Earn Money in a Future Without Jobs

Futurist Martin Ford says intelligent machines will replace humans in the workforce, causing massive unemployment and rattling the economy. His basic solution is a base income for all. And that is gaining traction.

The fear that automation might displace workers leading to unemployment goes back to over 200 years – the Luddite revolts in England. And this concern comes up every few years.

Progress is going to lead to new things and with new industries and they will need people for the new jobs. There will be new kinds of work. And that has been the positive story so far.

There is a lot of evidence to show that technologies are rapidly climbing the skills ladder. There will be impact on tasks done by accountants, financial analysts, journalists, lawyers, radiologists and so forth.

We could, of course, face underemployment rather than unemployment. You and I could face a very utopian framework – work less, more leisure, more family time and more time to do meaningful things in life. The best way forward then is to have some kind of guaranteed base income. The fear of this is that there may be too many people riding in the economic cart and not enough pulling the cart. So that will be a real challenge of future societies!

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