AI actually is causing a lot of unemployment in tech.

Not because it has been able to successfully replace anyone's job, but because the big tech companies are all gambling so much on becoming trillionaires that they have to throw tens of thousands of workers into unemployment to pay for it.

@existentialcomics Unless it's blue collar grunts like janitors or drivers, I have zero sympathy for the suit-wearing ghouls employed by these oligarch companies. They work for evil masters and should expect shitty treatment. Fuck em.
@existentialcomics One wonders what happens when the spinning's done and they're left with nothing.
@existentialcomics I mean…it’s a pretty good tool for some things. But this weird obsession with it becoming the sole focus is super weird. All these guys are old enough to remember dotcom. Right? Right??
@jonw it's a cult. And 💲 is their leader.

@existentialcomics

Hopefully all those people with expertise will create software and products that can be desktop only, are privacy focused, and functional - unlike all the garbage out there today.

Make something like quickbooks 2019 and I'll love you forever. I promise.

@existentialcomics they'll learn their lesson soon enough. I hope they learn it so thoroughly that this leads to higher wages overall. I'm imagining a potentially unrealistic scenario where they have to beg IT professionals to work for them again because their code is so swamped with garbage that it's become unusable.
@existentialcomics what’s becoming a trillionaire? Owning trillions or burning them pointlessly? After’s banks retreat it must be the second!

@existentialcomics

Stock prices going up after layoffs is not a recent phenomenon. After all, your expenses go down, so therefore you must be more profitable. At least in the extremely short term. And that's all about stock prices care about, apparently.

This made me sick the first time I saw a similar headline decades ago, and it makes me sick that it is still the way of capitalism.

@nosrednayduj @existentialcomics

There's even a mutual fund which -- sort of -- tries to capitalize on this.

MERFX buys the stock of companies about to be acquired and (working from memory) shorts the acquirer. They're anticipating cost cuts & head-count cuts in the acquired company, among other things.

https://www.morningstar.com/funds/xnas/merfx/quote

@existentialcomics it was never about successfully replacing people or optimizing. It was simply about providing the illusion so they had just enough reason to take the risk.

Lots and lots of people will lose their jobs. Maybe one day they will be rehired. If everything isn’t ruined first