If you take your post and replace "autonomous vehicles" with "household appliances" (Dishwashers, washing machines, tumble dryers, ...) it might be enlightening as this is something we all already got used to.
I'd say most of the "problems" you point at are not related at all to "autonomous vehicles", but to automation as a whole.
Economic disruption by automation does exist, but mostly due to our insistence of tying in the "right to live" with "participation in the economy".
There are real problems with autonomous vehicles. Primarily the amplification of existing negative externalizes of physical transport (Space, noise pollution, energy, waste, ...). Autonomous vehicles will cause an explosion in the (already insane) consumption of transportation.
> If you take your post and replace "autonomous vehicles" with "household appliances" (Dishwashers, washing machines, tumble dryers, ...) it might be enlightening as this is something we all already got used to.
I can't argue with that in numbers. But intuitively it's very different situations. In the past, only very rich households had dedicated personnel for such kind of tasks, so i guess it was not that big % of people doing that.
> In the past, only very rich households had dedicated personnel for such kind of tasks, so i guess it was not that big % of people doing that.
There were not many drivers either. But independent of drivers, shouldn't you also argue against dishwashers and washing machines? These are jobs that people could do manually. Low-wage jobs, so the cost of dishwashing and laundry shouldn't really matter, does it? Full-time drivers suffer serious health consequences, driving is a pretty bad job. I would assume dish washing is healthier. If we can confirm that, maybe we should automate driving and require manually dish-washing by professional dishwashers instead?
That looks like reductio ad absurdum argument. Returning professional dishwashers even not an option at this point due to depth of technology integration. Meanwhile autonomous driving is not yet here.
Anyway, as i see it, current situation is different to other similar historic ones. Maybe i'm wrong. But previously we had an abundance of low-skill jobs. Now all low-skill jobs are targets for automation.
I think that solutions like UBI are very detrimental to middle class. Since we see that higher class are very flexible in terms of tax-evasion. And i don't see how it can last for more than one generation of welfare people.
It is true that especially before WWII the household services market was not yet fully financialized, but that does not mean those "jobs" were not done.
The impact of that automation was hard to overestimate, as all of a sudden there were nearly twice the number of workers available, As the economic system adjusted it was the end of being able to live on one full-time income for the average family. Those hours gained from household automation where swiftly recouped in mandatory wage earning for most.
> but that does not mean those "jobs" were not done
Still, i'm not sure if any significant % of population was occupied in those jobs.
> As the economic system adjusted it was the end of being able to live on one full-time income for the average family.
By automation you mean industrialization of society? I maybe wrong, but industrialization only lead to urbanization, which separated older and younger generations which lead to "atomic family", still patriarchal in it's essence. Decay of which(as well as one full-time income per family) came only later in 20th century.
I'd say most of the "problems" you point at are not related at all to "autonomous vehicles", but to automation as a whole.
Economic disruption by automation does exist, but mostly due to our insistence of tying in the "right to live" with "participation in the economy".
There are real problems with autonomous vehicles. Primarily the amplification of existing negative externalizes of physical transport (Space, noise pollution, energy, waste, ...). Autonomous vehicles will cause an explosion in the (already insane) consumption of transportation.