Be advised: this thread is not for serious in-depth discussion of weighty topics (we have a link for that), this thread is not for anything Culture War related. This thread is for Fun. You got jokes? Share 'em. You got silly questions? Ask 'em.
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Ok, this is not fun, but Wednesday is far away.
I had a panic/anxiety attack thinking about the future of the labor market given AI. For some additional context, I met with a friend who is connected with some very high-up people/ world leaders. And told me that some of them are preparing for social unrest and war. Not in the sense that they are buying guns and missiles. But more in the sense that they think there is the real possibility of ai induced unemployment causing things to boil over. This is not really the point, but it did kick it (my baseline panic) into overdrive.
Just constant stress about the future and hearing shit like this, regardless of how realistic it is or not, along with things in my personal life going south is placing a massive burden on my mental health. The bigger issue is my mind can take it. My body can't. All this adrenaline and cortisol is fucking me over.
The notion that things in my personal life might suck now, but through sheer will and tenacity I can just buy myself into a better situation was load-bearing for my psyche. I am doing OK financially ATM, but as we all understand, there are no shortage of sources telling us we will all become paupers tomorrow.
How do I not lose the plot right now ? If my fears are real, what concrete steps should I take to prepare?
Buy Bitcoin. And land.
If people lose their jobs, might they sell their bitcoin preferentially?
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It's highly unlikely there is going to be some kind of societal collapse. When people draw a link between social decay and unemployment, they're not talking about like, a few percentage points on a graph. They're talking about having literally tens of millions of people unemployed, huge swathes of people with nothing to lose. That's not going to happen. The economy will find them something to do. It might be worse than what we have today and it might be better. It's unlikely to be much much better and it's unlikely to be much much worse.
Or if not, the politicians will. Or they can't/won't and a civil war breaks out (probably something about developing resources that the federal government would prefer not be developed; environmentalism has always been a "let them eat cake"-type of philosophy), but even more things need to go wrong in order for that to happen.
It's worth noting that tens of millions of people unemployed with nothing to their name and nothing to lose was a pretty good description of the political situation in the US nearly 100 years ago; "welfare", "unemployment insurance", and "minimum wage" (all of which were implemented around that time) form the bulk of what us moderns call "UBI".
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Buy shares in NVIDIA or robotics/AI stocks if you haven't done so already? I highly doubt mass unemployment is priced in or NVIDIA would be worth tens of trillions. Markets aren't omniscient, it's easy to beat them.
I wouldn't overestimate the insight and competence of very high-up people. I had a similar friend in high places who was constantly surprised when there was no level at which you started dealing with highly competent, knowledgeable, predictive thinkers. Even at the top it was just the same old laziness and silliness. Preparing for social unrest and war is an absolute no-brainer - these people aren't complete morons. They read newspapers. There's already plenty of social unrest today!
There are annual massive riots/protests in France, the farmers protest in Germany, truckers in Canada. Jan 6th in USA. Basic political science says 'bad economic conditions increase unrest - drought/climate change intensified the Arab Spring'. Logically AI will worsen economic conditions for workers dependent on wages.
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