Wednesday 7 December 2016

"Doom-laden Carney warns middle classes will be 'hollowed out' by new technology"

From The Daily Mail:

Robots could put 15 million Britons out of work, the Bank of England Governor declared last night.

In an alarming vision for workers, Mark Carney warned many jobs would be 'hollowed out' as huge technological advances meant roles could be automated instead. The Bank has said the march of the machines in the workplace puts administrative, clerical and production staff most under threat...

The 51-year-old, who earns £874,000 a year, said that as a cost-saving measure, he and the other members of the Bank of England's Monetary Policy Committee will be replaced with a flip chart with "0.25%" scribbled on it.

9 comments:

Lola said...

Funny. I thought Carney was already a robot. His spoutings are certainly mechanistic.

L fairfax said...

An AI possibly could do a better job as the Governor of the bank of England.

Demetrius said...

I have often wondered why Marvin from Hitchhikers Guide To The Galaxy was never made Governor of the Bank of England. He would have done better than any of them in managing the economy. As for "will be"; Carney is rather late it is already happening.

Steven_L said...

Sounds like I did the right thing getting into local government bureaucracy then. I think it will be a good while before robots become better than humans at making up excuses.

Graeme said...

Since when was it part of the role of the Gov to be the rich man's George Monbiot? Did they give the value of his residence?

benj said...

Haven't people been saying the same thing for hundreds of years?

Administrative jobs do not add to our stock of wealth and happiness. They are a necessary cost. If they become unnecessary because of technology or a LVT radically simplifies our tax code, then thats a good thing.

Perhaps Carney believes we should all go around breaking windows, etc, etc

dustybloke said...

L Fairfax, I strongly disagree.

A ZX81 would be sufficient.

dustybloke said...

Ben Jamin'

There are many people more clever that Bill Gates, not just French philosophers...

DBC Reed said...

Brilliant, as soon as Carney says something sensible all the Georgists cluster around saying "We're not really radical; we believe in only a tiny little tax change. Please don't say we don't understand Economics.Please! Sob!."
We are going to have to confront technological redundancy and that requires people to be fitted up with the money to buy stuff as the machines have taken their jobs.
Major Douglas sorted this out 100 years ago; it gave rise to a major political movement (Social Credit); "1984" was the dystopian vision of a world do everything possible to avoid giving out cash.