Technological Unemployment News & Discussions

[firestar464]

Famed AI researcher launches controversial startup to replace all human workers everywhere

April 19, 2025

Every now and then, a Silicon Valley startup launches with such an “absurdly” described mission that it’s difficult to discern if the startup is for real or just satire.

Such is the case with Mechanize, a startup whose founder — and the non-profit AI research organization he founded called Epoch — is being skewered on X after he announced it.

Complaints encompass both the startup’s mission, and the implication that it sullies the reputation of his well-respected research institute. (A director at the research institute even posted on X, “Yay just what I wanted for my bday: a comms crisis.”)

Mechanize was launched on Thursday via a post on X by its founder, famed AI researcher Tamay Besiroglu. The startup’s goal, Besiroglu wrote, is “the full automation of all work” and “the full automation of the economy.”

Does that mean Mechanize is working to replace every human worker with an AI agent bot? Essentially, yes. The startup wants to provide the data, evaluations, and digital environments to make worker automation of any job possible.

https://techcrunch.com/2025/04/19/famed ... verywhere/

"work is sacred"

lmao the same people were like "work is evil" only five years ago

[funkervogt]

There's no evidence of rising technological unemployment in the U.S. yet.
https://www.economist.com/finance-and-e ... n-your-job

[firestar464]

Yet.

[wjfox]

AI is ‘breaking’ entry-level jobs that Gen Z workers need to launch careers, LinkedIn exec warns

LinkedIn’s chief economic opportunity officer, Aneesh Raman, said artificial intelligence is increasingly threatening the types of jobs that historically have served as stepping stones for young workers who are just beginning their careers. He likened the disruption to the decline of manufacturing in the 1980s.

May 25, 2025 at 1:51 PM EDT

As millions of students get ready to graduate this spring, their prospects for landing that first job that helps launch their careers is looking dimmer.

In addition to an economy that’s slowing amid tariff-induced uncertainty, artificial intelligence is threatening entry-level work that traditionally has served as stepping stones, according to LinkedIn’s chief economic opportunity officer, Aneesh Raman, who likened the shift to the decline of manufacturing in the 1980s.

“Now it is our office workers who are staring down the same kind of technological and economic disruption,” he wrote in a recent New York Times op-ed. “Breaking first is the bottom rung of the career ladder.”

For example, AI tools are doing the types of simple coding and debugging tasks that junior software developers did to gain experience. AI is also doing work that young employees in the legal and retail sectors once did. And Wall Street firms are reportedly considering steep cuts to entry-level hiring.

https://fortune.com/2025/05/25/ai-entry ... -linkedin/

[wjfox]

[firestar464]

Don't like his company, but at least he's the only one who is outlining EXACTLY what needs to be done. Meanwhile, the left is still busy yapping about synthetic media, how it is soulless, and how we should create a work religion or something. Just l/acc already

[wjfox]

https://willrobotstakemyjob.com/

[wjfox]

[firestar464]

[firestar464]

[firestar464]

From the NYT article:

I have some doubts about whether Mechanize’s approach will work, especially for nontechnical jobs where success and failure aren’t as easily measured. (What would it mean, for example, for an A.I. to “succeed” at being a high school teacher? What if its students did well on standardized tests, but they were all miserable and unmotivated? What if the A.I. teacher learned to reward-hack by feeding students the correct answers, in hopes of improving their test scores?)

Valid criticism IMO. You see, the students should learn well, be happy and motivated, and ready for the future. Reward-hacking is something alignment research seeks to prevent. Unfortunately, not enough of said research is being done.

But like many A.I. companies working on labor-replacing technology, Mechanize has no novel policy proposals to help smooth the transition to an A.I.-driven economy, no brilliant ideas about expanding the social safety net or retraining workers for new jobs — only a goal of making the current jobs obsolete as quickly as possible.

We tax the AI companies, as well as the companies making massive profits from automation. Likely to be Elon's buddies, for example. Sure, retraining is important. However, one day, there will be no new jobs. To be fair though, it's important to allow people to transition to new stuff if they want to in the interim.

Mr. Barnett, who described himself as a libertarian, responded that it is. He believes that A.I. will accelerate economic growth and spur lifesaving breakthroughs in medicine and science, and that a prosperous society with full automation would be preferable to a low-growth economy where humans still had jobs.

How the hell is bro a libertarian? Bro supports wealth redistribution. So do I. At least I correctly identify myself as a socdem and an l/acc.

[raklian]

Strong arguments for why AI will ultimately not create more human jobs.

[firestar464]

The Economist- Why AI hasn’t taken your job

https://archive.is/zZylK

Yet.

[weatheriscool]

[firestar464]

Paper in question. The main challenge is embodiment.

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2507.07935

[weatheriscool]

I am going to predict that capitalism is fucked. At least the one that gives the vast majority of the population a chance to make it in life based on their labor. Business,corprations and the elites aint going to choose humans over a.i. We may have a little more time with hands on kinds of jobs but that is going to go away once robotics catch up to the a.i.

The only economic system of the future will look like star trek.
-Robots or cyborgs powered by a.i will do the vast majority of labor.
-Humans will benefit off of it

Will there still be the ability to better yourself? Maybe. But within the star trek sort of way.

The fact that people are electing assholes like Trump thinking pure capitalism is the best way forward are evil to the core.

[wjfox]

[wjfox]

[firestar464]

ONLY GUY in the comments I saw that had a sensible reaction to this. Rest of the discourse is just surface-level "omg jobs replacement bad"



This frustrates me, because when things really come to a head, most people are going to be pushing idiot solutions like "omg we should artificially prop up work" instead of UBI, unless ASI convinces people otherwise...

[zzz]

ONLY GUY in the comments I saw that had a sensible reaction to this. Rest of the discourse is just surface-level "omg jobs replacement bad"



This frustrates me, because when things really come to a head, most people are going to be pushing idiot solutions like "omg we should artificially prop up work" instead of UBI, unless ASI convinces people otherwise...

More like "let's raze silicon valley to ashes!" or something similar.