David Autor on the Future of Work and Polanyi's Paradox

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4.7 • 4.4K Ratings

🗓️ 6 October 2014

⏱️ 69 minutes

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Summary

David Autor of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology talks with EconTalk host Russ Roberts about the future of work and the role that automation and smart machines might play in the workforce. Autor stresses the importance of Michael Polanyi's insight that many of the things we know and understand cannot be easily written down or communicated. Those kinds of tacit knowledge will be difficult for smart machines to access and use. In addition, Autor argues that fundamentally, the gains from machine productivity will accrue to humans. The conversation closes with a discussion of the distributional implications of a world with a vastly larger role for smart machines.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Welcome to Econ Talk, part of the Library of Economics and Liberty.
0:06.4	I'm your host, Russ Roberts of Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
0:11.0	Our website is econtalk.org where you can subscribe, comment on this podcast, and find links
0:16.3	and other information related to today's conversation.
0:19.0	You'll also find our archives where you can listen to every episode we've ever done
0:23.1	going back to 2006.
0:25.4	Our email address is mailadycontalk.org.
0:27.9	We'd love to hear from you.
0:32.2	Today is September 18, 2014, and my guest is David Otter of MIT.
0:37.8	He's the author of a recent paper, Polonius Paradox and the Shape of Employment Growth,
0:43.3	which is our topic for today's episode.
0:45.0	David, welcome back to Econ Talk.
0:47.0	Thanks very much.
0:48.0	Pleasure to be here.
0:49.0	I want to start by saying this is an extremely interesting and provocative paper pack with
0:53.3	ideas and analysis, but still accessible for the most part to a non-specialist.
0:59.0	We'll put a link up to it, and I encourage listeners to check it out after listening
1:03.2	to the conversation.
1:04.2	I also want to say that this is one of many episodes of Econ Talk where we look at the threat
1:09.4	and opportunity posed by the increasing role of smart machines and computers in our economy,
1:15.0	and I want to let people know that more are coming, so enjoy.
1:18.9	David, let's start with Polonius Paradox.
	...

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