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I'm thinking about the culture war around AI, specifically the whole UBI debate. If AI truly does take over a lot of human work, there's a lot of people who are savagely agitating for a UBI on one side, saying we'll be post work. The other side of course says no that's not how it works, besides we aren't even close to being able to afford that. The left (generally) takes the former, while the right generally takes the latter.
What I'm surprised by is why nobody has so far mentioned what, to me, seems the obvious compromise - we just shorten the work week! As our forefathers did forcing a 5 day, 8 hour work week, why don't we continue there? Go down to a 4 day work week, and/or shorten standard working hours to 6 per day?
If AI truly will obviate the need for a lot of work, how is this not the more rational solution than trying to magically create a UBI out of money we don't have? How come this idea has barely even entered the discourse? I have been talking and thinking about AI unemployment for years and never once have heard someone argue for this compromise.
Who's "we"?
If it's the government, then how? Currently, they can set incentives like full-time benefits at X hours per week and required overtime pay for >Y hours (X=30, Y=40 currently, IIRC), but they aren't anywhere close to banning work (outside of a few edge cases like long-haul trucking).
If it's the companies, then why? They'd have to pay four sets of benefits, rent four workspaces, run training four times, have single-path tasks take 33% longer, and have meetings with four people instead of three with a 30 hour workweek and 120 hour weekly workload. If they're early adopters, then they'd also attract people looking for reduced time commitments compared to the standard, which is horrible negative selection.
If it's the employees, then who are they? Most people I know look for overtime, not temporary layoffs or unpaid time off. That suggests that their optimal work week is above 40 hours given their financial needs and time commitments. Heck, some people take multiple part-time jobs (which sounds horrible) because they want to work more hours than one job can provide.
We could be the labor movement, or I suppose employees. The way it worked in the past is basically the labor movement lobbied the government to reduce working hours.
You are in an extreme bubble if most people are looking for overtime. Or perhaps we could agitate for higher wages, organize into unions, etc. I'm just saying if AGI is actually going to massively increase productivity, labor should get a share of the pie instead of being turned into a permanently dependent underclass via UBI.
Maybe a bubble, but I don't think it's extreme.
See here (1995 PDF): 27.1% of people want more hours, and 6.4% want less. Or here (federal workers only): 42% are working part-time due to family responsibilities or "other", while 58% are due to work not being available, working a second job, or going to school. Here says 39% of workers would take a 1/5 cut to hours and pay, which is the highest I've found.
Also, the full-time comparisons use a baseline of 44-ish hours, not the nominal 40 (or 38.6 if you count two weeks of vacation). People are succeeding at finding overtime, and therefore not looking for more than the current amounts.
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