Robots stealing jobs

How to deal with the coming economic collapse. [Link]

That would appear to be a two-pronged challenge:

1. Survive the economic collapse.

2. Be happy about it.

We spoke to Pistono about these ideas a while back when he was still working on his book. Around that time, he was on the record with statements like this:

Without a backup plan to adjust to a new paradigm, we can expect the worst. Civil unrest, riots, police brutality, and general distress of the population will continue to rise until critical levels are reached, at which point the whole socioeconomic system will crumble upon itself. This has negative repercussions across the whole spectrum of the population, and it is against the interest of everyone on this planet, even of the richest and wealthiest people.

Presumably this “backup plan” is fleshed out in the new book, and it will be the means by which we can avoid all-out robopocalypse. Of course, while most agree that machines are rapidly taking on more and more tasks that at one time could only be performed by humans, not everyone is convinced that automation represents a real threat to the long-term employability of human beings — as long we’re willing to keep moving up the value chain and do things machines (still) can’t.