How to Make Sure Robots Help Us, Not Replace Us
An MIT task force warns against ‘so-so’ technologies that offer few benefits other than paring corporate payrolls.
The world needs robots that make life better, not just ones that put people out of work. But business attitudes, government policy, and scientific priorities are geared toward replacing workers rather than complementing and enhancing their skills. That’s the bottom line of a report by a task force at MIT that was released today.
“It’s super easy to make a business case for reducing head count. You can always light up a boardroom” by promising to replace people with robots, says David Autor, an MIT economist and co-chair of the task force, who gave an interview about the report. It’s harder to get buy-in for robots and other forms of automation that complement human work while improving quality, consistency, and scalability, Autor says.