Stephen Downes

When a tech or finance company puts the phrase 'understanding of humans' in the subhead, that's a red flag. A folk theory of 'human nature' is not a good basis for informed commentary. Neither is saying 'of course Keynes was wrong.' That doesn't invalidate the entire message here, though. Historically, when a new technology has been introduced, that has increased, not decreased, employment and wealth. It's not a simple case of "we found new and different productive endeavors to fill our time." Would that this were the case. Historically (and this is not the a16z message) though wealth increased, scarcity persisted because that wealth was not shared, and it was never possible to survive on a 15 hour work week. To me, the assertion that AI won't eliminate jobs is not an assertion about AI (which very much could reduce our need for labour) or even an assertion about people (if it were, a16z would be saying a guaranteed income would increase social wealth) but rather an assertion that the exploitation will continue (just as it has through previous rounds of technology development).