The NDP came in well ahead of the Liberals literally two elections ago. They were also polling in first for about half of the last election campaign, and one of the big factors in their losing votes to the Liberals was from voters who wanted the conservatives out, and didn't want to split the left vote. If there hadn't been fear of another Harper term from vote splitting, they likely would have fared much better.
The previous two elections especially, they were absolutely aiming for the big chair.
It's also partly about not wanting the conservatives to get majorities when ~62% of the country voted for center-left and left parties.
I actually prefer the system the Liberals wanted, as I feel proportional too easily opens the door to dangerous fringe populists. But I can also easily see why the party closest to the center would prefer STV, and other parties wouldn't.
I think the relevant comparison here is that Jack Layton got 30% of the vote and it was an amazing victory... never mind the other side getting a majority government. Paul Martin got 30% and resigned on election night. The NDP did really well for a minor party. If they want to be the small-L liberal party in Canada they need to eat the current one and there's no sign of that happening anytime soon (and if it did happen, wouldn't really solve the problem... a mass defection from the LPC would make current NDP'ers a minority in their own party).
Certainly, the NDP are currently a more minor party federally. I was replying to the notion of whether or not they want to aim higher.
In 2015, Mulcair ran an underwhelming campaign, and made the big mistake of not being Jack Layton. But there's no question they were aiming for the number one spot.
Basically, I don't think their preference for proportional representation over single transferable vote comes from complacency or lack of ambition.
Which we all kind of knew, of course, because of their massively long recess that just so happens to coincide with the end of the federal election, but good to see it spelled out.
I'd like to think that the reason Conservatives are still polling at 75% in Alberta is because Kenney hasn't had time to implement all of his cuts, but I'm pretty sure the Conservatives could literally insult every Albertan's parentage and we'd still vote them in overwhelmingly.
Which we all kind of knew, of course, because of their massively long recess that just so happens to coincide with the end of the federal election, but good to see it spelled out.
I'd like to think that the reason Conservatives are still polling at 75% in Alberta is because Kenney hasn't had time to implement all of his cuts, but I'm pretty sure the Conservatives could literally insult every Albertan's parentage and we'd still vote them in overwhelmingly.
yea we wont know what gets the slice until October 24th, conveniently after the federal election.
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DaimarA Million Feet Tall of AwesomeRegistered Userregular
Which we all kind of knew, of course, because of their massively long recess that just so happens to coincide with the end of the federal election, but good to see it spelled out.
I'd like to think that the reason Conservatives are still polling at 75% in Alberta is because Kenney hasn't had time to implement all of his cuts, but I'm pretty sure the Conservatives could literally insult every Albertan's parentage and we'd still vote them in overwhelmingly.
yea we wont know what gets the slice until October 24th, conveniently after the federal election.
Yep, funny how budget day has to wait for the Federal election to be over.
Which we all kind of knew, of course, because of their massively long recess that just so happens to coincide with the end of the federal election, but good to see it spelled out.
I'd like to think that the reason Conservatives are still polling at 75% in Alberta is because Kenney hasn't had time to implement all of his cuts, but I'm pretty sure the Conservatives could literally insult every Albertan's parentage and we'd still vote them in overwhelmingly.
yea we wont know what gets the slice until October 24th, conveniently after the federal election.
Yep, funny how budget day has to wait for the Federal election to be over.
Yea though it is probably par for the course when elections loom, be interesting to look back and see how other parties have done it in various provinces.
Which we all kind of knew, of course, because of their massively long recess that just so happens to coincide with the end of the federal election, but good to see it spelled out.
I'd like to think that the reason Conservatives are still polling at 75% in Alberta is because Kenney hasn't had time to implement all of his cuts, but I'm pretty sure the Conservatives could literally insult every Albertan's parentage and we'd still vote them in overwhelmingly.
yea we wont know what gets the slice until October 24th, conveniently after the federal election.
Yep, funny how budget day has to wait for the Federal election to be over.
Yea though it is probably par for the course when elections loom, be interesting to look back and see how other parties have done it in various provinces.
The Québec legislature is still sitting. The 2019-2020 budget was released last March.
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ShadowenSnores in the morningLoserdomRegistered Userregular
edited September 2019
Manitoba's election was in September. Cons were in, election happened, Cons were still in.
Manitoba's election was in September. Cons were in, election happened, Cons were still in.
To be fair it feels like a large number of roadworks projects were held up until after the election as that was a budget contention point.
But that’s more of a tinfoil hat and confirmation bias thing on my part. Thinking the cons wanted the applause of talking up investment in infrastructure without the grumbling of all the gridlock it’s causing for what feels like spurious “improvements”
Israel is the poster child of the downsides to proportional voting. They've mitigated some of the problem recently by putting in a 3.25% cutoff, so in this month's elections the extra-super-racist parties didn't get seats, but there's still the problem that anyone who thinks they're smart enough and popular enough has an incentive to split off if it looks like their party will only get 10 seats and they're number 11 on the list.
I'm not sure what one can say about the UK's situation at the moment other than maybe try not to have a public referendum on a massively contentious issue whose support cuts across party lines.
This is always interesting to me, the list of countries in this world that use forms of Proportional Representation number 87. I would think if the problems with the system were so wide spread we could do better than just coming up with Israel as the "poster child of the downsides", which really reads more like its an outlier when you put in the context of how many places this works for. Would say New Zealand or Ireland then be the "poster child of the upsides"?
Its curious to me that there was a middle ground that Liberals, NDP, and even the Conservatives could have reached: Use a ranked ballot and have proportional representation at the riding level with each riding containing 3 seats. We could have still kept local representation, not bothered with party lists (which is what I commonly hear Conservatives in BC level against PR) so the electorate still can "vote out" a particular candidate, let the electorate's ballot be more nuanced and powerful, and represented far closer to the majority of the electorate. The Trudeau Liberals didn't have to declare the whole thing dead.
As of now, since this issue of having Canadians more fairly represented is so important to me personally, I've taken note that only two parties are even attempting to have electoral reform on their platforms and only one of those plans would in any way be effective in helping break the status quo that is First Past The Post where the minimum thresholds of supporting voting blocks for a candidate to take a seat are abysmally lowered by every additional candidate on the ballot over 2 (Thresholds: 2 candidates 50.1%, 3 candidates 33.4%, 4 candidates 25.3%, 5 candidates 20.3%, and so on) which leaves the rest of riding effectively unrepresented and disenfranchised by the system - which is intended by design to push us towards only considering two of our riding's candidates as real contenders, that's a sad state of affairs to consider an acceptable status quo.
Seeing as Trudeau did not follow through on this very important issue, it really only leaves me with NDP as the effective vote for change, who are campaigning on implementing Mixed Member Proportional with a sunset clause, where we have a referendum AFTER we have had a chance to test drive the new system, which would significantly lower the effectiveness of propaganda that convinces us to just stick with the status quo of the devil we know. The Greens only promising to just hold yet another Citizens Assembly, which I don't have any faith would be any different that Trudeau creating a toothless ministerial position and striking a parliamentary committee designed to fail, especially after how I saw the citizen's assembly that recommended BC-STV was treated after it won a majority of the votes in its referendum.
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daveNYCWhy universe hate Waspinator?Registered Userregular
I’m not sure I’d want to go looking for a worse example than Israel. They’re pretty dysfunctional on the government thing at the moment. They also have a number of factors that make things worse that wouldn’t come into play in Canada. Demographic issues, the Palestinian conflict, and an utter collapse of the center-left and left.
Shut up, Mr. Burton! You were not brought upon this world to get it!
I’m not sure I’d want to go looking for a worse example than Israel. They’re pretty dysfunctional on the government thing at the moment. They also have a number of factors that make things worse that wouldn’t come into play in Canada. Demographic issues, the Palestinian conflict, and an utter collapse of the center-left and left.
Did anyone go out for the Climate Strike yesterday?
Ottawa had a pretty great turnout, but holy shit, Vancouver and Montreal crushed it. Great to see so much involvement. Hopefully it translates into real pressure on the government.
Did anyone go out for the Climate Strike yesterday?
Ottawa had a pretty great turnout, but holy shit, Vancouver and Montreal crushed it. Great to see so much involvement. Hopefully it translates into real pressure on the government.
I think Edmonton had around a thousand people, which is great! Went for lunch with some friends who are more center right though and the discussion was just "I mean, they can strike all they want, but they don't actually KNOW what sort of economical pitfalls there would be for transitioning..." Like, no shit there will be pitfalls, does that make it any less necessary or urgent? My eyes about flipped out of my fucking skull. I love these people, but I swear they don't think about opposing views for any longer than 3 seconds.
Between you and me, Peggy, I smoked this Juul and it did UNTHINKABLE things to my mind and body...
Not much movement outside of the blip post-brownface. Conservatives polling ahead of the Liberals, but a lot of that is being weighted by their polling in the prairies, especially Alberta/Sask.
Also, apparently Andrew Scheer never actually sold insurance, which is the scandal Du Jour, and boy does it fit with everything I've heard about Andrew Scheer that he'd fake being an insurance salesman.
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
The Greens are the Anti-Wi-Fi and Pro-Homeopathy party. Don’t waste the brain space
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
It's just stupid. It will simply move factories outside of the country. Also, attributing job loss is not trivial.
Also also, stopping automation is not the answer to the problems caused by automation, unless you want to have half the country filling the holes dug by the other half. Just redistribute the profits, no matter where the factory is.
Not much movement outside of the blip post-brownface. Conservatives polling ahead of the Liberals, but a lot of that is being weighted by their polling in the prairies, especially Alberta/Sask.
Also, apparently Andrew Scheer never actually sold insurance, which is the scandal Du Jour, and boy does it fit with everything I've heard about Andrew Scheer that he'd fake being an insurance salesman.
Jesus, what were you actually doing if insurance salesman is your upsell? Professional child molester?
Not much movement outside of the blip post-brownface. Conservatives polling ahead of the Liberals, but a lot of that is being weighted by their polling in the prairies, especially Alberta/Sask.
Also, apparently Andrew Scheer never actually sold insurance, which is the scandal Du Jour, and boy does it fit with everything I've heard about Andrew Scheer that he'd fake being an insurance salesman.
Jesus, what were you actually doing if insurance salesman is your upsell? Professional child molester?
He's the same guy who claimed that his parents making over 100K a year in the 80s/90s meant he had an impoverished upbringing. I think it's his attempt to sell himself as a 'normal Joe', despite having been in government since his early 20s and clearly being privileged in his own way.
It's part of the Conservative messaging - Liberals are rich and privileged and don't understand how you live, while we're the salt-of-the-earth. Harder to sell that image when you've spent less time in a 'real' job than Trudeau.
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
It's just stupid. It will simply move factories outside of the country. Also, attributing job loss is not trivial.
Also also, stopping automation is not the answer to the problems caused by automation, unless you want to have half the country filling the holes dug by the other half. Just redistribute the profits, no matter where the factory is.
People here in Alberta are very blind to the fact that since the oil crash the Oil sands have heavily invested in and implemented a f*&k ton of automation in all aspects of extraction... I keep telling people that the jobs they are pining for LITERALLY DO NOT EXIST ANYMORE.
Automation is not just for automakers or big plants... With the advent of self driving vehicles and self-correcting a.i. ton's of jobs are on the block. If you sit in front of a computer for work there is a great chance you are going to be made obsolete in the next decade.
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
It's just stupid. It will simply move factories outside of the country. Also, attributing job loss is not trivial.
Also also, stopping automation is not the answer to the problems caused by automation, unless you want to have half the country filling the holes dug by the other half. Just redistribute the profits, no matter where the factory is.
People here in Alberta are very blind to the fact that since the oil crash the Oil sands have heavily invested in and implemented a f*&k ton of automation in all aspects of extraction... I keep telling people that the jobs they are pining for LITERALLY DO NOT EXIST ANYMORE.
Automation is not just for automakers or big plants... With the advent of self driving vehicles and self-correcting a.i. ton's of jobs are on the block. If you sit in front of a computer for work there is a great chance you are going to be made obsolete in the next decade.
How so? Can you elaborate because I'm not seeing it and nothing I've read really points to the outcome you're suggesting. Automation will bring about change but said change does not necessarily mean a deficit in terms of how many net jobs there are.
The big problem with automation is it requires a more educated and skilled workforce to increase production/productivity but all the increases in profits are being captured by the executives that push for automation and the skilled workers that operate it have their salaries stagnate and be left behind.
With stuff like the oil sands a lot of times you can't bring jobs back. Preserving jobs can kinda work, because the cost of buying upgrading might be more then it's worth. But if you are starting up a new project or you shutdown and are now starting something up again, often it's cost-effective to upgrade to the newest process which probably involves less jobs and more automation.
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BouwsTWanna come to a super soft birthday party?Registered Userregular
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
It's just stupid. It will simply move factories outside of the country. Also, attributing job loss is not trivial.
Also also, stopping automation is not the answer to the problems caused by automation, unless you want to have half the country filling the holes dug by the other half. Just redistribute the profits, no matter where the factory is.
People here in Alberta are very blind to the fact that since the oil crash the Oil sands have heavily invested in and implemented a f*&k ton of automation in all aspects of extraction... I keep telling people that the jobs they are pining for LITERALLY DO NOT EXIST ANYMORE.
Automation is not just for automakers or big plants... With the advent of self driving vehicles and self-correcting a.i. ton's of jobs are on the block. If you sit in front of a computer for work there is a great chance you are going to be made obsolete in the next decade.
How so? Can you elaborate because I'm not seeing it and nothing I've read really points to the outcome you're suggesting. Automation will bring about change but said change does not necessarily mean a deficit in terms of how many net jobs there are.
I can't really comment when referring to office related work, but it's DEFINITELY the case for driving automation. According to a study I found, trucker's make up 1.57% of the TOTAL employment of the country. This would be related (as I understand it) to Class 1 hauling only, and wouldn't include smaller delivery, taxi, courier, etc. So a technology that is being actively sought and would massively disrupt an industry could wipe out (on the conservative side of things) 2% of all jobs. And this would not translate to more, higher paying jobs in other sectors directly. There are not spin off industries because autonomous vehicles (and especially electric vehicle's, but we're a longer way off for those in Class 1 I believe) require less maintenance, and less repair (fewer accidents, less abuse from drivers).
Edit: Statscan puts the total working population at ~5% for those employed in "transportation and warehousing" which is... I mean a lot of people, but like, how many in transportation, and how many in warehousing...
BouwsT on
Between you and me, Peggy, I smoked this Juul and it did UNTHINKABLE things to my mind and body...
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DaimarA Million Feet Tall of AwesomeRegistered Userregular
Edit: Statscan puts the total working population at ~5% for those employed in "transportation and warehousing" which is... I mean a lot of people, but like, how many in transportation, and how many in warehousing...
Amazon and similar companies are working on automating the warehousing side of things.
I think a point that needs to be made bare is that, for the most part (there are exceptions), automation may not lead to a decrease is overall jobs, but seems as though it may lead to a decrease in jobs in the unskilled labour market.
Miner, oil rig worker, taxi driver, delivery person, trucker, factory worker, warehouse clerk, grocery clerk, data entry clerk, retail clerk, fast food chef, and so on.
There are the jobs that are going be going away, but, in their place will be jobs springing up in parallel to / in service of these new automated systems. The problem is, these latter jobs will likely require education and expertise that the former, traditionally, do not.
The societal impact of this is that there is a percentage of the population who cannot, or perhaps choose not to, seek out the training and education needed to function in this near future. They certainly don't want to feel like they have to pay for it! These are the people who are afraid for their futures. We cannot ignore these people, they exist, their feelings matter, and they need our help. This is where proposals like UBI and overhauls to our social safety nets come in. If it is true that there may soon be no place in the working world for people who cannot/will not adapt, we need to figure out how to address that. Ignoring it and going just "they'll adapt" is folly!
I think a point that needs to be made bare is that, for the most part (there are exceptions), automation may not lead to a decrease is overall jobs, but seems as though it may lead to a decrease in jobs in the unskilled labour market.
Miner, oil rig worker, taxi driver, delivery person, trucker, factory worker, warehouse clerk, grocery clerk, data entry clerk, retail clerk, fast food chef, and so on.
And that's wrong. A lot of skilled jobs are on the block too. Image processing could replace radiologists tomorrow if we wanted to, and insurance claims evaluators in the near future. Chatbots have already started replacing customer service workers. The internet of things and warehouse automation can replace middle-management entirely. Sales and marketing can be (and is currently being) replaced by preference-prediction and recommendation software. And that's just off the top of my head.
EDIT:
Now I'm thinking about all the cool AI prototypes we had when I was an undergrad in the 90s. Theorem-proving AI, protein-folding AI, patent-discovery AI, legal precedent discovery AI, medical diagnostic AI... they didn't amount to much because the technology back then didn't live up to our ambitions, but with the new AI boom these are going to come back, and kill a lot of skilled jobs.
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
It's just stupid. It will simply move factories outside of the country. Also, attributing job loss is not trivial.
Also also, stopping automation is not the answer to the problems caused by automation, unless you want to have half the country filling the holes dug by the other half. Just redistribute the profits, no matter where the factory is.
People here in Alberta are very blind to the fact that since the oil crash the Oil sands have heavily invested in and implemented a f*&k ton of automation in all aspects of extraction... I keep telling people that the jobs they are pining for LITERALLY DO NOT EXIST ANYMORE.
Automation is not just for automakers or big plants... With the advent of self driving vehicles and self-correcting a.i. ton's of jobs are on the block. If you sit in front of a computer for work there is a great chance you are going to be made obsolete in the next decade.
How so? Can you elaborate because I'm not seeing it and nothing I've read really points to the outcome you're suggesting. Automation will bring about change but said change does not necessarily mean a deficit in terms of how many net jobs there are.
The truth of the matter is that, outside of a few areas (and things like physical human service areas), a lot of our work can be done via comptuer algorithms. I think adoption of the latter will be slower than people expect in some areas (due to lack of trust/need for manual verification), and faster in others.
Clothing models, for example, I expect to largely be viewed as dead-end and possibly extinct within a decade.
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
It's just stupid. It will simply move factories outside of the country. Also, attributing job loss is not trivial.
Also also, stopping automation is not the answer to the problems caused by automation, unless you want to have half the country filling the holes dug by the other half. Just redistribute the profits, no matter where the factory is.
People here in Alberta are very blind to the fact that since the oil crash the Oil sands have heavily invested in and implemented a f*&k ton of automation in all aspects of extraction... I keep telling people that the jobs they are pining for LITERALLY DO NOT EXIST ANYMORE.
Automation is not just for automakers or big plants... With the advent of self driving vehicles and self-correcting a.i. ton's of jobs are on the block. If you sit in front of a computer for work there is a great chance you are going to be made obsolete in the next decade.
How so? Can you elaborate because I'm not seeing it and nothing I've read really points to the outcome you're suggesting. Automation will bring about change but said change does not necessarily mean a deficit in terms of how many net jobs there are.
Example: My ex-wife works in purchasing. They have a department of +/- 25 people. Lot's of what she does is look as historic purchase trends and make educated guesses about future purchases. Having too much inventory on hand is a no-no as some of it is perishable and it's just a bad business plan to have dead stock.
Last month 20 x of those employees have been let go in her location and about 100 more across Canada as a fancy new piece of a.i. software has made that job obsolete.
Amazon automated many of their chat services and no one notice. Labor is still a huge part of a businesses expense and a.i. is for all intents and purposes taking over the roles slaves had. "Free" labor that has an initial start up fee and companies are gobbling it up.
Minimum income is needed asap to help soften the blow as we are blissfully unprepared for this.
Outside of auto workers being impacted by job losses am I missing something with regards to this proposed "Robot Tax" from the Greens or is it as a frivolous a thing as it sounds? Hell, I don't even think auto workers were really impacted recently by automation. Pretty sure those companies just stopped making the cars they manufactured there.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
It's just stupid. It will simply move factories outside of the country. Also, attributing job loss is not trivial.
Also also, stopping automation is not the answer to the problems caused by automation, unless you want to have half the country filling the holes dug by the other half. Just redistribute the profits, no matter where the factory is.
People here in Alberta are very blind to the fact that since the oil crash the Oil sands have heavily invested in and implemented a f*&k ton of automation in all aspects of extraction... I keep telling people that the jobs they are pining for LITERALLY DO NOT EXIST ANYMORE.
Automation is not just for automakers or big plants... With the advent of self driving vehicles and self-correcting a.i. ton's of jobs are on the block. If you sit in front of a computer for work there is a great chance you are going to be made obsolete in the next decade.
How so? Can you elaborate because I'm not seeing it and nothing I've read really points to the outcome you're suggesting. Automation will bring about change but said change does not necessarily mean a deficit in terms of how many net jobs there are.
The truth of the matter is that, outside of a few areas (and things like physical human service areas), a lot of our work can be done via comptuer algorithms. I think adoption of the latter will be slower than people expect in some areas (due to lack of trust/need for manual verification), and faster in others.
Clothing models, for example, I expect to largely be viewed as dead-end and possibly extinct within a decade.
I don't think we're disagreeing. Automation will definitely drive a redistribution of employment and with that absolutely comes hardship for the individual. That said, the answer isn't to stymie innovation. We should be focused instead on preparing for this through education and retraining.
edit: Also, thank you for an actually insightful post. The article was interesting.
I think a point that needs to be made bare is that, for the most part (there are exceptions), automation may not lead to a decrease is overall jobs, but seems as though it may lead to a decrease in jobs in the unskilled labour market.
Miner, oil rig worker, taxi driver, delivery person, trucker, factory worker, warehouse clerk, grocery clerk, data entry clerk, retail clerk, fast food chef, and so on.
And that's wrong. A lot of skilled jobs are on the block too. Image processing could replace radiologists tomorrow if we wanted to, and insurance claims evaluators in the near future. Chatbots have already started replacing customer service workers. The internet of things and warehouse automation can replace middle-management entirely. Sales and marketing can be (and is currently being) replaced by preference-prediction and recommendation software. And that's just off the top of my head.
EDIT:
Now I'm thinking about all the cool AI prototypes we had when I was an undergrad in the 90s. Theorem-proving AI, protein-folding AI, patent-discovery AI, legal precedent discovery AI, medical diagnostic AI... they didn't amount to much because the technology back then didn't live up to our ambitions, but with the new AI boom these are going to come back, and kill a lot of skilled jobs.
I get the point you're making, so allow me to refine my argument.
Yes, automation can touch every job market, but at different rates, and with differences in impact. The unskilled labour market is more likely to be hit first, in my opinion; it's already begun. Yes, of course, we need to think about the long-term ramifications of automation in other, more advanced fields, but this isn't all going to happen at once. The unskilled market will be first, which will sort of act as a testbed, and, provided society makes it out okay, will then continue apace, but we need to deal with the immediate ramifications now.
Also, I think the main difference between the effects on the unskilled market and the specialised market, is that (and this is just opinion, I don't have figures on this) those working in specialized fields are more likely to possess a better suite of transferrable skills and education, meaning that, while automation may indeed affect them, they are less likely to be driven completely out of the job market. The same cannot be said for unskilled labourers. While I concede that the skilled marketplace may indeed be impacted as well by automation, I believe this impact is a more long term one than the immediate impact we're going to be seeing in the unskilled market, and those affected are more likely to be able to bounce back and continue to support themselves than those in the unskilled market.
So just got a call from my kids school board that CUPE is probably going to be striking next week; so no school for the kids. It's like god damn clockwork with electing conservative governments and government services going on strike.
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JacobyOHHHHH IT’S A SNAKECreature - SnakeRegistered Userregular
Re: retraining and support, I feel like the model used in Newfoundland post-moratorium might work, or at least be a decent template. There were many unskilled workers out of work, but there seemed to be sufficient resources for retraining. I think there was still a mobility issue, both from people not wanting to leave home (can’t discount that!) and opportunities not always being “in range”.
My stay-at-home wife works very closely with our kids' school and is actually quite close with the support staff, certain teachers, the librarians and even the principal. School council and all that. My kids are in SK and Gr3, but even the grade 8's recognize my wife from her various volunteer efforts in the school. Which is to say that we're pretty close to the strike action. Our admin ladies are wonderful people who often go the extra mile. However they make only $16.50/hr. These women, as well as the angels who are the kindergarten ECE's, deserve to be treated better. I don't know fully what their beef is... but they should at least get some consideration, as opposed to vitriol they were getting on right leaning talk radio this morning. Its like these callers don't even know what and who are striking. They see CUPE and go red. They hear schools and think "overpaid teachers with 4 month vacations!".... sheesh.
I can't really defend the custodians though, because in my experience the boys washroom in my kids school is absolutely disgusting, they don't clean the hallways and instead of de-icing the entire tarmac, there is just a path from the parking lot to the doors in the winter. And the kids are just forbidden from playing on the icy tarmac, but shunted into the ice covered snow in the fields instead. So, you know.... fuck those guys.
My stay-at-home wife works very closely with our kids' school and is actually quite close with the support staff, certain teachers, the librarians and even the principal. School council and all that. My kids are in SK and Gr3, but even the grade 8's recognize my wife from her various volunteer efforts in the school. Which is to say that we're pretty close to the strike action. Our admin ladies are wonderful people who often go the extra mile. However they make only $16.50/hr. These women, as well as the angels who are the kindergarten ECE's, deserve to be treated better. I don't know fully what their beef is... but they should at least get some consideration, as opposed to vitriol they were getting on right leaning talk radio this morning. Its like these callers don't even know what and who are striking. They see CUPE and go red. They hear schools and think "overpaid teachers with 4 month vacations!".... sheesh.
I can't really defend the custodians though, because in my experience the boys washroom in my kids school is absolutely disgusting, they don't clean the hallways and instead of de-icing the entire tarmac, there is just a path from the parking lot to the doors in the winter. And the kids are just forbidden from playing on the icy tarmac, but shunted into the ice covered snow in the fields instead. So, you know.... fuck those guys.
"News" talk radio is gross. When you say your kids are in SK and Grade 3, do you mean Saskatchewan?
Posts
Certainly, the NDP are currently a more minor party federally. I was replying to the notion of whether or not they want to aim higher.
In 2015, Mulcair ran an underwhelming campaign, and made the big mistake of not being Jack Layton. But there's no question they were aiming for the number one spot.
Basically, I don't think their preference for proportional representation over single transferable vote comes from complacency or lack of ambition.
https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/election-2019/exclusive-poll-reveals-doug-ford-factor-a-big-problem-for-scheers-conservatives-in-ontario
Which we all kind of knew, of course, because of their massively long recess that just so happens to coincide with the end of the federal election, but good to see it spelled out.
I'd like to think that the reason Conservatives are still polling at 75% in Alberta is because Kenney hasn't had time to implement all of his cuts, but I'm pretty sure the Conservatives could literally insult every Albertan's parentage and we'd still vote them in overwhelmingly.
yea we wont know what gets the slice until October 24th, conveniently after the federal election.
Yep, funny how budget day has to wait for the Federal election to be over.
Yea though it is probably par for the course when elections loom, be interesting to look back and see how other parties have done it in various provinces.
The Québec legislature is still sitting. The 2019-2020 budget was released last March.
To be fair it feels like a large number of roadworks projects were held up until after the election as that was a budget contention point.
But that’s more of a tinfoil hat and confirmation bias thing on my part. Thinking the cons wanted the applause of talking up investment in infrastructure without the grumbling of all the gridlock it’s causing for what feels like spurious “improvements”
MWO: Adamski
This is always interesting to me, the list of countries in this world that use forms of Proportional Representation number 87. I would think if the problems with the system were so wide spread we could do better than just coming up with Israel as the "poster child of the downsides", which really reads more like its an outlier when you put in the context of how many places this works for. Would say New Zealand or Ireland then be the "poster child of the upsides"?
Its curious to me that there was a middle ground that Liberals, NDP, and even the Conservatives could have reached: Use a ranked ballot and have proportional representation at the riding level with each riding containing 3 seats. We could have still kept local representation, not bothered with party lists (which is what I commonly hear Conservatives in BC level against PR) so the electorate still can "vote out" a particular candidate, let the electorate's ballot be more nuanced and powerful, and represented far closer to the majority of the electorate. The Trudeau Liberals didn't have to declare the whole thing dead.
As of now, since this issue of having Canadians more fairly represented is so important to me personally, I've taken note that only two parties are even attempting to have electoral reform on their platforms and only one of those plans would in any way be effective in helping break the status quo that is First Past The Post where the minimum thresholds of supporting voting blocks for a candidate to take a seat are abysmally lowered by every additional candidate on the ballot over 2 (Thresholds: 2 candidates 50.1%, 3 candidates 33.4%, 4 candidates 25.3%, 5 candidates 20.3%, and so on) which leaves the rest of riding effectively unrepresented and disenfranchised by the system - which is intended by design to push us towards only considering two of our riding's candidates as real contenders, that's a sad state of affairs to consider an acceptable status quo.
Seeing as Trudeau did not follow through on this very important issue, it really only leaves me with NDP as the effective vote for change, who are campaigning on implementing Mixed Member Proportional with a sunset clause, where we have a referendum AFTER we have had a chance to test drive the new system, which would significantly lower the effectiveness of propaganda that convinces us to just stick with the status quo of the devil we know. The Greens only promising to just hold yet another Citizens Assembly, which I don't have any faith would be any different that Trudeau creating a toothless ministerial position and striking a parliamentary committee designed to fail, especially after how I saw the citizen's assembly that recommended BC-STV was treated after it won a majority of the votes in its referendum.
Whatever happened to Israel's left, anyway?
Ottawa had a pretty great turnout, but holy shit, Vancouver and Montreal crushed it. Great to see so much involvement. Hopefully it translates into real pressure on the government.
Do... Re... Mi... So... Fa.... Do... Re.... Do...
Forget it...
I had to work.
I think Edmonton had around a thousand people, which is great! Went for lunch with some friends who are more center right though and the discussion was just "I mean, they can strike all they want, but they don't actually KNOW what sort of economical pitfalls there would be for transitioning..." Like, no shit there will be pitfalls, does that make it any less necessary or urgent? My eyes about flipped out of my fucking skull. I love these people, but I swear they don't think about opposing views for any longer than 3 seconds.
https://newsinteractives.cbc.ca/elections/poll-tracker/canada/
Not much movement outside of the blip post-brownface. Conservatives polling ahead of the Liberals, but a lot of that is being weighted by their polling in the prairies, especially Alberta/Sask.
Also, apparently Andrew Scheer never actually sold insurance, which is the scandal Du Jour, and boy does it fit with everything I've heard about Andrew Scheer that he'd fake being an insurance salesman.
Now my FB feed is full of people convinced that the auto checkout at Sobeys and Shoppers is putting people out of work despite the fact that I'm fairly certain studies have shown that automation tends to create jobs. Higher paying ones at that.
The Greens are the Anti-Wi-Fi and Pro-Homeopathy party. Don’t waste the brain space
MWO: Adamski
It's just stupid. It will simply move factories outside of the country. Also, attributing job loss is not trivial.
Also also, stopping automation is not the answer to the problems caused by automation, unless you want to have half the country filling the holes dug by the other half. Just redistribute the profits, no matter where the factory is.
Jesus, what were you actually doing if insurance salesman is your upsell? Professional child molester?
He's the same guy who claimed that his parents making over 100K a year in the 80s/90s meant he had an impoverished upbringing. I think it's his attempt to sell himself as a 'normal Joe', despite having been in government since his early 20s and clearly being privileged in his own way.
It's part of the Conservative messaging - Liberals are rich and privileged and don't understand how you live, while we're the salt-of-the-earth. Harder to sell that image when you've spent less time in a 'real' job than Trudeau.
People here in Alberta are very blind to the fact that since the oil crash the Oil sands have heavily invested in and implemented a f*&k ton of automation in all aspects of extraction... I keep telling people that the jobs they are pining for LITERALLY DO NOT EXIST ANYMORE.
Automation is not just for automakers or big plants... With the advent of self driving vehicles and self-correcting a.i. ton's of jobs are on the block. If you sit in front of a computer for work there is a great chance you are going to be made obsolete in the next decade.
How so? Can you elaborate because I'm not seeing it and nothing I've read really points to the outcome you're suggesting. Automation will bring about change but said change does not necessarily mean a deficit in terms of how many net jobs there are.
MWO: Adamski
I can't really comment when referring to office related work, but it's DEFINITELY the case for driving automation. According to a study I found, trucker's make up 1.57% of the TOTAL employment of the country. This would be related (as I understand it) to Class 1 hauling only, and wouldn't include smaller delivery, taxi, courier, etc. So a technology that is being actively sought and would massively disrupt an industry could wipe out (on the conservative side of things) 2% of all jobs. And this would not translate to more, higher paying jobs in other sectors directly. There are not spin off industries because autonomous vehicles (and especially electric vehicle's, but we're a longer way off for those in Class 1 I believe) require less maintenance, and less repair (fewer accidents, less abuse from drivers).
Edit: Statscan puts the total working population at ~5% for those employed in "transportation and warehousing" which is... I mean a lot of people, but like, how many in transportation, and how many in warehousing...
Amazon and similar companies are working on automating the warehousing side of things.
Miner, oil rig worker, taxi driver, delivery person, trucker, factory worker, warehouse clerk, grocery clerk, data entry clerk, retail clerk, fast food chef, and so on.
There are the jobs that are going be going away, but, in their place will be jobs springing up in parallel to / in service of these new automated systems. The problem is, these latter jobs will likely require education and expertise that the former, traditionally, do not.
The societal impact of this is that there is a percentage of the population who cannot, or perhaps choose not to, seek out the training and education needed to function in this near future. They certainly don't want to feel like they have to pay for it! These are the people who are afraid for their futures. We cannot ignore these people, they exist, their feelings matter, and they need our help. This is where proposals like UBI and overhauls to our social safety nets come in. If it is true that there may soon be no place in the working world for people who cannot/will not adapt, we need to figure out how to address that. Ignoring it and going just "they'll adapt" is folly!
And that's wrong. A lot of skilled jobs are on the block too. Image processing could replace radiologists tomorrow if we wanted to, and insurance claims evaluators in the near future. Chatbots have already started replacing customer service workers. The internet of things and warehouse automation can replace middle-management entirely. Sales and marketing can be (and is currently being) replaced by preference-prediction and recommendation software. And that's just off the top of my head.
EDIT:
Now I'm thinking about all the cool AI prototypes we had when I was an undergrad in the 90s. Theorem-proving AI, protein-folding AI, patent-discovery AI, legal precedent discovery AI, medical diagnostic AI... they didn't amount to much because the technology back then didn't live up to our ambitions, but with the new AI boom these are going to come back, and kill a lot of skilled jobs.
https://willrobotstakemyjob.com/
Anyway, a lot of this is based off a paper which was published in 2013. Here's Another one from 2017.
The truth of the matter is that, outside of a few areas (and things like physical human service areas), a lot of our work can be done via comptuer algorithms. I think adoption of the latter will be slower than people expect in some areas (due to lack of trust/need for manual verification), and faster in others.
Clothing models, for example, I expect to largely be viewed as dead-end and possibly extinct within a decade.
https://www.harpersbazaar.com/uk/fashion/fashion-news/a22722480/how-artificial-intelligence-models-are-taking-over-your-instagram-feed/
You may already be looking at fake models and not even realizing it. Clothing models on amazon? May be fake.
Every model in that video is computer generated
Example: My ex-wife works in purchasing. They have a department of +/- 25 people. Lot's of what she does is look as historic purchase trends and make educated guesses about future purchases. Having too much inventory on hand is a no-no as some of it is perishable and it's just a bad business plan to have dead stock.
Last month 20 x of those employees have been let go in her location and about 100 more across Canada as a fancy new piece of a.i. software has made that job obsolete.
Amazon automated many of their chat services and no one notice. Labor is still a huge part of a businesses expense and a.i. is for all intents and purposes taking over the roles slaves had. "Free" labor that has an initial start up fee and companies are gobbling it up.
Minimum income is needed asap to help soften the blow as we are blissfully unprepared for this.
I never finish anyth
I don't think we're disagreeing. Automation will definitely drive a redistribution of employment and with that absolutely comes hardship for the individual. That said, the answer isn't to stymie innovation. We should be focused instead on preparing for this through education and retraining.
edit: Also, thank you for an actually insightful post. The article was interesting.
I mean, they have. That's what automation and offshoring have done. A ton of things we get and use day to day are cheaper then they used to be.
I get the point you're making, so allow me to refine my argument.
Yes, automation can touch every job market, but at different rates, and with differences in impact. The unskilled labour market is more likely to be hit first, in my opinion; it's already begun. Yes, of course, we need to think about the long-term ramifications of automation in other, more advanced fields, but this isn't all going to happen at once. The unskilled market will be first, which will sort of act as a testbed, and, provided society makes it out okay, will then continue apace, but we need to deal with the immediate ramifications now.
Also, I think the main difference between the effects on the unskilled market and the specialised market, is that (and this is just opinion, I don't have figures on this) those working in specialized fields are more likely to possess a better suite of transferrable skills and education, meaning that, while automation may indeed affect them, they are less likely to be driven completely out of the job market. The same cannot be said for unskilled labourers. While I concede that the skilled marketplace may indeed be impacted as well by automation, I believe this impact is a more long term one than the immediate impact we're going to be seeing in the unskilled market, and those affected are more likely to be able to bounce back and continue to support themselves than those in the unskilled market.
Switch: nin.codes/roldford
I can't really defend the custodians though, because in my experience the boys washroom in my kids school is absolutely disgusting, they don't clean the hallways and instead of de-icing the entire tarmac, there is just a path from the parking lot to the doors in the winter. And the kids are just forbidden from playing on the icy tarmac, but shunted into the ice covered snow in the fields instead. So, you know.... fuck those guys.
"News" talk radio is gross. When you say your kids are in SK and Grade 3, do you mean Saskatchewan?