How to Save the USA

Maybe this is a way to save the country. What If we invest another 2 to 3 trillion dollars and put robots in place of humans every where that is possible. This will be a true investment where the government gets non voting shares in every business it invests in and a minimum dividend. Then no matter what happens that hinders humans from working the world can keep moving forward. Plus we should be able to complete with every other country in the world because our "labor" rate will be a fraction of any other country. Thoughts?

That's dumb.

originally posted by: AutomateThis1
That's dumb.

Lol, what's dumb about it?

I suppose it could.. work

Id only support it if it was under total and absolute control from the largest corporations around though. And, as long as no one ever, under any circumstances, examined how things like automation could be used at the individual household level to achieve decentralized autonomy, self-sufficiency, and self-determination.

originally posted by: MRinder

originally posted by: AutomateThis1
That's dumb.

Lol, what's dumb about it?

Unemploying people who pay taxes and spend in the marketplace.

You know, not having a tax base.

/facepalm

a reply to: Lumenari

The government gets dividends from all the businesses, mfg returns, Displaced workers get paid by the government just like they are now, but the government is flush with cash from owning a percent of every business..

You won't need a tax base to generate revenue because the return on these investments should generate an ever growing hunk of revenue.

Duh!

a reply to: Lumenari

All of society would need be given a base wage. Jobs that cannot be automated, more.

originally posted by: MRinder
a reply to: Lumenari

The government gets dividends from all the businesses, mfg returns, Displaced workers get paid by the government just like they are now, but the government is flush with cash from owning a percent of every business..

You won't need a tax base to generate revenue because the return on these investments should generate an ever growing hunk of revenue.

Duh!

Why not just come right out and say that you would like to see more socialism?

Why shouldn't the government just own 98-100% of every company?

Actually screw it, why even have a government anymore?

Let's just let the corporations take over and rule over us openly and completely.

Think about how much tecnological advancements and money will be generated out of us during the upcoming corporate wars.

We'll be owned and managed by corporations, and we'll be okay with it because Johnson and Johnson is the best.

Nuh uh! Glaxo Smith Kline is the best!

a reply to: AutomateThis1
That's a bit overdramatic, but it is inevitable that most current work that humans do now, will be done in the very near future by technology. This way if the government invests we as a nation share in the return and will have money to help the Displaced workers.

a reply to: MRinder

I won't disagree with you completely. That said, it's a little more nuanced than how you make it out to be in your OP.

a reply to: AutomateThis1
And I wouldn't want corporations to take over the government but I think it would be great if the government outsourced all the day to day government work to Amazon. They would make it so much more efficient and customer service oriented.

When you get enough of AI!

When they tell you the probability of the most horrendous events in human history, you will , you will hate them!

originally posted by: MRinder
a reply to: Lumenari

The government gets dividends from all the businesses, mfg returns, Displaced workers get paid by the government just like they are now, but the government is flush with cash from owning a percent of every business..

You won't need a tax base to generate revenue because the return on these investments should generate an ever growing hunk of revenue.

Duh!

Ideally, companies that compete tend toward more efficient operations, they have to to keep up with or get ahead of their competitors.

The problem with government bureaucracies is they have no such competitive pressures to drive efficiency and that's part of the reason why they tend to be very inefficient. Instead of spending money on labor, they would end up wasting a lot of money on bureaucratic inefficiencies to manage the bureaucracy.

Unfortunately, the Federal Trade Commission doesn't seem to be doing its job which is to regulate mergers in order to ensure that industry stays competitive, so we are ending up with near monopolies or oligopolies that can overcharge consumers without worrying too much about competitive pressures, so what's really needed is for the FTC to do its job and prevent monopolies/oligopolies, instead of approving them like it has been doing.

Mega-mergers like AT&T and Time Warner crush American democracy

These mergers are not small combinations, but giants merging with giants. Microsoft bought LinkedIn, Amazon merged with Whole Foods and Monsanto was merged with Bayer. In cynical fashion, the name “Monsanto” is being dropped in the new company, because it had become so toxic to activists.

You may think of Google as a single organic entity, but in 2011 it bought a different company every week. Facebook, whose questionable practices are on full display with the scandal of Russian interference and its discriminatory advertising, doesn’t have a lot of competition because it bought the competition: it owns Instagram and WhatsApp.

America is getting crushed by big, unresponsive, powerful corporate monopolies

These mergers hurt everyone except for the CEOs and the investors who make money off of monopolistic prices. Workers get less pay and stripped benefits, and unions are stuck with little bargaining power. Consumers, meanwhile, are often stuck with unresponsive call center customer service and hidden fees.

Just think about the hours you spend talking to Spectrum when service is bad – would you spend those hours if there was real competition? It hurts the small and medium-sized business owners that are the vibrant, innovative heart of a thriving
democracy. It also hurts our democracy: these companies are like little fiefdoms, spending millions in politics to buy silence from lawmakers.

The federal government has shown little willingness to stand up to corporate monopolies, and use its powers under the existing antitrust statutes, including the powerful Clayton Act and Sherman Act.

So there are already antitrust statutes on the books, they just need enforcement, and lack of enforcement has been the problem.

Regarding automation, laborers in the US are expensive, so companies can and will make investments to automate where it makes sense. One of my former employers was a half-billion dollar a year company with completely automated production facilities. Most of the employees in manufacturing were in some kind of maintenance role, to keep the automation running properly. The incentive was there to automate, so they automated. Another company in a similar industry didn't have such a steady flow of the same process so all the re-programming and re-tooling all the robots/automation for smaller, different orders was more costly than using laborers, so automation wasn't a solution for them until the flexibility of the robots and ease of re-programming them and adapting them to more varied tasks improved. That may happen eventually with advances in robotic technology. In other cases it was cheaper to outsource to China where labor was cheap.

So, from my experience in industry in the US, if companies are not already replacing workers with automation, there are reasons. They already do it where it makes economic sense.

a reply to: Arbitrageur

Thank you. I'm a bit frustrated at the moment, so thank you for your comment. That's basically what I have to say on the matter.

originally posted by: MRinder
a reply to: Lumenari

The government gets dividends from all the businesses, mfg returns, Displaced workers get paid by the government just like they are now, but the government is flush with cash from owning a percent of every business..

You won't need a tax base to generate revenue because the return on these investments should generate an ever growing hunk of revenue.

Duh!

~sigh~

There is never going to be a Return On Investment for anything that the government does.

Ever.

And then you want a UBI on top of that.

I agree with your solution, actually.

That way we can just burn this country to the ground, stupid ideas like yours will die off at the the same time that people like you will die off and then people who can think rationally can rebuild the country.

a reply to: Lumenari

That's how I've been feeling lately. Screw it. Let it all burn to the ground. That way for years to come whenever people start getting the social itch the smarter survivors can say "Nope look what happened. We tried 'Democratic Socialism' and it failed too."

But knowing the way they think they'll just come up with another excuse as to why it didn't work.

If it's true salvation you seek, we have to destroy the concept of money and get back to nature.

Let's start slow, get rid of pennies and plant potatoes.

originally posted by: MRinder
Maybe this is a way to save the country. What If we invest another 2 to 3 trillion dollars and put robots in place of humans every where that is possible. Thoughts?

It's ok humans are being turned into robots...... soon you and everyone will be one of the things connected to the internet.

Yay 5G.

originally posted by: MRinder

originally posted by: AutomateThis1
That's dumb.

Lol, what's dumb about it?

Literally everything. You want to replace jobs with robots, so then when people need money to pay their bills -- where do they get it?

When people have no money, how do they buy things?

People need to work to earn, and earn to buy.

a reply to: MRinder

You do realize Westworld is not an actual thing yet?

Machine still requires Man, at least for the time being, still a lot of stuff that cannot be fully automated, and even when it is, still requires human intervention to keep the production lines flowing.