5th March, 6:00 – 7:30 pm – St John’s College, Old Divinity School, Main Lecture Theatre
Recent technological developments, especially in the field of machine learning, robotics, and A.I. have both wiped out entire sectors and created demand for new skills. There is considerable evidence that the technological change observed over the course of the last century has created more jobs than it made redundant and that it has favoured high-rather than low-skilled jobs. Voices claiming that this technological change led to mass unemployment have been proven largely wrong.
But at the dawn of a new major technological shift, it is legitimate to revisit these questions and conclusions. Is the automation of labour as we might see it in the next few years fundamentally different? If almost all jobs that neither require a college degree nor advanced social skills were replaced by robots and sophisticated algorithms within the next two decades, what would human labour look like? How do we need to adapt our social organisation and tax system? And does this transformation make a Universal Basic Income inevitable?
Speakers:
Professor Guy Standing, co-founder of the Basic Income Earth Network, author of many books about universal basic income (see list below) and the key advisor to the working group of the Labour party investigating universal basic income. His website can be accessed here.
Dr. Malcolm Torry, Director of the Citizen’s Income Trust and honorary research fellow in the Social Policy Department at the LSE. From 1980 to 2014 he served in full-time posts in the Church of England’s ministry. Since 2014 he has given most of his time to the debate on a Citizen’s or Basic Income and is the author of many books about this topic. His London School of Economics (LSE) webpage is here.
Please register on Eventbrite here.
