The emergence of AI and what it means for Jobs: An alternative perspective

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They took your jobs! You watch South Park, you know, you get townsfolk getting upset. It is episodes going back probably 15, 20 years ago. And in that case, it was an immigration. I forget the name of the episode. I mean, I love that show. It was an immigration episode, but the guys at South Park made it where people from the future.

were coming back in time machines because of problems in the future and they were taking jobs. And again, it was brilliant. It really was. But again, there’s lots of hysteria. Yeah, lots of hysteria. Great Def Leppard album from back in the day. Yes, on AI and jobs. So Andy Kessler, a really interesting piece today I wanna touch on. Talking about artificial intelligence and whether or not it’s gonna destroy

Jobs. The answer, damn straight it is. Yep, yep, damn straight. It’s going to destroy jobs. There’s no doubt about it at all. Again, as the world turns. That’s that’s what happens, people. I often cite economist. I don’t even like calling them an economist. Kind of a thinker.

forward thinker Joseph Schumpeter, the concept of creative destruction. Old jobs disappear and new jobs are created all the time. And Kessler talks about, and again I remember this, I used to do the same thing on a regular basis. I used to go on these constantly, constantly doing guest appearances on radio shows. This is back during the 1990s. Still do them, but did a hell of a lot of them back.

then. And it was easy. This book that Kessler put out more than 10 years ago, he was doing a radio tour and he’s doing radio programs around the country and whatnot. And he mentions that he was on he was on this radio show. So it was a public radio station in a big city. And he was discussing his 12 rules for entrepreneurs and investors, including lowering costs.

waste what’s abundant, scale and get horizontal. But the host of the program told Kessler, only wanted to discuss the title, which is Eat People. So he walked through the history, walked through the history of how technology, and we all know this people, technology has replaced lower end jobs, have they not? Have they not? A great example of this just popped into my head.

was Obama talking about all the job losses because of the ATMs. And it wasn’t the case, it was the exact opposite. More jobs were created. Sure, did the tellers go away? Absolutely. But it created a hell of a lot more jobs in the banking sector. Travel agents, I mean, they’re few and far between unless you have specialized travel agents, special tours, traders.

Wall Street. There used to be, I mean, all these big firms, they would have warehouse sized floors of traders. That’s a lot of them gone away. Those trading floors don’t exist anymore. But anyway, anyway, Kessler talks about, you know, he thinks the interview was going well with the public radio show host, but it didn’t. And the host said, well, I’m against it.

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I asked against what? I’m against technology destroying careers and lives. It has to stop. Again, left-wing lunatics out there. These are the same left-wing lunatics that are carrying around fricking iPhones. Do you have any idea? Did you think about the amount of jobs that the iPhone has displaced? Also think of the amount of jobs that it has helped create.

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Anyway, the left-wing host, it has to stop. That’s why we have unions. Yeah. He tried to explain to the host that you can’t be for or against it. It is what it is. It’s part of progress and it’s gonna happen again and again and again. From buggy whip manufacturers to elevator operators.

And history shows that more and better paying jobs are always created as some jobs are destroyed. But again, left-wing host, again, left-wing mindset out there, don’t wanna hear it. Hey, big business, hey, any more unions out there? Uh-huh, uh-huh. New and better jobs are always created. No one wants to believe it.

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He points out, am I a fan of the television? I love the show. Again, I’m almost ready to watch the entire series again. I do that with great series from time to time. And I’ve never watched the Sopranos every three, four years. But Mad Men, Mad Men, and those massive, you know, floors of secretaries, the typing pools, and the stuff that they had to do. I mean, you have to go watch that show and just actually see how little work.

is done over the course of the day. I find it fascinating. I asked my mom about this, about the drinking at the office. I said, did you really like that back then? She said, yeah, yeah, it was. Anyway, stenographers, typesetters. A 2022 paper studying automation and job categories states that roughly 60%

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of unemployment in 2018 is found in job titles that did not exist in 1940. A Goldman Sachs report from March goes further. 85% of employment growth over the last 80 years, 85% is explained by the technology-driven creation of new positions.

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Life goes on.

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Life goes on and jobs will be eliminated. He points out last summer, Southwest Airlines basically just ended all expiration dates on their flight credits. Why did they do that? They just recognized that having real people handling phone calls is expensive. So it was cheaper just to basically have no expiration date.

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so customers would stop calling and use the website instead.

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A few weeks ago, dock workers reached a tentative deal with West Coast ports on automation technology. A decades-long battle. The union wants limits on everything from computer-controlled cranes to barcodes. Anything that threatens jobs. Yes, barcodes. Now this. Striking Hollywood writers are demanding that AI not be used to write sloppy first drafts. We see it all.

around us, it’s gonna continue. And again, start thinking about artificial intelligence and robotics and the various different manufacturing platforms that are gonna move back into the United States. And guess what? It’s going to create jobs, gonna destroy jobs, another place is gonna create them.

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Creative destruction is not going to change. Again, we live in a world where you can adapt. And the focus needs to be on jobs training programs. And again, just dealing with the terrain, dealing with the terrain and seeing the changes that are gonna take place. So you always have to constantly be abreast of things. Always have to educate yourself. And again, there’s never been a time in the history of the planet where it’s been easier to do it.

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Hey, I’m having this conversation with my kids not long ago. And I was explaining to them the type of work that was involved in doing a paper. And some of the research that you had to do and you had to go and you had to use my, remember microfiche and the machines you’d have to use to go back and look at old newspapers and whatnot that all you need to do is to press a bloody button now on your phone.

the hours that you had to spend doing that, they’re not making microfiche machines anymore, I don’t think, right? Change is the dynamic, but again.

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Stuff gets destroyed. Stuff gets built. Wealth is created and the standard of living, everyone continues to rise. Watchdog on wallstreet.com.