Consider this: My company employs several graphic designers. If starting today, we'd likely use AI instead. This pattern isn't new - factories displaced local food sources, online stores replaced bookshops, Photoshop simplified graphic design work.
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The key issue isn't technology - it's intent. Are we pursuing better quality and outcomes that benefit everyone? Or are we just cutting costs to benefit executives and investors while displacing workers? That's the difference between progress and exploitation.
Here's the real challenge: we need to answer this question as a society. If we default to letting businesses decide, driven purely by profit motives, society loses. We need active policies and frameworks that protect creative work while embracing AI's benefits.
What could this look like? Perhaps tax incentives for companies maintaining creative positions. Maybe requirements that AI-driven cost savings partially fund human artistic and creative roles. Or new business models that blend AI efficiency with human creativity.
UBI alone isn't enough - businesses would likely adjust prices and rents to capture that income stream, leaving people in the same or worse position. We'd need strong price controls, housing reform, and healthcare guarantees alongside UBI for it to work.
The goal should be ensuring everyone can live with dignity while still having opportunities for meaningful work. This might require reimagining our entire economic system, not just adding UBI to our current one.
The future belongs to those who shape it. We can let AI and automation be yet another force that concentrates wealth and diminishes human potential, or we can intentionally build a world where technology enhances human creativity and dignity.
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How do we do that? I don't know.