Mission: Liberate humanity from the drudgery of wage labor & launch the world economy into orbit by decoupling economic progress from human bottlenecks.
Mr. Shapiro, I've been back a few times to your PLE article. I'm learning! Final two thoughts: 1) Your % of American's who work may be short a % point as I think military is not in the number employed figure. I know military people consider it more than a job but they work! 2) Thanks so much for providing a link to your sources. It is a treasure chest. I need to get to my own writing ....
What about the GATO framework you had before? I know, different topic, but... I heard about it for the first time today via Evelyn Weiss, but when I went to the website, it was replaced with a bunch of malware. I also didn't see any changes to the GitHub documentation in two years, which is kind of surprising given the advances in tech in that time (though if you've been sick, totally understandable). I tried to comment via Patreon, but you apparently have to be paid to do that...
Really? That seems... very optimistic, given what little I was able to read about it on GitHub. That said, is it really okay to just have a domain taken over by malware, while still having it as the second search result (the GitHub repo) advertise that domain, with your name attached to it?
I'll be coming back to this a few more times in order to get all I can from it. I'll share with you that I sat in on a ZOOM meeting a few weeks back with a provincial, union leader who spoke of the need for a Basic Income Guarantee floor AND and the social safety roof in order to build a strong house that protects workers. Her reasons for the roof mirror the reasons you've written. Corroboration from disparate sources is very important to me. She did not build the roof. (In fairness she did some framing up.) You however are a good roofer! Thanks so much for sharing your thinking on post-labor economics.
Excellent, as usual. You’re truly my “brother from another mother”.
Key section:
The social contract crumbles if citizens lack levers to demand accountability; automation amplifies this, concentrating control in algorithms and conglomerates. We need power interventions to empower coercion, forcing concessions from capital and state.
I’m deeply concerned about exploitative algorithms becoming the modus operandi
Super interesting David. Really well thought through journey through this new landscape. And absolutely critical. Much kudos to you for investigating this as so much rides on the decisions we make now. I have heard lots of voices in the AI world saying we need a new paradigm but you are the first to actually create a framework for us to think about it. Predictions are difficult especially about the future, as Yogi Berra is proported to have said. It will unfold non linearly and quixotically. I also, as one of the comments above, wish to agree with your assessment that we will need fiction to help us envision positive futures. To that end I shamelessly am plugging my solar punk novel, also here free on Substack, written and in podcast form- https://open.substack.com/pub/nareshgiangrande. Aegis 1.2 it’s called. I hope this is ok?
Thanks for putting (a lot of) effort into writing this post. Really helpful framework. I fear the power of elites will continue to grow for decades, these changes take a long time to come to fruition and often only finally happen with a revolutionary event. Let’s hope we avoid that. The flip side is full of hope and DAOs will surely play a role. So much uncertainty but so much creativity to apply to solutions for the common good.
Excellent article! Impressive how you connect all the dots. I've been learning a lot about blockchain the past years and I'm super fascinated by its potential to redistribute power in society!
Super excellent. I watched labor peak at GM plants in the '70s. Management pushed back by sending production lines to Mexico. Those GM plants have long been torn down - replaced by grass and weeds.
AI is going to be the single most liberating/killer technology to ever hit the world. Roombas have morphed into walking robots. Management consulting is dead end. Tech layoffs will be followed by more tech layoffs. Plumbers are good. My question: What will all these pushed-out non-AI non-tech people do in the future?
The price to just enter a job will be tied to one's ability to effectively prompt the latest AI LLM. You don't even need the Internet. Just install a quantized LLM on your PC. Jump your knowledge by 100X. Write entire code structures in minutes (literally). Forget current marketing methods. Income spiffs from Google searches are 75% gone - soon to be 90%.
Your next job will be based on your ability to work with AI-enhanced technology. Who is ready? It's all over but the shouting. And there will be lots of shouting as the average worker shakes hands with a chromed robot next to them. Oh wait. That won't happen.
Who will pay for all those displaced? Ah! That would be the government, supported by those on top of the AI stack. (Why didn't I get an invite to Bezo's wedding? Was my aluminum boat too small?)
Really excellent article and covered such a huge range of research, I think this work is so important. It was quite overwhelming to read. I’d love it if you came out with some writing about effective and actionable activism that regular people can do now. To prevent things from “getting worse before they get better” as well as we can. I’m feeling very lost on that front
You have an interesting "portfolio career" which is sort of what I'm doing. Maybe we can talk sometime if you're interested. Just breaking the ice and socializing some ideas.
Very well thought out. I'm an author, and your work serves as validation for a lot of the fuzzy speculative world building I did for my most recent near-future sci-fi novel. We're accellerating so quickly, that at this point it's impossible to accurately predict even 1 year into the future, but I'm convinced that absent some kind of planetary catastophe, this is this is the direction that we're accelerating: Something resembling PLE is very close. Great work!
Great deep dive! I agree with many overall points.
1. automation has been a dominant factor for manufacturing job loss
2. real wages have not kept pace with productivity growth or corporate profits/revenue
3. inequality is a major concern for the long-term health of the economy, and laying the groundwork for pre and re-distribution make sense.
How do we explain the fact that the prime age labor force participation rate age 25-54 is at a near ATH? https://fred.stlouisfed.org/series/LNU01300060
Is it because of the entry of women into the workforce and the rise of dual-income households?
Mr. Shapiro, I've been back a few times to your PLE article. I'm learning! Final two thoughts: 1) Your % of American's who work may be short a % point as I think military is not in the number employed figure. I know military people consider it more than a job but they work! 2) Thanks so much for providing a link to your sources. It is a treasure chest. I need to get to my own writing ....
What about the GATO framework you had before? I know, different topic, but... I heard about it for the first time today via Evelyn Weiss, but when I went to the website, it was replaced with a bunch of malware. I also didn't see any changes to the GitHub documentation in two years, which is kind of surprising given the advances in tech in that time (though if you've been sick, totally understandable). I tried to comment via Patreon, but you apparently have to be paid to do that...
GATO became kinda irrelevant because the world basically already adopted it
Really? That seems... very optimistic, given what little I was able to read about it on GitHub. That said, is it really okay to just have a domain taken over by malware, while still having it as the second search result (the GitHub repo) advertise that domain, with your name attached to it?
I'll be coming back to this a few more times in order to get all I can from it. I'll share with you that I sat in on a ZOOM meeting a few weeks back with a provincial, union leader who spoke of the need for a Basic Income Guarantee floor AND and the social safety roof in order to build a strong house that protects workers. Her reasons for the roof mirror the reasons you've written. Corroboration from disparate sources is very important to me. She did not build the roof. (In fairness she did some framing up.) You however are a good roofer! Thanks so much for sharing your thinking on post-labor economics.
Excellent, as usual. You’re truly my “brother from another mother”.
Key section:
The social contract crumbles if citizens lack levers to demand accountability; automation amplifies this, concentrating control in algorithms and conglomerates. We need power interventions to empower coercion, forcing concessions from capital and state.
I’m deeply concerned about exploitative algorithms becoming the modus operandi
Super interesting David. Really well thought through journey through this new landscape. And absolutely critical. Much kudos to you for investigating this as so much rides on the decisions we make now. I have heard lots of voices in the AI world saying we need a new paradigm but you are the first to actually create a framework for us to think about it. Predictions are difficult especially about the future, as Yogi Berra is proported to have said. It will unfold non linearly and quixotically. I also, as one of the comments above, wish to agree with your assessment that we will need fiction to help us envision positive futures. To that end I shamelessly am plugging my solar punk novel, also here free on Substack, written and in podcast form- https://open.substack.com/pub/nareshgiangrande. Aegis 1.2 it’s called. I hope this is ok?
Thanks for putting (a lot of) effort into writing this post. Really helpful framework. I fear the power of elites will continue to grow for decades, these changes take a long time to come to fruition and often only finally happen with a revolutionary event. Let’s hope we avoid that. The flip side is full of hope and DAOs will surely play a role. So much uncertainty but so much creativity to apply to solutions for the common good.
There will always be class struggle. That is unavoidable. Fortunately we can also find aligned interests
Excellent article! Impressive how you connect all the dots. I've been learning a lot about blockchain the past years and I'm super fascinated by its potential to redistribute power in society!
Super excellent. I watched labor peak at GM plants in the '70s. Management pushed back by sending production lines to Mexico. Those GM plants have long been torn down - replaced by grass and weeds.
AI is going to be the single most liberating/killer technology to ever hit the world. Roombas have morphed into walking robots. Management consulting is dead end. Tech layoffs will be followed by more tech layoffs. Plumbers are good. My question: What will all these pushed-out non-AI non-tech people do in the future?
The price to just enter a job will be tied to one's ability to effectively prompt the latest AI LLM. You don't even need the Internet. Just install a quantized LLM on your PC. Jump your knowledge by 100X. Write entire code structures in minutes (literally). Forget current marketing methods. Income spiffs from Google searches are 75% gone - soon to be 90%.
Your next job will be based on your ability to work with AI-enhanced technology. Who is ready? It's all over but the shouting. And there will be lots of shouting as the average worker shakes hands with a chromed robot next to them. Oh wait. That won't happen.
Who will pay for all those displaced? Ah! That would be the government, supported by those on top of the AI stack. (Why didn't I get an invite to Bezo's wedding? Was my aluminum boat too small?)
Really excellent article and covered such a huge range of research, I think this work is so important. It was quite overwhelming to read. I’d love it if you came out with some writing about effective and actionable activism that regular people can do now. To prevent things from “getting worse before they get better” as well as we can. I’m feeling very lost on that front
There's not much any individual can do systemically. You can safeguard your livelihood by pivoting towards an AI-resistant domain but that's about it.
What about building your personal capital, ie saving and investing?
You should be doing that anyways. It has nothing to do with Post-Labor Economics
Shouldn’t we be building political coalitions as soon as possible around these issues?
Need to know what to pursue first. Adoption of PLE will mostly be in university and policy. I'm working on building a consultancy around it.
Interested to get involved somehow if you do build a consultancy or similar!
You have an interesting "portfolio career" which is sort of what I'm doing. Maybe we can talk sometime if you're interested. Just breaking the ice and socializing some ideas.
Yeah, I'd love to have a chat! Just sent you a message here on Substack.
Very well thought out. I'm an author, and your work serves as validation for a lot of the fuzzy speculative world building I did for my most recent near-future sci-fi novel. We're accellerating so quickly, that at this point it's impossible to accurately predict even 1 year into the future, but I'm convinced that absent some kind of planetary catastophe, this is this is the direction that we're accelerating: Something resembling PLE is very close. Great work!