IMO a really underrated Robin Hanson idea: insurance that pays out when some condition that approximates "robots took most jobs" is triggered. It can also be done at gov-level: gov buys securities that pay out {1 year of GDP} once the "robots take most jobs" condition is triggered. - ThreadSky

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vitalik.ca • 682 days ago

IMO a really underrated Robin Hanson idea: insurance that pays out when some condition that approximates "robots took most jobs" is triggered.

It can also be done at gov-level: gov buys securities that pay out {1 year of GDP} once the "robots take most jobs" condition is triggered.

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vitalik.ca•682 days ago

The reason this makes sense is that currently the gov (and individuals) are taking a big risk: income will go down and welfare demands will go up a lot once "robots taking most jobs" actually happens. So instead push some of that risk out to outside actors.

vitalik.ca•682 days ago

Perhaps some of those "outside actors" might even be eg. employers who would benefit a lot from automation (so if full automation succeeds they would have to pay out). That way both sides of the "bet" will benefit from a reduction in their total risk.

vitalik.ca•682 days ago

This would benefit a lot from people thinking hard about what some precise definitions of "robots taking most jobs" might actually be. Perhaps it could be split into a separate contract for each of 10 different definitions, to reduce the risk that one definition leaves some people uncovered.

avsa.eth.xyz•682 days ago

Sounds like a cool idea but I can see how governments would be cautious about being seen as “taking a bet” on something that voters wouldn’t like.

avsa.eth.xyz•682 days ago

Taking a more extreme, imagine a democratically elected president that, in order to “insure democracy”, made millions on bets (with payouts going to the people via direct basic income) that they would, in fact, become an absolutist tyrant.

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