We're in the software business. Putting people out of jobs is what we do. Pretty much any technological advancement puts people out of jobs. But it's okay! There are more productive things they can be doing. That's kind of the whole point!
Kevin Drum has argued that once computers are smart enough to drive trucks, what are truck drivers going to do instead? Computers will be smart enough to do just about anything else they could do.
Different jobs will take their place. There are a lot fewer farmers these days, for example. The real trick is to find effective ways for people to get the training.
The Luddite argument is going to become obsolete one day. There are only so many iGadgets and squeaky plastic toys people are able to pay for. Just because an argument has been correct for along time, doesn't mean it will always be correct.
This is the wrong place to make this argument (it should probably be made at length) but I think the only real solution when we have a super-efficient, highly automated world is to drastically increase taxes to the super-rich and subsidize people with obsolete skillsets. But regardless, we'll no doubt see more interesting developments here in the next ten years. The current unemployment situation is just the beginning, although a lot is going to happen in the meantime.
(This is from a country where about 10% of the population is currently on welfare and we almost de-facto already have the economic subsity system I'm describing)
if somebody has worked most/all of their life in a low-education unskilled labor job (the kind that are most likely to be disrupted by computers), who says they even have the ability to become a robotologist or something very intensively knowledge based? In the future these will really be the only kinds of jobs computers cant do. The problems here are much more complex than the Luddite issues of yesteryear, and its disingenuous to write somebody off as a dumb Luddite.
While technology makes easy jobs disappear, it also makes hard jobs easier. The advent of calculators means grocery clerks can be completely innumerate.
