I heard that there would be a new Great Depression.
I’ve also heard a lot of different theories, and one of them interested me: after the bursting of the bubble, AI will not disappear anywhere, is it in vain that so many data centers were built? AI will be embedded everywhere, people won’t even be able to test how it works, “it works somehow, great!” because all human workers will be fired, not at once, of course, but gradually, In a few years, about 2-7 years to be exact(depending on the industry). And because of this, AI systems will begin to get out of control, this will cause incorrect diagnoses, failures in the banking system, arresting or killing innocent people by drones, and so on.
The reason I’ve explained this so poorly is because, in the first place, the topic of AI and the debate around it is terribly infuriating to me, and it’s obvious that the harm from AI won’t be able to compensate for the little benefit it will bring. Secondly, I use a translator, so my text may seem crooked, unnatural, or silly.
I heard that there would be a new Great Depression.
let it frame it to you in a different way.
when was the last time there were too many workers and not enough jobs? what happened then?
the depression will start before the pop. the pop will be the middle of the story.
AI is being pushed as a way to engineer an economic apocalypse that has never been seen before. it drives employees out of high paying jobs, which starves local governments of tax spanning from state income tax to individual sales tax. all of these governments are completely unaware of this happening because they’re too occupied on saving themselves a slice of the pie. before they realize it, it will be too late.
the goal is to reduce the amount of high paying jobs to increase executive profits. these highly educated and paid workers will need to learn to subsist on low wage salaries. likely working in manufacturing or distribution facilities, though those jobs are dwindling too.
it all ends with a wealth gap not seen since the industrial revolution, the “golden age”.
LLMs as we know them now are absolutely going to disappear. There won’t be nice free text interfaces to models with trillions of parameters. That will seem obscenely extravagant.
n LLM is fantastically expensive to run: OpenAI makes a loss of over 10 billion dollars per year, and loses money even on its highest-oaying customers.
There’s a reason why Anthropic and OpenAI were competing to sell their war-crimes-as-a-service to the Department of War. Private investment is starting to dry up and the Pentagon is one of the few places with the sort of money an LLM needs to keep alive.
Using generative AI is an extremely inefficient way to do most of the things the world uses it for at the moment. It only appears efficient because the AI companies are giving it away for free and eating the loss, burning through capital as fast as they can.
What will be left? Small local models that will go out of date quickly since they won’t be continuously retrained. Still ok for writing boilerplate code and such, but not the thing that seems like it can replace every job on the planet. Generative AI will be seen as a much more limited tool.
Data centers that could be useful for lots of SaaS tasks that don’t involve running supercomputer GPUs at full pace 24 hours a day so they fail and need to be replaced like vacuum tubes in a 1950s computer.
A countermovement called something like “slimline productivity” where doing stuff without AI becomes trendy. No need to spend so much on AI, just get your employees to do it by hand! Cheaper, more reliable, more human! After a few years everything is advertising itself as “slimline”.
An enormous amount of work for software engineers who know how to work without AI, debugging the terrible AI-generated code that we’ve flooded the world with… if anyone can pay for it.
yeah, building an app now, could have saved myself some time and just put an llm handler whereever code got tricky, but i know the hammer is coming, i put it in the background and spend extra time making sure the output is continuously improving on underlying code strategy to make itself obsolete whereever i can and also massive amounts of documentation so when it does get scarce, my atrophied vibe coder brain can try to navigate it, patrick boyle also has been claiming the same thing about ai runway https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NbL7yZCF-6Q
What’s more interesting is that the AI fueled replacement of human labor is happening along side the largest global rebalancing of trade and finances in history. It could be argued that the U.S. is entering a phase of readjusting to not controlling all of the international trade and being able to run endless debts by doing it. At the end of WW2, the U.S. was able to set the terms for many countries. The contrast between these changes in reduced funding to social welfare programs, which the eventual collapse of the U.S. bond market will force as there will be no money to pay for much besides an outdated military and the interest on the debt. To keep the party going they massively hyped up AI and dumped even more imaginary dollars into it, hoping to be able to replace the need for workers. Creative ways of keeping the bond market bubble going crossed over between these two issues. One example is how tethered currency to the dollar for things like USDT have behind the scenes been funding an increasing share of Treasury debt. It’s all one big interconnected house of cards where at the root of it is an idea based off having exorbitant privilege with a reserve currency. Where you can create this imaginary private company called the Federal Reserve which has magic balance sheets that can act as a second unlimited treasury, while feeding the debt issued by the primary treasury. All of this money just moves around causing inflation and higher interest payments. A system like this will have to collapse at some point and with all the international finanace changes happening, it’s only a matter of time.
Sad news for you, we’re already in a depression
The overall problem with humanity is that we think we’re as smart as humans can be, so we are at the pinnacle of human achievement.
I just saw a video about the first synthesizer. It was built in 1897, and it took up the basement of a building the size of an entire city block. They had the technology to do it, but not to do it well. But they didn’t see it that way. To them, it was the pinnacle of technology. But 75 years later, and we can put that same instrument in a suitcase.
Data Centers may be something that will be useful in the future, but our tech isn’t good enough yet. Right now it takes an enormous building, and mind-boggling amounts of resources, and does incredible damage to the environment, as well as the damage to the economy and the job market.
It’s like realizing that you can talk with two tin cans and a string, and then running out and installing a giant international system of tin cans & string, instead of waiting for the tech to advance to a point where we can do it properly.
Maybe in 50 years, the tech, regulations, and policy will be caught up to the ambition, but right now, we aren’t ready for it at this level of technology.
AI won’t replace everyone. Have you seen those police robots? At the end of the day, it will be a regular old cop arresting you for making trouble, don’t worry.
People will loose money, the poor will get poorer, the rich will get richer. Some countries will become more fascist, others might become more sane. People will die, people will commit atrocities, people will fall in love and make more people, and the wheel keeps on turning.
Nobody has said that AI will replace everyone, except rhetorically. But it will replace MANY people, on an increasing basis, as each new iteration gets more powerful.
It won’t take long before we have a PERMANENT double digit unemployment rate, and the government will gaslight us all into accepting that as normal, even as it rises to the 50% or more.
OP wrote:
because all human workers will be fired, not at once, of course, but gradually, In a few years, about 2-7 years to be exact(depending on the industry)
which I replied to. LLMs won’t replace all human workers, because for instance it cannot do manual labour. And to preemptively answer “but robots”: industrial robots already exist since forever.
The problem with industrial robots is they really need scale. They’re not practical or useful for anything but very large manufacturing.
If humanoid robots become a thing, they promise to automate a lot of smaller scale manual work
I believe you overestimate modern robots a bit. They are still expensive, they still require maintenance, and they still cannot reliably and efficiently deal with new situations based on incomplete instructions.
Of course industrial robots have always existed, but technology is much better now, and we have AI to power them now. These aren’t your grandpappy’s robots.
The combination of automation and AI is going to lead to the elimination of entire human powered industries. The technology currently exists to automate EVERY fast food outlet in the country, and every one of those companies already has a system ready to roll out. The only reason they haven’t is because nobody wants to deal with the backlash when it happens. But once it does, the rest are going to follow, quickly. A lot of these jobs are first jobs, second household incomes, retirement supplements, etc. The loss of those jobs will be felt deeply.
How many people are supplementing their income with driving a ride share? How many older workers are doing that after losing their jobs? Both Uber and Lyft make it very clear on their website that they intend to replace their ENTIRE fleets with autonomous vehicles, which are nothing more than AI powered robots. These are people who aren’t on the unemployment rolls because they have managed to scrape together driving to work. Without this, they go right back to being on the unemployment rolls.
I just saw a report on autonomous trucks, predicting 170,000 on the roads with a few years. That’s 170,000 lost truck driving jobs. What are those professional drivers going to pivot to?
AI/ Automation won’t replace every job, but we will eventually have to live with a permanent unemployment rate over 50%, and if they could figure out to replace EVERY job, they would, enthusiastically.
I forgot that the US is a dystopian hellscape where many people work what would have been a college summer job a couple of decades ago just to get by, my bad.
Sarcasm aside, self driving cars are actually a good example. It is a rather controlled environment, with standardised signs and rules, and billions upon billions of r&d money thrown into it for decades now. And they barely, mostly, just kind of start to work.
Fun fact, there is a fully automated, commercial pizza vending machine in my city. Kind of neat, from a tech stand point. I still don’t see it replacing all the pizza places.
The things that do cost jobs will probably surprise us now. 20 years ago, people were demo-ing the automated supermarket, and we just recently saw large scale retailers adopting self scan / scan as you shop and that stuff. And while it does eliminate some jobs, you still need some human to stop shoplifters, clear errors, figure out what to do with the dropped, cracked milk crate, check that those minors are not getting liquor with their brother’s driving license and so on.
I forgot that the US is a dystopian hellscape where many people work what would have been a college summer job a couple of decades ago just to get by, my bad.
Sarcasm aside
That was supposed to be sarcastic? Because that’s the reality for MANY people in America. If you don’t see it happening around you in your life, good for you, things are going well for you. But we are in a K-shaped economy, and a lot of people are on that lower rung, and those are the people that are going to get hit worst by AI.
Great, so in your scenario, things will still be great because people can always clean up busted milk jigs, and watch for shoplifters (both of which could be easily automated, by the way)? And that sounds like a reasonable job environment to you? Don’t worry about AI taking your job, you can always get a minimum wage job guarding the rich guy’s stuff, at least until they perfect the Slaughterbots to replace you. Nice career, you should get those $120k student loans for your software development degree paid off in no time.
And they’ll use the pizza vending machine, if they want a pizza, or any other fast food, because they’ll ALL be fully automated. The building itself will be the vending machine. Autonomous trucks will be loaded by robots at a robotic warehouse, driven to the locations and unloaded by robots, then cooked and served by robots. The entire process from end to end can be done without a single human touching it, with the technology they have RIGHT NOW.
It’s only a matter of time before it’s perfected and launched. Dismissing an obvious societal trend because it is inconvenient is a very American trait, and it has gotten us to where we are now. How about we start seeing the actual future that is looming in front of us, and stop pretending it’s not there? AI is coming, and the manner in which businesses are already deploying it is already losing jobs, just in anticipation of losing even more jobs.
Replacing as many human-powered the is the express purpose of AI by nearly every corporate entity. Stop pretending that it isn’t.
Sorry, there must have been a couple of misunderstandings.
That was supposed to be sarcastic
Sarcasm probably isnt the correct word. More like “cynic statement with no contribution to the debate”. I know full well that the US is a shit show, and I am scared shitless that they export their “new” culture to the whole world.
Great, so in your scenario, things will still be great
No. In my opening statement, I clearly said that people will suffer. People are suffering already. More than once, people in my family tree had to suffer through their job being replaced by automation and economic forces.
with the technology they have RIGHT NOW.
Now, this is the point where I disagree: if it is possible with today’s tech, why is it not happening? Why is automation limited to repeatetive tasks and stuff like self checkout?
Either companies aren’t as greedy (unlikely), or the tech isnt quite there yet.
Replacing as many human-powered the is the express purpose of AI by nearly every corporate entity. Stop pretending that it isn’t.
I don’t. Public corporations are, by definition, legally required to be greedy, soulless machines. Salary is one of the biggest, if not the biggest single cost item for most service companies.
However, many of the people trying to convince us that “AI” is there and inevitable are those that conveniently have an interest in selling AI.
I am scared of the societal effects of so-called AI, don’t get me wrong. But not because it will replace “all jobs”. Will it eliminate some jobs? Probably. Are the current prognoses overhyped? IMHO, also likely.
Besides, many issues with today’s society (especially in the US) have nothing to do with AI, like exploited “gig workers”, lack of social security, ridiculously expensive costs of (bad) education, and not enough people being held accountable for their actions if they are rich. None of those need AI, but AI surely doesn’t help either.
Now, this is the point where I disagree: if it is possible with today’s tech, why is it not happening? Why is automation limited to repeatetive tasks and stuff like self checkout?
They have the tech right now. My local news even ran a little disguised Chipotle PR video showing their new robotic burrito bowl machine, as the news anchors oohed and aahed over what was essentially a propaganda ad.
So Chipotle already has it, and every other fast food outlet is either working on it, or has it - and has for a long time. They’ve been salivating for this moment for decades. There are only two things holding it up:
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The tech isn’t quite ready: It is, but it it isn’t. It’s ready to be fully tested on the public, and that’s when it will finally get fully perfected. They’ve gone as far as they can without actually installing it. Now they need real world scenarios.
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It will be a PR nightmare. The first fast food chain to announce a fully robotic store is going to get savaged, including a massive national boycott, one that I will happily join. But once one company does it, and the dust settles a bit, the others will do it, too.
The next stage will be when someone announces that their entire company will be mostly automated, probably a fast food operation again. That will result in an even stronger boycott that may even bankrupt the company. It will certainly take a serious hit, but someone will make the calculation that the short-term PR risk is worth the long-term profits.
We are in the calm before the storm. We can see it on the horizon, and we can see how big and ferocious it will be. The job environment after the full implementation of AI, is going to get really bad. Saying that it won’t be so bad, that the approaching maelstrom won’t kill EVERYBODY, isn’t comforting.
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True answer: no one knows.
My guess: it seems very similar to the dot Com bubble. Once it pops a lot of companies will lose a lot of money in the valuation and many will likely close their doors. But some will still exist, which are those with good business plans and a reasonable profitable business. Yes the dot Com bubble burst but there is still an internet. Companies basing their business on venture capital based on their valuation will likely crash and burn. A company forcing “Ai” for marketing or such will fail. A company with a good base business which happens to use Ai will probably be fine. For example a company making sandwiches to determine what sandwich you actually want to order probably will fail. A company who happens to use Ai to estimate how much of each type of meat and vegatables to buy each week based on recent use/sales will probably still be fine. Once the bubble burst companies who are only valuable because of marketing as “Ai” will likely die. There are uses but it’s not everything but they are trying to shove it in everything.
This
How much Internet was there in 1997 just before the crash?
How much Internet is there now, 25+ years afterwards?
There was a decent amount of internet back then although not as much as there is now. The issue was people giving millions to any company that had a website. Websites were being made for everything and shoved in everyone’s faces. Like I remember there was a block of cartoon on wb11(animaniacs, freakazoid, etc) and they had ads on during the block for the website of the block, which didn’t have a url but a “AOL keyword” you could look up to go to. Nothing to sell, not really any tie-ins just like “do you want to see more from wacko, yacko and dot? Ask your parents to go to AOL keyword whatever the cartoon block was called.”
people giving millions to any company that had a website
Yup. There was hype and adding “web” to everything didn’t automatically make it a Better Thing.
Similarly, the fact that some AI is hype or that some companies are using it stupidly doesn’t change the fact that it is absolutely going to change our society and we won’t want to go back to the time before we had the tech.
True just like we can’t go back to the time before the internet. Some companies have a good business which happen to use Ai, they will likely be fine. Some companies only exist because they claim Ai and survive on vc money, they will likely die.
There are uses of Ai. There are smart uses of Ai. There are incredibly stupid uses of Ai. There are some uses of Ai that are stupid now but will be industry standards in 30 years (think Netflix in late 90s) due to advancements in technology. If you know what companies will be which you could be a billionaire which is what people are betting on. But they are bets, no one really knows what will stick and what will burn…
It’s already happening. A lot of services and free tiers got cut in the last months, and paid tiers got more expensive.
It’ll not completely vanish, if you’re a sane human being you probably know it has a few usages here and there.
But once you start using it for real work you’re done, it’s just a matter of time for the chaos.
I think we’re in the stage of people slowly realizing that AI work isn’t worth the price compared to a real human work. Because it’s expensive for a not so well done job. While real worker do a solid job, with consistency, for the same or less price.
The irony, given that machines always did jobs faster and more consistenly (like a calculator). But this case here we’re talking about a machine that try to mimic humans work without a well defined behavior.
LLM models are evolving very little these past months, very few improvements every new release. And so far no solid proof that it can do things well as humans do.
That Anthropic attempt on making agents build a C compiler was catastrophic, an insane amount of money for a thing filled with flaws. But proved it can’t do anything true valuable and trustworthy.
This is a good summary.
One thing I will add though, I don’t think AI is going away any time soon. The hype and saturation will probably fade a bit (hopefully). But what we are also seeing right now is a move to more self-hosted AIs due to price increases in things like Copilot.
I wish some if my coworkers would realize the limitations and hazards of over-using AI. Too many of them are still deep-throating all things AI, pushing for it to be used for every single little thing.
I’ll be buying so many hard drives!
might wanna save that money to instead buy water since these companies are basically just stealing it all and won’t give it back
The biggest company stealing water is Nestlé and they are Swiss … that’s where I am!
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I’d say that it depends on how healthy the economy is beyond the bubble
shakes eight-ball
Not looking promising
This economy isn’t healthy anyway. Never was.
I’ve never er understood why the perfect society would build domes. It’s going to get way to hit in there.
It will be a great time to invest in the stock market.
People forget the 2008 crash. In March, 2009, before Obama policy was passed, the DOW bottomed out at 6,547.05.
It’s currently at 49,704.34.
If you had invested in an index fund back then, you would have earned 7.59x your money.
Yup
Issue is, if it affects a lot of things, like 2008, people will likely not have jobs at all or their salaries would go down or stagnate, so people probably won’t be able to invest.
At least, my parents told me they struggled during that time. I thought common people weren’t much affected but according to them I was wrong.
All in all I really hope that when it happens I’ll be able to invest.
I kept my head down and worked through it, but yeah, it was scary. Lots of people saw their 401ks wiped out and I was like “First time?”
It can’t burst, it can’t burst! I bet all of my bit coin on this! What are we going to do!? I’ll get a bail out. Yeah that’s it a fucking bail out! Heidi get me my cocaine I have a scheme to plot! Oh it’s right here good. Good.
What will happen if a global pandemic breaks out? What about a hot war in Europe? Or if they close the Strait of Hormuz?
What seems to happen is the stock market dips for a few months and then we’re back to breaking all-time highs again. So in other words - discounts on the stock market for a while, and an opportunity for anyone with some expendable cash to make a nice profit. I’ve bought all these dips and I’ll do the same thing again.
I will finally upgrade my PC.
