A more dystopian view.

Until the late 18th century people weren't valued too much.
Sure there had been periods, such as after the various plagues, when economic historians have shown us the value of labour rose dramatically, virtually finishing off the feudal system at the same time.
But during the 19th and most of the 20th century people became a more valuable commodity, to man the factories of the industrial revolution and the associated infrastructure, as well as to provide the much larger armies for the bigger wars.

As labour became more necessary in large numbers, so too did it become necessary for the state, except in dictatorships for a while, to cede political power - universal suffrage eventually, freedom of association etc.
The value of labour has however shown little increase in the past 20 or so years. Why is that?
Technology.

In the next 20,30,40 years AI and associated technology will probably be able to do everything that humans now do. Humans need not apply.

How will that change the dynamics? At present for instance, transport workers, sufficiently organised and united, can shut down the system and gain much of what they consider fair.
But how far away are driverless buses and trains?

We look favourably on technology at present because it improves our lives, although in some respects that is debatable. But how will we feel about it when it becomes more and more a competitor?
More importantly, as the value of people as an income producing asset declines and becomes a liability instead, how will the state view citizens?
Will their political power be reduced? Political power has followed economic value in the past.

Will we always be in control of AI or could it develop a will of its own as well as intelligence way beyond anything a human is capable of.

If it's possible, hide your face from the bots and all technology they have access to, no?

Too cryptic?

Stig, what you say, the popular response, that people will get other new jobs is a historical truth but it doesn't follow that it will be a future truth as well.

We are facing a situation where AI and technology can do everything we do better & cheaper

In nature, where a particular species is able to vastly 'overpopulate', that 'social milieu' becomes an 'opportunity' for harmful 'natural' pathogens which take advantage of that 'opportunity', to specialise in 'feasting' on that population.


pestilence = = a fatal epidemic disease.




snow leopard population, circa 2017, about 5,000

homo sapien sapien population, circa 2017, 6 billion plus.

homo sapien sapien    [it means the clever, clever ape]



.




Q.
Have we, as a species, outlived our hunger to strive ?

Q.
Is it time for a pop crash, for homo sapien sapien ?

^^^ Thats the way - imply anyone less than 100% enthusiastic about the brave new world is defective - nothing more than a mindless drone

Never mind that technological advance tracks an identical trajectory to wealth inequality - you should get excited about all the time youll have on your hands when youre replaced - just dont let your mind wander to the question of how youll afford to survive, let alone thrive. 

The common answer is that we'll all become robot repairmen...but what happens when the robots take that over too?  Become Robot repair robot repairmen?  Eh doesnt matter, we'll just kick the can down the road, surely someone in the future will figure out how to stop the machine we were too weak to stop now.

Yeah, I didn't think pointing out the drone-like nature of much of society would go down too well, but while taking umbrage at the suggestion, figure out what you are going to think about when you have too much time on your hands.

bogarde73 wrote on May 1^st, 2017 at 10:49am:


It was by no means necessary. Beneficial from an economic perspective, and perhaps inevitable because of this, but not necessary, and it only arose independently on a small number of occasions.

Quote:


Computers have recently outdone humans at chess. Not yet at driving cars. Not exactly a blitz.

When 800 executives were surveyed for a World Economic Forum report published in September 2015, three-quarters said company audits would be performed by artificial intelligence by 2021.

A similar proportion reckoned the world would have witnessed the first tax collected via blockchain within that timeframe, while 45 per cent said robots would be occupying places at the board room table.
Clearly, the tax profession is ripe for digital disruption.

In a new briefing paper, KPMG envisages a world where much tax compliance work is done by machines, leaving humans to pick up the more complex tasks.


While computers will do the heavy lifting on the number crunching front, tasks requiring "judgement" will still be the domain of flesh-and-blood advisers, according to a report authored by Grant Wardell-Johnson, the leader of KPMG's Australian Tax Centre.

Compliance has been streamlined and continues to become more efficient," it says.

"This will form a sound foundation for even greater specialisation through the use of clever algorithms to calculate tax liabilities.

"Some of this may be mechanistic, such as a thin capitalisation calculation."

But as exemplified by IBM's Watson computer system, robots will also be able to learn from data to perform more complex tasks.
 
Machines can now be programmed to consider millions of images of horses and cows and thus draw their own delineation for what makes a horse different to a cow.

"This is profound and is one of the factors that will lead to the Fourth Industrial Revolution," the report says.

"In the tax world computers could 'learn' to distinguish between an expense which constitutes a deductible repair and one that is non-deductible improvement."


Legal research is another area of work that will be heavily affected.

"Indeed one can imagine a computer considering the optimal tax structure for an investment in the future," the report says.

The report judiciously avoids any mention of the potential for mass job losses such as those have hit the media. Rather, the role of accountants and tax professionals will evolve, it says.

"There is still a significant role for judgement. That role has been enhanced given the complexity of dealing with a greater number of stakeholders and the reputational risk involved in tax moving into the domain of corporate social responsibility."
 
On an optimistic note, job creation might even result.

"If there has been a trend in tax for offshoring, that trend may be reversed with 're-shoring'.

"In a technological environment, generally involving low marginal costs, the cost of employment becomes a diminished factor in determining where activities are carried out."

At the same time, tax professionals will become more like free agents, possibly assisting companies on an as-needs basis rather than being bound to one employer.
 
The report, Tax Technology: Embracing 'the now' and thinking 'the future', was launched at an event in Sydney called Catalyst.

:AFR