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Blog: Comparative Advantage and Robots

The recent debate at the SOHO Forum on automation and potential joblessness got me thinking about the issue. One thing that I think Antony never brought up is comparative advantage.

Econ students will understand this point in regards to countries. Even if country A is worse at every single line of production than country B, it is still advantageous for both countries to engage in production, since B (even being superior at everything) still cannot produce infinite amounts of everything.

If this concept is applied to humans vs robots; even if robots someday can do absolutely everything better than humans, it does not follow that humans will have no jobs.

Regardless, Antony did a great job. I just didn’t see his opponent overcoming Antony’s point that automation has only ever made the masses better off, not worse.

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