What paid work might remain for human beings to do if we approach a world where AI is able to perform all economically useful tasks more productively than human beings? In this paper, I argue that the answer is not ‘none at all.’ In fact, there are good reasons to believe that tasks will still remain for people to do, due to three limits: ‘general equilibrium limits,’ involving tasks in which labor has the comparative advantage over machines (even if it does not have the absolute advantage); ‘preference limits,’ involving tasks where human beings might have a taste or preference for an un-automated process; and ‘moral limits,’ involving tasks with a normative character, where human beings believe they require a ‘human in the loop’ to exercise their moral judgment. In closing, I consider the limits to these limits as AI gradually, but relentlessly, becomes ever-more capable.
But labor is a necessity to survive, and always has been. We need the production of goods and services. Of course the distribution of wealth and goods is also an issue, but somebody (or something) has to produce the things we use.
Labor is a human putting in work. Fully automated production of goods and services is already a thing for some goods and services today and some others have a much, much larger automation component than they had historically.
Don’t confuse the wealth distribution mechanism (getting paid for labor) with the actual work itself.
And all goods and services require some amount of humans putting in work in order for them to be provided. Nothing is truly 100% automated yet.