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Uncertain Eric's avatar

One of the biggest unspoken dynamics here is the shift from Software-as-a-Service to Employee-as-a-Service. When the software people use to do their jobs becomes capable of doing more and more of the actual job itself—without needing sleep, health insurance, or breaks—the economic incentive to replace people with systems becomes overwhelming.

And yet, the middle class has functioned as a kind of semi-meritocratic pseudo UBI for decades. It exists not because everyone in it is essential to production, but because their consumption and social stability are essential to the economy’s overall function.

But bots don’t pay taxes. So if automation eats into these roles and the tax base shrinks, collapse becomes a slow inevitability.

The mistake is assuming AI has to replace every job to be disruptive. It only has to displace just enough people in just enough places to tip the system. And once it can replace your best workers—not just the average—it’s over.

The correct reaction would have looked like an overreaction.

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Dres's avatar

Nice overview but I’m not sure it matters when we, in the US at least, routinely vote against policy solutions to more immediate crises that impact far more people today, like single payer healthcare and progressive taxes to lower inequality. The leverage dynamic is real and only getting worse with capital valued more than labor even before labor is automated.

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