Introduction

Abstract

Technological unemployment is a subset of historically recurring problems related to jobs in general and unemployment in particular, which are now of global importance. The typical difficulties of employment have been identified, although not all of them lead to unemployment: jobs don't give workers happiness, most jobs now require skills the education system does not provide (Coates and Morrison 2016), wages are falling and the inequality gap is widening, robots are fast replacing existing jobs, automation will require a different set of skills, etc. (see, for example, Elliott 2017; Ford 2015; Gordon 2013). Accolades, fears, predictions, consequences of technological unemployment have been many and varied: from the unbounded optimism of those who are at the forefront of research, who believe that technology is here to wipe out all ills, to the warnings of economists and social scientists, who predict a massive systemic disruption of the means of production and consumption. Mass media and other publications give similar assessments (see for ex.

Amartya Sen's Capabilities Approach: Resistance and Transformative Power in the Age of Transhumanism

“…Either conditional or unconditional, governmental financial support that is sufficient for necessaries may help socially powerless people and may also reduce inequality, insecurity, and poverty (Paine 2010). As numerous questions remain regarding a universal income, for example, concerning the recipients, the source of the money, the length of assistance, its taxability, and so on, dialogue and experimentation need to be conducted by nation states (Marturano and Vizmuller‐Zocco 2019).…”

“…Governments may provide remuneration to users in recognition of this contribution (Bellucci 2005). Another possibility is to provide certain types of replacement income to those who have lost their job to a machine (Marturano and Vizmuller‐Zocco 2019). While the conditions for a free wage should be carefully negotiated, such financial assistance can alleviate the economic disparity between different social groups, and, consequently, relieve the unequal distribution by providing socially marginalized people with more opportunities to access technology.…”

“…Moreover, those who have lost their jobs need technical skills to find a new job or profession. Even after they acquire new skills, their skills need to be updated on a regular basis, as technological advances will continue to increase at a faster rate in a transhumanist society (Marturano and Vizmuller-Zocco 2019). Due to this circumstance, education should be a necessary component of programs provided by governments and private enterprises in order to assist people to adapt to and be equipped in the society of every-expanding technology (Marturano and Vizmuller-Zocco 2019).…”

Universal Basic Income as a Promoter of Real Freedom in a Digital Future

“…Psychophysical well-being and the possibility of building social networks promoted by the fact that UBI's stakeholders are freed from certain dynamics of exploitation of leisure time and their potential by the labor market have a further probable effect on the enhancement of creativity, which needs a context characterized by freedom in order to be cultivated. Thus, various types of consequences of UBI can also be hypothesized for creativity (see also Marturano & Vizmuller-Zocco, 2019).…”

“…In the new digitized society, where the interests of companies and employers are more important than redistributive activities, leisure time is secretly exploited by turning consumers into workers who simultaneously test, use, consume, and are unwittingly hired as workers by the digitized communication system to which they provide online feedback on how they use electronic devices, how they communicate, their tastes and political choices, where they are, and what they do. Ubi can therefore also be seen as a form of remuneration for "implicit digital work" that helps artificial intelligence companies to make profits by "implicitly" using the consumer's free time (Marturano & Vizmuller-Zocco, 2019).…”