By Eric Frisch, 10x Management Writer
We’ve already heard the warnings from Jack Ma, but now Bill Gates has jumped into the fray by predicting massive job loss due to automation in the next 30 years. But Gates believes he has a solution: governments should tax the companies that use robots to replace humans. In a recent interview with Quartz, Gates proposed a tax on robots to help finance jobs that likely cannot be replaced by automation, such as care for the elderly and working with kids in schools.
Gates believes that governments need to step in to help redirect jobs to people with lower incomes, as opposed to relying on businesses and the free market. Gates does not necessarily believe that automation will lead to the end of human labor, but that it could have a significant impact on the level of inequity in the world:
“If you want to do [something about] inequity, a lot of the excess labor is going to need to go help the people who have lower incomes. And so it means that you can amp up social services for old people and handicapped people and you can take the education sector and put more labor in there. Yes, some of it will go to, “Hey, we’ll be richer and people will buy more things.” But the inequity-solving part, absolutely government’s got a big role to play there. The nice thing about taxation though, is that it really separates the issue.”
What else does Gates foresee in the near future?
- In the next 15 years, Africa will become self-sufficient in terms of food production.
- In the year 2035, poor countries will no longer exist thanks to foreign aid.
- We are on the brink of a clean energy breakthrough that will revolutionize the world. Gates has already invested $2 billion in renewable energy!
If you like this article, you might enjoy reading Why Getting a Head Start on Automation is Necessary