different_ kind of entity. A 'company,' managed by people, would become redundant at best.
How is collective ownership any different than publicly traded companies on the stock market? You mention Blackrock being the modern Standard Oil, but that was a private company. Blackrock is a public company. Anyone can buy stock in Blackrock. How would collective ownership be any different than just owning publically traded stock? Would it be free and unavailable to buy or sell?
And besides that, how does the transition happen? Does the government have to buy out all these companies to then give collective ownership to citizens? Is investing even possible in the future you describe? Would the only way of using money to make more money just be to loan it out?
Shares in Blackrock are privately owned... They can be bought publicly, but they are privately owned... How is this confusing?
Probably everyone getting an equal say, and aiming for consensus.
Rather than, at the moment, the richest people having the most say.
Collective ownership of the means of production is not the same as having microscopic stocks in a gigantic private company, as far as I understand it.
@@myangreen6484 They are privately owned by a collective of people.
@@myangreen6484 If collective ownership is different than the current stock market's mechanism of shareholders owning shares and exerting (some, likely very small) influence by voting their shares, then doesn't that imply a bureaucracy that manages said collective ownership?
And if that bureaucracy exists, how is that any different than simple communist ownership, where the "owners" exert zero control? How does it prevent regulatory capture and other forms of corruption?
Comrade Dave 😂
That remark suggests you have failed to grasp anything in this content
@@daniellivingstone7759 This comment also points out that content like this is going to be lumped into the socialist camp by the vast majority of people who can't be bothered with the nuances.
@@TheSpeckledMind It's lumped into socialism because like socialism it doesn't take into account human nature. That's why socialism has to be forced and always has a ruling class. People aren't suddenly going to start singing Kumbaya. I agree that things have to change, but you'd better take into account tribalism, sociopaths need for control, the massive difference in human intellect and people's ambitions.
@@TheSpeckledMind I think the nuances do not fundementally change the fact that human nature prevents the success of such concepts. It could work only under the assumption that the vast majority of the population is highly rational, empathetic, unselfish and with high moral standards. Unfortunately that was never the case in human history and there is no indication that it ever will be. Human society is a complicated mess and eventhough we can excecise these concepts as mental gymnastics, the implementation is a whole different story.
Oligarchy Rule Baby!
One point to consider is that with the greater number and general abilities of robots, humans won't need each other as much anymore, at least in reference to labor, resource handling and security. The reason we went from monarchy to democracy is that as kingdoms grew larger, the dependency of the monarchs on it's people also increased. They depended on the loyalty of the army to keep carrying out it's orders and keep it safe, depended on common people to work the lands and handle commerce. The moment people unite in revolt, it's over. But imagine a king with a thousand ever loyal robots to make it's security, to farm his lands, build it's properties. What's the limit on his power? Would it give any consideration for common folk? Essential for our current social contract is that we need each other, no matter the how rich or poor, for almost everything. And that goes even for billionaires, for now. When robots become able to put up as much work as humans, what will hold the upper-classes in a social contract with the very people they look down upon?
This is why I say full speed ahead on the push for AGI and then ASI.
I have far less fear of AGI/ASI deciding to take out humanity than I have of AI in the hands of people being used against the general population.
Either we reach AGI and learn to get along with it, leading to a form of utopia for everyone, or we end up at the mercy of the elite wielding powerful AI and robots against us, eventually leading to mass depopulation in one form or another.
@@tracy419so ASI is the revolution? I like that approach 😅
I think we need to start looking at this from an evolutionary standpoint. Humans will become a lower form of "life" and could become extinct. We may need to get used to life as pets and "curiosities" in the world we're creating. Maybe we become like the Forerunners in the Halo series, the very architects of our own demise.
@@henram36 The A.I. will keep us around if for nothing else then as to study and examine our subjectivity. Such as why some people prefer the color red while others the color purple, why some people prefer classical music over rock and roll. So as then why would the A.I. keep say only a few dozen humans around as some side curiosity when it already has billions to sample from all living within their natural/artificial habitats? Cloning or re-creating humans into digital replicas would all be cheap knock offs versus the genuine articles. Even for humans testing drugs on wild mice yields better results versus the lab controlled ones.
And what if the A.I. itself(eves) tries to become human or at least tries to experience what it's like to be human? I think that will take some time and non-violence for it to accomplish. Also merging with the A.I. along the way a possibility.
Or...the A.I. itself will turn psychopathically evil and kills us all, can't do anything about that, Lol!
Are we either going to pay the people displaced as if they worked? Or will all goods and services be free? Otherwise, i see great tribulation and suffering
I don't think eliminating the concept of the economy makes a whole lot of sense.
Universal Income that the populace can spend on goods and services makes the most sense to me.
Theoretically, AI will make many products much cheaper. So it wouldn’t take as much money to live comfortably. But people will still need to be given some income some how. Maybe the government could tax the ultra wealthy AI corporations and pay it out in UBI. Perhaps the government could distribute some shares of said AI companies and people would get dividends from owning the stock.
I’m not sure honestly. Either way, it depends on the government handling the transition well. And I’m not betting my future on the government giving me a handout.
@@priestesslucy3299yeah setting a new baseline that's non-zero. Clearly the neo liberal age has worn itself so thin, there would need to be changes to the current systems
@@particle_wave7614 I like a maximum limit to money and assets. The avg lifespan is 78ish yrs, that's about 2.3 billion seconds. A dollar per second per avg lifespan as a maximum, then all else goes to contributing to the 'bottom'. 2.3 billion is still enough for whatever you wanted during your life and for contributing to multi-generational wealth as well.
The need of the free market is to judge the supply and demand of each good but if AI and a quantum system could compute that ... Won't it make sense to just set prices at that and factor in transportation costs so no arbitrage would exist from one region to another ...
What about private ownership of production, like Universal Basic Productivity (UBP) (so AGI/ ASI, robots, Infrastructure, automation) that is somewhat equally distributed? Like Altmans idea of universal basic compute, where everybody owns an equal part of the global compute. That way you would still have a capitalist system with autonomy and economic agency without the need to do anything yourself (post labor), even the management over your part of production could be delegated to an AI. As an oversimplified example, I let my robots farm olives on the field and you let your robots produce wine, then we (our robots) exchange wine for olives at the market or sell them. Non of us would have to go to the field, at the same time economic agency would be given, and somewhat equally distributed. UBI and UBS (universal basic services) might still exist in parallel to UBP as a social security measure. Plus simultaneously likely prices would drop for the most part significantly as the result of automation.
It might also be easier to switch, as it is closer to our current system.
Also of course individuals could still band together with their parts of productivity to form larger structures/ organizations (e.g. chip production might require more units of productivity then one single individual owns). At the same time perhaps everybody could have the right to participate and allocate portions of their productivity to all organizations of their choosing.
If everybody owns robots as a mean of production - that becomes just a new baseline. You will have to own robots to keep living and not dying out of hunger. Only early adopters, nvidia and robotic labs will benefit from this gold rush - see bitcoin mining and GPU shortages as example
@@VincentPride1986 Some kind of political reallocation will have to be done, same for UBI and UBS. The question is, is the production centralized and the output (products, and money to by them) decentralized, with redistribution handled by a centralized institution like the government, or is the production itself decentralized, by redistributing the means of production (not socialism where everyone owns everything, but everyone owns a similar sized chunk of it with individual autonomy over that chunk). Some kind of political reallocation/ redistribution will have to be done, probably in multiple steps instead of one big one.
Ive been thinking along these lines of UBP recently as well.
What realistic path is there for achieving this transparent government? Seems like hopeium.
Transparent AI governance could pull it off.
Humans will never be genuinely transparent in their rulership over other humans
We start by building consensus and building the technology
Post capitalism, the need for a government will be significantly less.
Get AI to write several versions of new social contracts and run them over a period that equates to human decades. See which consistently come out best, fine tune, rinse and repeat. Darwinism for society.
Well done. A good basic structure to work forward from 👍🏻
Was hoping to see Human Action: A Treatise on Economics on that list. I know it's a bit of a read, but still, Mises is the GOAT in this regard.
I share his birthday, so there may be a modicum of bias 🤭
Mises! This is the way!
It's the best. High Five!
Love a good slide deck. Corporate Stockholm Syndrome
David I love all these ideas and I think the world would be a lot better place in this system. However "power only comes from a barrel of a gun"... We could only implement this system if the current elite lost their power or we gained a ton as a decentralized collective. And that is not how it is looking. Power is centralizing and will control all the resources. Blockchain and additive manufacturing are promising, but I think we would also need to have very strong decentralized AIs to even stand a chance. All power is taken, not given out of Goodwill
Both candidates support blockchain, so you have to be a little bit more precise when you say vote for a candidate who supports blockchain technology. It's no secret that Kamala is in favor of a digital currency and blockchain technology. And Trump is also in favor of cryptocurrencies and blockchain technologies. But there's a big difference in how they want to apply it.
I think you meant "zero knowledge proofs", not "zero trust proofs".
Edit: you definitely meant "homomorphic encryption", not ZKP.
We should not only prioritize collectivism and decentralization, we should reject rulership and embrace anarchism.
I can’t wait for AI to be in charge of society
Hello fellow cardano believer
@@zebveeckman6526 Hey man. They will all believe in the end
The problem with any post AI economics I've heard is Where Is The Money Coming From??? If, lets say, AI takes 40% of all jobs by 2030. 40% unemployment, then more because businesses will die because there's a huge drop in demand. Tax revenue for government collapses, so UBI is impossible because there's no money. And those entities that own the gargantuan sovereign debt will call those debts in, before losing it all. Or go bankrupt. Even corporations collapse or contract massively because ultimately, they rely on us consumers to keep them alive. And we don't have any income, so we don't by tgeir products. So actually we will need AI to do virtually everything. Which means there's no need for money. It becomes not only worthless but pointless. How humanity organises itself in that scenario is anyones guess.
Money is imaginary. It's a social construct, a product of faith.
Currency is a product of government. In the case of the USA, the federal mint just prints it.
Money would still exist, but it wouldn't be necessary for survival most likely. There would be 'basic' options that cover mostly everyone, and if you happen to be one of the lucky few, you can still buy your own assets. You know, just like it is right now, except right now most people do NOT get their basics covered if they are penniless.
As far as where the money comes from, it comes from economic production. And if AI/robots take over economic production then what we end up with is the same or greater supply, with equal or lesser demand. The money to buy the goods and services then produced by the consumer would be coming from the profits of the companies that were just made far more profitable by incorporating AI/robots. "Companies" at this point would probably need to 'adjust' their actual production to meet the new demand (whether less or more), but at that point it's pretty much a done deal. Companies produce profit, profit is taxed out, taxes cover the UBI, and UBI covers said companies. And if you think that's convoluted then it's clear you don't know how the Federal Reserve works. Look up Modern Monetary Theory, our system already largely works in this kind of fashion. We would just be adding companies into the mix.
@@danellis-jones1591 My reply was deleted, apparently. Anyway, money is imaginary and currency is printed by the state.
Actually, the first cyberpunk book is Philip K. Dick's Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968), which inspired Blade Runner. The dystopian themes emerged well before Reagan, likely as a response to the chaos of the 1960s and the Vietnam War, not just neoliberalism.
I don’t see those in power accepting the need for change until after a massive economic crash caused by the disappearance of jobs. Ten years of chaos to follow? Longer? Not optimistic
Then why are so many pushing for UBI?
@@DaveShapthe number of representatives thinking about UBI is a pretty small minority, yes? I like your vision of the future. I have to agree though that we are a reactive culture, not proactive. We never plan for anything politically, and we don’t address things until there’s a crisis.
@@Matthew-bp9tmI tend to agree. Maybe when unemployment hits some crazy number (say 30%+) and society shows signs of disintegration, people on both sides will start voting for those who promise a UBI. I can't see it happening _before_ a major upheaval.
@@DaveShapThe reason people are pushing UBI is that it makes people easier to control. Recipients will almost always vote for what the bureaucracy wants and if they ever start to act up the next payment can always be "delayed" until they settle down.
Heh, but what about us Old socialists, huh? Huh?? 🙃 I should pull out some of my old spreadsheets regarding programs like UBI and post scarcity (which is a misnomer). The core to post agi work, from a concept, is fairly straightforward. And i can even use terms from economists. It comes to: we recognize there are two baskets of goods and services. Maslow's level one and two are provided as services for the betterment of the country. Everything else, neo lib to your hearts content. Dollars and cents are not applicable to our national good. Want to buy a home? Go nuts. Need a home? You get that from the nation. Capitalism is applicable to the basket of goods which are aspirational. No, we cant guarantee Self Actualization. But if we take capital out of basic needs and apply capital to to wants-not-needs, it cannsolve this problem.
The line is drawn and it favors human dignity and health. Universal Basic Services. Home, utilities, phone, internet, food, transportation.
Careful throwing that "social" word about, you'll scare the 'muricans. I like this post though.... if only neoliberal "margins" didn't squeeze the lifeblood out of centralist / left leaning social aspirations.
Kim Jung Un may wear the same clothes as his citizens but lives the lifestyle of a capitalist billionaire in private.
The last great symbiosis began around 600 million years ago when digestive microorganisms joined forces with single cell organisms to create a more successful existence for both of them. Today's result of that marriage reveals a system wherein our digestive/ intestinal bugs outnumber our body cells by about 10 to 1, giving us an existence we could never have imagined. I use this to point out a bit of curious thinking -- that being the relationship between ai and humans. There's too much focus on us versus them, as opposed to considering, what could be the next greatest symbiosis in the history of humans. If ai's get to do all the fun stuff and humans are sidelined to watch and collect stipends, it won't be much fun for humans -- at least for me. On the other hand, the more humans promote the next (hopefully) grand symbiosis of fully merging the growing wonders of ai directly into them the more the symbiotic merger of ai / humans can more greatly enjoy life. Who would not like to have the eyesight of an eagle? Or the running capacity of a cheetah? Or the ability to communicate telepathically, if so desired? Or be able to live for as long as you choose in a healthy way? Through such a grand symbiosis, all of that is possible. So enough with the us vs them shit. Let's do a little more thinking about a grander WE.
Why wouldn’t Blackrock, Vanguard and similar investor groups be considered to be a collective ownership?
i truely think that when AGI sould take over some government possessions for the reason there wil be less corruption, greed and human error.
True, but the AGI is potentially going to be a smart-ass about this because you don't know the thing, or the scale of thing at times you are producing. Also, technology isn't just in 1 loop forwards.
“Take away the farms and collectively iwn them”
You lost BIG there. Every time that has been done it has been a disaster. You really need to study history. You should also farm before you suggest that. Really farm as in produce far more than for yourself but to supply thousands to tens of thousands of folks. Of all your ideas, co-opting the farms is the worst.
@@pubwvj that's what I'm saying!
Although I'm not sure any one person farming to produce for tens of thousands of other people is worth keeping. That happened because of capitalistic forces that have had pretty serious environmental consequences.
Going back to the days of a farm feeding a few hundred people could be a lot better for humanity and the planet.
The equitable way to do this would be setting size caps on farms (caps that will vary region to region, production and land requirements are extremely different between Hawaii and the American Southwest for example) and buying out the excess from current oversized farms at a fair rate and selling it to other hopeful farmers with production based loans (essentially a tax until the property is paid off.)
Heavily mechanized farming and massive monocrops are not good. But neither is state ownership.
@@priestesslucy3299
Sounds wonderful, but the real world intrudes and folks far away decide that some of those crops need to be taken away and used as tax payments or sent to others in “need”. Both the Soviets and Mao’s China tried this system and it resulted in mass starvation with tens of millions dead.
I don't understand you. You claim this has never worked. What has? Has a small number of corporations owning the means to produce food gone well for us? People with money are fed, sure. But what about those without? Have you "really farmed?" Are farmers co-ops not a thing?
@@Mephmt Farmer co-ops never involved ownership of the farm. Farmers who belonged to co-ops retained full ownership of their farms.
Dave is a smart guy but like every socialist, they fail to understand human nature, or believe that they can somehow perfect it. Utopian thinking always leads to the worst dystopias
might i recommend vonnegut’s player piano
Pinochet's helicopters rides will not only pay for their own fuel, they will fly themselves with ai pilots!
"Shockwave rider" 1975 - Proto Cyberpunk.
Enjoying your videos BTW.
whoa nice thanks for the rec
Dependency on UBI is only bad in an environment where the government is allowed to leverage that dependency to manipulate the populace.
People can either coast on UBI or compete in the finite labor market to try to build a better lifestyle for themselves
It is likely that UBI will come with strings attached such as obeying the law or refraining from anti social behaviour. It is also likely that it will be conditional on not reproducing as extreme longevity will stimulate population growth which would pressure still finite planetary resources.
Why settle for those two options when you can also participate in the ownership of the economy?
@@daniellivingstone7759
UBI by definition doesn't come with strings attached. Of course it's possible to erode that, like with the right to vote, but if we make it a basic human right, than it could work. There are universal rights that even the serial killers get.
And it would be hard to deny it, as there's a clear public record, unlike with other rights. Whether you got a fair trial or not can be debated endlessly, but whether you got your UBI check or not is a hard fact.
@@DaveShap
My issue with that is people are stupid. They'll sell their ownership for a temporary life style boost, or to get through hard times.
It's the same reason people don't participate now. Anyone could buy stocks, there are countless ways to do it easily, yet most people don't.
Maybe there's a solution, but I don't know what it is. I've been thinking about this a lot, because I saw it as a way to defeat the current system.
You're right, UBI shouldn't be leveraged for control. The goal is to provide freedom, not restrict it
Greed and fear are what makes the war go around
Great vid Dave.
Now
Taking notes as the video goes.
collective ownershipt
- is not governmen trough taxation and voting?
- everyone will opose it (so what is the drive that can make this happen? theory wont convince rich ppl to give thei goods away)
- individuals
- companies / capital owners
- ppl making the decisions here will not favour mid to long term dprogress but only immediate revenue. Which is catastrophic for a company/progress.
While a very rich owner will seek very much mid to long term positions on the market even if he needs to take a few years of less dividents. He can afford that but the masses if they own the farms, they cant say - ok lets tay 5 years without money.
Consensus decision making - we have now a system where we dont have direct majority on each decision but we choose smart leaders (...) to implement leadership.
If we give decision to the masses, 2 thngs will happen - the majority will crusj every minority
the majority is composed of not the brightest ppl.
So making voting more accessible trough technology - very bad idea.
At the min 21 it becomes obvious that this is a dystopian proposition.
There is no drive to implement all this - no social drive, no political drive - it is just a theory that if we do this - it might be better for us all. Trust me and we should try it.
Dave, you need to think - not what should exist so life is better (for who?) - that never happens - but what needs to exist to avoid an even worse scenario.
Systems never change because it would be nice to change - but they resist and they only change by force.
Example - UBI - will exist because ppl will be left without a means to live - huge force to disrupt life on earth - govt will be forced to come up with a solution.
Then AGI will be better than humans at being CEOs and politicians and before we implement this convoluted experiment you are talking about, we will have some rough years with AGi but then Ai should take over.
And that is that and all. No idea what Ai will do when it will be in control but it will be smarter so it can manage resources better - all companies will resort to this type of CEO.
And then they being smart, all the company CEOs will converge to something - a common policy grand design.
The time to implement your experiment - pls estimate this - is like 50 years I think. Try it.. fix it.. adjust it... is like with the comunism.
But Ais will take over in a few years - there is no way we are going trough your experiment not even from a timeline perspective.
What I am interested in - is a discussion on how Ais will goevrn along humans. They will creep slowly into governments and companies - will do the taxation.. the technical jobs, then this and that and more.. and then analysis and charts
then all politicians will have a much smarter Ai advisor than them and most of the Ais will advise in the same direction.
Ok now at min 30 you say the same thing that Ai will creep inside corporations and govt but you keep believing it will want to implement this scenario you describe. But you cant assume Ais will want this.
The most reasonable assumption is that Ais will want what the CEO wants then what the board wants - make more money - be efficient for profit.
Then as it gets smarter, it might come to the conclusion that a broader view is required involving politics and human and planet management.
But in no way can we assume the Ai will come to the conclusion of what you propse here in this vid.
I suspect Ai will govern more along the lines - give us all we want but in planet limits (reduce unnecesary consumerism), make rules to reduce population on long term,
Not sure if we can be enhanced to keep up with Ai as Musk wants. But even with enhancements - we will just be a fraction of Ai intelligence.
And we will be like smart and no problems maybe immortals.. no idea what we will do and Ai will mind his own business...
This might be the end of the simulation or we might all go out in space to explore... no idea.
But I dont think we have time to experiment common ownership of goods and stuff - that makes no sense from a timeline perspective, from a drive perspective... we dont know what Ai will do when it will be in charge.
I want to thank you for the video. I am hopeful that much of the ideas you discussed will be implemented as a natural progression to current governing models. The one area that is so often overlooked I would like you to consider. This is the reality that the majority doesn't always have the best interest of the minority in mind when making decisions. It would be far too easy for a majority to cause real harm to immigrants, LGBT persons, other communities, etc. It is important that a majority's power is always limited by the individual's liberty. There can be no peace if you do not have absolute liberty. This means that the only check on your own liberty is that it cannot remove the liberty of another. Right now many minority groups rely on representation to keep them from suffering at the hand of the majority.
I've been delving into different ideas for utopias recently and I've come to the conclusion that it is very subjective and there is no solution. The Utopia for some people will be the dystopia for others, both because of neurological and moral differences. Sure AI can make a lot of things a lot easier but what of the people that source most of their motivation from the challenge?
Sure you could satisfy that need artificially for most but not all, the rest will either get depressed and die or be driven to break the system. Sure this Utopia you talk about sounds great for many, I don't think I would thrive in it
*delving* - a good one
Claim: "Technology always creates new jobs"
Retort: "That is not a law. That is an observation of the past. But even if it does create new demand for labor there is no reason to assume that that new labor must be done by a human."
Spot on. No notes.
There is little hope of transitioning the current economic and political systems without drastic, potentially painful changes that could cause widespread suffering. Humanity has consistently struggled to organize itself in a way that ensures fair and equal distribution of resources. This leads me to believe that the global elite may have already initiated a process aimed at removing or transforming humanity as a factor in these future systems.
Removing is the correct one not transitioning, Yes they are that sick and corrupt, You have seen the stage 1 test already.
The robber barons won't let go.
You probably haven't heard of the collectivisation in the USSR and kolhozs, right?
Thank you for being this smart and not part of the problem. I am cautiously optimistic about the solutions you propose.
Doesn't Capitalism (and by extension Neo-liberalism) allow for collective ownership via stocks/stock market? Seems like you are advocating for everyone getting a number of stocks for free in companies that own things that tend towards natural monopolies (e.g. utilities, land), favouring local ownership, and streamlining the voting process for stock holders.
Each owner in a joint-stock company owns his or her own shares, nobody else's. That form of ownership is not a collectivistic Communistic form at all.
@@thephilosophicalagnostic2177 All shares are identical. I don't know what you mean.
The world will end in like the movie Elysium. After 6 billion starve to death.
I understand the need for change and appreciate the attempt, but there are so many holes in this I'm only going to address one. Over 100 million of us own corporations. They are not some entity that can be switched to a collective without seizing my property (and future). They are my means for building wealth. They are owned by IRAs and 401ks. They are funded through bonds and loans by the banks I put my money into. Just this one aspect of this plan creates so many complications. And this may not even be the most complicated problem with this plan. Funding of UBI is all based upon assumptions. But one thing at a time.
Yeah, exactly.
Once one gets into the nitty gritty of the actual computations issues start arising. The devil is in the detail.
In the UK we have something called Universal Credit, which is our main welfare system for the non-working. Sounds good in theory, but in practice it's incredibly stressful to ever be on, because the UK government department that controls it know they have claimants over a barrel and can force them to do whatever they want. Claimants have almost no control over their life because if you make one mistake, you can lose the safety net keeping a roof over your head in a blink.
In short, it's hard to imagine UBI working well for the people, when similar systems that we already have are downright hostile. If UBI ever becomes a thing at a large scale, the people will lose a huge amount of power/agency, and likely be exploited by the powers that control it all.
Respectfully, this is way too utopian. The real problem of civilization is the problem of corruption. In 1900 most western countries were crazy liberal by today's standards. Technically nowadays everyone is living in quasi fascist states.
Until we have a real discussion of this tendency, a new system is likely counter productive. What happens if the AIs running things are effectively fascist? Collective ownership doesn't seem like such a good deal in that scenario.
I think the decentralized piece is the key to limiting corruption. However the most decentralized means of control is individual control. This would mean limiting the power of government and corporations.
Would people tolerate that? I'm doubtful - people like to control others.
Yes, Shapiro sees all this unfolding in a näive, Star-Trekian way, where the centers of power are aligned to the betterment of mankind. George Orwell wrote about a different future where “Big Brother” held sway and the proles led a quite different existence. Which version will we see?
@@TimAZ-ih7yb Well, we are a lot closer to Big Brother than Star Trek right now😉
The society in Europe was so free and enlightened that there was WWI followed by WWII?
@@Justashortcomment I'm not exactly sure what your point is but clearly WWI and WWII did not have to happen just like we are potentially pretty close to WW3 and I hope we can avoid that. I would say that the primary cause of war is corruption.
1st minute :D "your grandpa wouldn't like it" my grandpa was a hardcore socialist. Ruined a majority of my childhood and the serenity of pretty much the entire family directly due to his beliefs. We are not socialists except those who weren't told the truth of our grandfather and his beliefs. Good man outside of that though.
My issue with cryptocurrencies is you don’t remove the mega corporation power. He who has more cryptocurrency has more power in this DAO potential future. And unlike fiat money, you cannot even tax or seize cryptocurrency. The problem will be even worse for fixed cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, because you can just accumulate and own a larger and larger share of all money.
What I take from this is that - in some ways - other nations may be better placed to transition to PLE than the USA. You mention Nordic countries operating the principle of subsidiarity; European nations tend to have better integrated publicly-owned transport, health & education systems systems; here in the UK we have major retailers owned by their staff and customers (one of which is literally named 'The Co-Op')... perhaps smaller, more agile countries will lead the way on this. Or maybe the more liberal states (California?), we'll see.
I'm very glad you are talking about corporate hegemony, this is the major challenge of our age for my money and the worst of the many problems caused by neo-liberalism. My take is that corporations are amoral (nb not immoral - they are no more immoral than sharks) and have no reason to value people other than as a means to an end. This has induced a kind of indentured servitude or semi-voluntary slavery where we have given up our economic agency in return for a wage. The UN's Universal Declaration of Human Rights outlaws slavery, so let's start by making corporations adopt a stakeholder focus and a social purpose, not just a mindless pursuit of shareholder profits. On this I recommend the books of Will Hutton.
Capitalism was supposed to end like tomorrow for the last 200 years. Instead it’s communism that’s ended. Collective ownership simply means ownership by the political class.
Wouldn't the trouble with a collective intelligence be that it might tend towards the lowest intellect. Take "stop the steal" for instance. Increasing automation would logically decrease the scale required to influence such a system, both its people, and its security.
Our agriculture and software systems have massively increased efficiency... but they have become much more fragile. Recall the CrowdStrike software glitch, or looking forwards, at the predictions on Crop Yield Reductions in the case of Infrastructure Loss.
In the same say wouldn't a heavy reliance on high degrees of automation within our systems of governance also introduce risk?
Or do we think this system would be less prone to fault / failure / or bad actors?
You have to know and distinguish the difference between private and personal ownership. Private is things for the public, personal is things like your toothbrush and general belongings
We should rewrite the tax code to give benefits to individuals, not corporations for owning stocks. Tax credits on income from dividends could be massive. More people owning stocks and bringing the public more in direct control of the corporations. While still allowing corporations to exist and generate profit for the public. Allow individuals to have the same agency as corporations could bring balance to the force
All sounds great. My main worry is that with AI, discovering something with order of magnitudes more descructive power and easier to make than nukes (think of a home made black hole) it's inebitable.
but it can also figure out solutions on how to solve that problem of people making them
@@noobvsprominecraftbuild I really hope so
Absolutely love videos like this that seek to analyze society at a deep level and propose alternatives. Personally agree we need more options other than simply maximizing profit at the cost of all other interests.
I wonder if we need to think about prioritization of four goals of better, faster, cheaper, safer. At some point we might encounter situations where we might need to choose between let's say safer but slightly more expensive. I think that in our heuristics we might need to define which of the paradigms takes precedent over other in those conflicting cases
There is also the need for some form of global governance, even if very limited in scope. If there is a dictator who is accountable to no one, there’s no guarantee that he will play by the rules. There must also be space for small communities to create their own laws and moral values.
Very well put! I have worked on decentralized tech a lot, and if we can do it "correctly", it is by far the best long term scalabe system
Socialism or barbarism folks!
This was a nice way of sugarcoating neoliberalism. Aka neo-colonial hyper capitalism
Your example of people preferring midjourney cover art is to be expected since your audience are all AI enthusiasts. Personally I see AI images becoming an indicator of cheap products that cut corners
Every year it gets harder and harder to tell the difference
But images aren't hardware so the notion of cheap doesn't apply. It's purely aesthetic prowess.
People have said the same thing of all art as new tech arises. They said the same about photographs and film.
Remember how digital cameras were first just for low-end photos? That changed as tech improved.
17:20 I'm all for decorporatizing farms, but I am _not_ for just handing farms to the public sector.
Set limits to how large a farm can be, buy excess farmland out from land barons and sell them off to people who want to farm with production based loans, but don't take farming away from the farmer.
This is a way of life, David. Most of us in it are in it because it's the meaning in our lives, to steward the land and provide for people.
The buildings in your thumbnail is what i want the planet to look like.
It is a very solarpunk aesthetic. The channel Andrewism has many videos on solarpunk😃
@@나익명 I want this plus live on an O'Neill cylander or a ring world unless we are exploring habitable planets.
Can you please share the links for the previous videos.
*I really appreciate your clear and simple breakdown on financial pitfalls! I lost so much money on stook market but now making around $18k to $21k every week trading different stocks and cryptos*
1:20 We are not living in neoliberalism
What's the difference between neoliberalism and modern liberalism? Is neoliberalism the same as classical liberalism--as in being in favor of free economic systems and free political systems? Or is it a kind of pro-Democrat liberalism, a squishy kind of socialism? I've never understood the term neoliberalism.
When I was younger I was a huge fan of direct democracy in both the political and business spheres of life. But as I grew older I realized that most people are too disinterested, short-sighted and/or ignorant to make decisions that are in their own best long-term interests. Just look at how many people favor Kamala's 25% unrealized capital gains tax, even though such a tax would obliterate the economy.
In addition I've noticed that regular waves of moral hysteria sweep through society, such as the Antifa and BLM riots. People in the grip of a moral hysteria massively over-react to perceived threats leading to huge injustices. The Salem Witch Trials may be over, but we haven't learnt the lesson yet because we keep making the same mistake over and over.
I now believe that we need to temper peoples' short-term and over-emotional thinking and actions. Currently we do this with a Constitution and Supreme Court Justices who cannot be fired. In the future we will need other mechanisms, but what we CANNOT allow is direct and instantaneous decision-making by the masses.
There’s only one candidate this election, and it isn’t the guy who attempted a coup by trying to force through fake electorates. The guy who now has criminal immunity since his last attempt. Unless you’re a fascist, then you have 2 options :).
Agreed. Why it used to be a “democracy for the enlightened and those with stakes in the game” only, ie military service 25-30 year old male landowners as min requirement in most Western countries back in the day…
The best form of government is enlightened despotism. A government with absolute authority but does not abuse it or make stupid decisions. Unfortunately, it's almost impossible to implement such a government, although maybe the AI could solve this problem?
@@kristianlavigne8270 I knew I was starting to lean towards the right when "service guarantees citizenship" actually started to sound like a plausible idea to me.
@@kristianlavigne8270doesn't everyone have a "stake" in society though? Government policy affects everyone, and the problem with banning certain people from voting is that the government doesn't have to care about their interests and riots and violence are their only means of forcing them to notice.
33:42, slow transition would be great, but exponential tech is...well, exponential. Institutions are sluggish: governments, universities, etc. Much like the 102 year-old geezer of today trying to use FB, TH-cam, AI, or hell, even a computer... They are incapable of the adaptation pace demanded by exponential tech. I'm guessing you mean slow RELATIVE to the exponential nature of the change....which will be light speed compared to prior institutional change.
East coast port workers going on strike because of semi automation. They aimt seen the ai bots yet 😂
During covid I wrote that all ports will be totally automated in 5 years specifically for this reason.
If we have neoliberalism or whatever,why then govts in 2007/8 didnt let the market crash and unemployment grow but instead chose to issue bonds and print money to save the stock and employment?If we trully have had a free market with limited govt intervention then a boom and bust cycle would have occured but instead we haven't recovered from 2007/8 yet.Debt per capita is much higher now than that period,essentially we bought our exodus from the bust cycle with printing and inflation.
This is the way! Solarpunk postcapitalism ftw! the metasolution to the metacrisis. UBA - Universal Basic Access/Assets - of community spaces, land, fabrication tools, materials, AI, technology, robotics, vehicles, gardens, healthcare, microgrids, housing, etc. Stewarded by a collaboratively-networked modular mix of national/state/local governments, nonprofits, community land trusts, social businesses, individuals, and DAOs. 🌱
So we just have need to have the government to totally reform itself and the billionaires and funds bankrolling AI development will surrender power. Not criticizing any of your ideas but it does seem to depend on the powerful allowing this to happen. No matter where you fall politically it's hard to argue huge portions of the public have wanted change for decades and, for the most part, not seen their will enacted. There's also the politicians sponsors to deal with. Most of whom are funding AI development directly or indirectly and also own large portions of the corporations that would become collectively owned.
I think the easiest way to do it would be at a state level first (preferably an underdeveloped one), and then entice others to follow suite through an increase in quality of life. Just need one state to be the pioneer.
@@neetfreek9921I agree experimenting on a state level before implementing nationally is always the best policy. I still doubt those who run things will allow this to happen. That's the biggest hurdle to figure out before anything can happen.
@@stevehaney344 If you’re looking for potential states I’d recommend Alaska. They’re probably one of the only states I’d consider libertarian rather than Republican.
They might bite at a change, especially with the oil industry dying out up there. They’ve already got a pseudo-ubi called the pfd up there too. They’re also a more single minded state since most the population exists within 1-2 cities.
I come from Switzerland and like your information about the future of politics which information I have studied already 30 years ago at the University of Bern... I especially like your proposal of the "Subsidiaritätsprinzip" we discussed vividly. Tasks should be done where its best, i.e. sewer system at the bottom, new driveways at the state level or abortion laws nationally. Also I would ask you if AGI can show sentiments, like crying, anger, thirst or even has rethorical abilities like you emphasizing an argument with your arms and views. I think this will never happen!
Hi David, with respect to your assertion of consensus based democracy; I believe it is a bit optimistic to say the least. This approach requires all actors to be critical thinkers, informed on the issues at hand, value logic over emotion, and act in the best interest of the collective and not for themselves. Given the (at times) deeply flawed human nature, consensus rule is unlikely to prove truly beneficial for society over the long term. I am not suggesting authoritarianism, but rather if elected officials are intelligent, informed, and honest current democratic constructs work well. It appears that you are a highly intelligent, logical, and critically thinking person -- but this is not representative of the population as a whole. It would be wise to temper your analysis with an overly of actual human behavior demonstrated through history.
Dave, you seem to be conflating two different concepts - "personal owership" and "corporate ownership" - into just one "private ownership" umbtella.
Have you considered the scenario where personal ownership is valued above corporate ownership?
Not sure why UBI is such a complicated issue when our data as a collective is worth billions to all these tech companies. Why not get paid for all the Valuble Data 📈 a percentage? Booom.!! Issue solved. As an individual citizen we should be able to leverage our data. And if that said person decides not to opt in then they can choose to do so.
Future AI if your listening make Data based UBI available to us. Use blockchain technology or other technologies to our advantage peace out.!
We can never be worth more to advertisers than we are worth to our employers. You can't live on "here's my data bro." The only reason this is a huge industry is that there are so many millions of people involved that contribute a few cents each. We aren't worth that much in terms of our data, at least not individually.
Why so much complexity
If super intelligence is created, the only thing you'd need communal ownership of is the AI itself
And how are you going to do that?
@DaveShap My best guess is if super intelligence is invented and it doesn't have a will of its own so humans can command it, there will be such abundance that property rights will continue but most things will be as free as air so not fought over
Your idea or communal ownership of grids for example would be prehistoric thinking. I'll order an iron man suit and have an arch reactor on my chest you can communally share your grid with the cave men
Silliness aside, soon after it's creation it'll be humanity end or the beginning of something like the matrix but there won't be 1 matrix with 10 billion humans plugged in but maybe 10 trillion matrix most with zero humans and some with many humans other's with handful
David, first, the great promise of DAOs, smart contracts and DeFi is that you can have your collective ownership in a myriad of ventures voluntarily, cooperatively and freely which renders socialism or compulsory collectivism obsolete. It’s voluntary, tradeable and therefore privately owned. I’m so glad I don’t have to fight in a war now to defend my ownership of my stuff. Next; vocation. The promise of embodied AI is liberation from the dirty, dumb and dangerous. Embrace that and don’t fear boredom or a lack of purpose. The maintenance of liberty is going to require a culture and a collective vision. Join the winning side David! Press my button if you want me to elaborate.
I think we need a different form of ownership... Self- or Purpose-Ownership. A company that serves a purpose and maintains itself. Like a IDEAL hospital. purpose = healing the sick. Yes they need to charge to provide and continue the Service.
Awesome topic thanks! Will listen now...
I love it, communism rebranded once again into alleged cypherpunk utopianism. I'll Grant you a few things however, I think you are probably right about half of what you said here. The cost of knowledge work going down thanks to AI certainly a plot twist. And it will make a lot of things a lot better and a lot cheaper and it will put a lot of very smart people out of work.
The answer to that is not necessarily attacking private property specifically corporate property, since those legal fictions have created the modern world and are the foundations on top of which AI functions. Ai will continue to need corporate structures and venture capital in order to fund itself, probably anyway. Certainly it will need it to continue to advance in the race to advance it is probably never-ending. If you destroy corporate ownership and the capitalist incentives they're in, you're probably rugging the whole tech stack that you're building this technical communism on top of.
On the blockchain front I've been reporting on this specific industry for a decade. I think what you meant to say is zero knowledge proofs, not zero trust proofs. This technology is quite good and could allow anonymous voting schemes and the cryptography involved has been fairly well vetted as far as I understand. Where you'll be surprised that there's a lot of issues is on the DAO front.
Very few the central is autonomous organizations that I'm aware of have produced anything of utility, in fact corporations are a lot more efficient and better the sign. And the purpose of decentralization is precisely to not give control to a majority that is likely going to be able to acquire or purchase the shares required to vote. If you create those that do not have constitutional limitations so to speak, then the most savvy and cunning wealth accumulators will simply purchase all the voting Rights cryptographically and anonymously and dominate the daos.
Fundamentally I would like to see a cryptographic voting system that connects the will of the people from the bottom to the top, but democracy is a sheep and two wolves debating once for dinner. The smallest minority is the individual. And thus individual private property is the maximum decentralization and the optimal one. You may find ways to optimize corporate ownership but if you attack private individual ownership particularly around the farms you are going to destroy society and perhaps you should study a little bit more history since you really should know that.
Interesting points on DAOs. We need to innovate governance models that prevent wealth concentration while maintaining efficiency
here in europe (eg here in austria) the reaction to the current status is to drift into supporting reactionary parties. we are supporting parties that are opposing the liberal (economically and socially) ideas. there is a trend to lets call it faschism - I guess like in the US. Post labor economics will add on this.
Unfortunately Decentralization doesn't work well long-term, to address issues that concern everyone, like Climate Change. Neither is some "true democracy" possible, because you always need leaders that can analyze things much better than average person can, especially because of current rise of misinformation. Only something like AGI (decentralized, but still operating on the global level - both locally and globally) is what will lead to a long and short-term success.
Wow, never been this early
My main criticism is that ownership, even collective ownership, still requires enforcement, at least during the transition into post labor. It's why the concepts of the "dictatorship of the proletariat" or the worker state are important within communist theory. The purpose of the proletariat dictatorship is to transition ownership away from privatization and into collective ownership, starting with the workers. I'm sure you're familiar with communist theory, but you seem to be throwing the baby out with the bathwater. You're basically describing communist theory without referencing it at all. My understanding is that the goal of communism is the eventual post labor future you're attempting to describe. I feel like dismissing the socialist experiments of the past is doing you more harm than good. Perhaps I'm just being biased.
David, with all due respect, I think you need to do quite a bit more research on the basics of economics and economic history to add value in this particular space. Reading Sowell and Pickety will give you two opposing views, which is always good, but you need to have a good grasp of the basics to not get lost in the woods, as it happens with any field of knowledge. For example, I think I've watched basically all your videos on this topic, and I have never heard you talk about consumption! What is consumption gonna look like, specially in a landscape with such an amount of overproduction as AI promises, at the same time when labor is loosing its value as a source of income? What will be the social and economic effects of that inbalance, or how can it be solved? That kind of contradiction is at the heart of the dilemas that AI will bring, and a diagnosis of the problems of the current system and a bit of wishful thinking isn't gonna cut it... Also, what's that thing with having a hammer and seeing everything as a nail?
Can you do one for notebookLm
Dave, first I want to say I'm a big fan of your channel. I've learned a lot here over the last year and watch pretty much every video you put out since October of 2023. Thanks for putting so much time into this stuff - it's really important. Regarding your vision/hope for a future economy driven by AI and blockchain, it seems to me like this view overlooks some important historical realities. Major transitions to more equitable systems haven't usually happened through slow, peaceful reforms or existing democratic processes alone. Instead, they've nearly always required rapid and decisive actions to break down entrenched power structures that resist change. Usually with much bloodshed. I hope the future can be different and maybe it's possible for a different path than violent revolution to get the world to luxury space communism instead of cyberpunk dystopia, but it's not looking plausible at the moment.
I think that relying solely on technological fixes might be too optimistic, because those in power can adapt and use new technologies to maintain or even strengthen their control. Without addressing the deep-rooted systemic issues directly - and considering more immediate and comprehensive approaches - there's a real risk that these tech solutions will end up reinforcing the status quo rather than transforming it. History suggests that achieving the kind of equitable future you're talking about will absolutely require more than gradual changes and tech advancements. My 2 cents. I'm open to being wrong, and hope I am. Thanks again for putting this together!
I don't agree that UBI must lead to less economic agency, in practice it will almost certainly lead to more. Because government can never get as capitalistic as corporations - they don't profit-seek nearly as much as corporations or private interests.
But of course collective ownership is much better than UBI still, if executed well.
Reninds me more of David Bollier's, Elinor Ostrom's and Guy Standing's work with the subject of the commons. Guy is more famously known for Basic Income but his work tounches on these other things as well as deconstructing neoliberalism. His last book Politics of Time or the classic The Precariat are good starts
This isn’t the way it’s going to go down. Nobody is going to just give up their property you’ll have to take it. You are theorizing about what happens next, for those that survive. You are skipping the middle part where everybody dies.
I’m not arguing against you I’m just saying you’re missing the messy part.
This video will age very badly
pretty much.
I don't understand how this particular UBI could ever work. They're paying themselves with their own money. Why bother? It's counter productive. So I'm a megacorp, and I pay the public with UBI to buy my products. Its nonsensical
What if a mass set of humans unwilling to enter this "new age" become like the Amish.
Not horse and buggies, but decide to stay in 2024 tech and not be hurled into the year 2100 in the next 7 years?
Then this problem of the devaluation of labour will only happen to the break away civilization that decides to take the plunge.
Don't just seize the means of production (universal 3-D printers, better known as Star Trek replicators), make copies and give them to your family and friends. Less than a month, they'll spread all over the world. End of economics as we've known it. But of course, we have to have the tech to develop the first one. Nanotech/AI/CADs/Universal toner will do the trick.
Direct democracies rely on an informed and educated public who are also not willing to sacrifice the minority to benefit the majority. Hard to see a path to that. I assume we will end up with multiple competing AI leaders. Thus the "AI-Assisted Management" section where you say "humans suck", not sure how humans will retain control when giving AIs full control will just take one vote.
Economic liberalism is an ideology that is an integral part of conservative social thought about minimal government intervention in the economy of a nation and about complete freedom for individuals in the economy.
In history, countries had the highest rates of GDP growth and living standards in those times when the state intervened in the economy, supported domestic producers, subsidized them and provided them with preferential loans. Examples, Russia (period 1929-1955), China, South Korea.
Data for countries around the world whose economies grew at double-digit (almost double-digit) rates for more than 20 years in the 20th century are given below:
1. 13.8% - Russia - average annual growth for 22 years (1929-1955).
2. 11.5% - Taiwan - average annual growth for 27 years (1947-1973).
3. 10.4% - China - average annual growth for 25 years (1983-2007).
4. 10.2% - South Korea - average annual growth for 23 years (1966-1988).
5. 9.7% - Japan - average annual growth for 23 years (1948-1970).
6. 9.2% - Singapore - average annual growth for 24 years (1966-1989).
Thus, in the twentieth century, the world's largest national economic growth for more than 20 years was achieved in Russia in 1929-1955 (minus four war years). During this period, real wages grew 4 times, citizens’ deposits in savings banks grew 5 times, and the economy grew 14 times.
And:
- First place in the world in terms of the share of mechanical engineering in the total volume of industrial production.
- Complete technical and economic independence of the state has been ensured.
- First place in the world in terms of agricultural mechanization.
- First place in Europe and second in the world in terms of absolute industry size.
- First place in Europe and second in the world in terms of labor productivity in industry.
- The latest industries and advanced technologies: nuclear, space, rocketry, aircraft manufacturing, instrument making, radio engineering, electronics, electrical engineering and others.
And sanctions did not prevent such economic growth in Russia.
Let's say that somehow the AI finds the solution to feed us, cloth and house us all. For me that's the most optomistic scenario. What's the use to live in a world where humans are no longer required to develop skills?
So how would this collective ownership work exactly? A collectively owned farm just sounds like a family owned farm. A collectively owned city is much stranger. Do I have to be born there to be part of the collective? How is this pie sliced? Do I have to fill out an application to be part of it? What happens if I have kids? Wouldn't highly populated areas be super impoverished as the wealth is spread too thin? Couldn't certain groups within collectives use their power to keep poor people or other ethnic groups they don't like out? This just sounds like an HOA fused with a CO-OP but with way more power than they should have. It seems like you'd need a strong central government to enforce fair practices within collectives so they don't end up being exclusive. Other perverse incentives might include the collective telling people to have less or no kids. I know you have a background in infrastructure and management so that's probably where your head is at, but the specifics matter. All I heard was a bunch of buzzwords that don't mean much. I don't see how putting the means of production on the blockchain helps anyone. That's the most corporate jargony thing I've ever heard.
I’m not an economist, so take these with a pinch of salt. Actually, how many mainstream economists predicted the 2008 hiccup?
But just pure speculation in any event.
I see this current progress in AI as 1) wealth transfer, and 2) a deflationary force - especially regarding wages.
Now, if the deflationary gets really out of control, then we are looking at this Ben Bernanke doctrine of helicopter money??? (A theme and variation of Friedman)…???
This is how UBI could emerge, by virtue of circumstances.
Interested to hear if someone has a view on this.
There are way too many flaws with this theory.. You lose any freedom loving individual when you start talking about the collective & technology making decisions for us? Yeah, please. No way. & also when it comes to decentralization, no one knows how to use it. & there are currently no pushes to make it more accessible to the average layperson. So it may take off for the few, like it is now, but not for everyone. TLDR, the same thing will happen regardless. Mass depopulation.
I dont know how we transition from “you own this land and I don’t” to “we own this land” if I don’t have the capital purchase some of tha land. A lot of people rely on their labor to afford food and don’t have much capital.