London Robotaxis

[Julia]

Taking things to their extreme conclusion, robots doing all work with robots able to fix create and fix themselves meaning no work for humans at all would mean no need for money as money is only needed to pay other humans to do work for them. Before we get to that point, automation will lead to things being increasingly cheaper.

Money is also needed to pay the humans who own resources to allow you to have access to them, either directly (eg. food) or indirectly (eg. the materials needed to build and fix robots). In your extreme conclusion, whoever is sitting on the supply of robot oil is not going to need to work, but we certainly will... if we can find any.

 

[Bikeman78]

Human drivers and insurance companies would never

Some do, including the Tesla driver in the example I mentioned above. Tesla's defence seems to be that their cars are safer than human drivers. That may be true but it shouldn't get them off the hook completely.

 

[johncrossley]

Money is also needed to pay the humans who own resources to allow you to have access to them, either directly (eg. food) or indirectly (eg. the materials needed to build and fix robots). In your extreme conclusion, whoever is sitting on the supply of robot oil is not going to need to work, but we certainly will... if we can find any.

In the event of 100% automation, money would be useless to a notional owner of robots, as there would be nothing to spend it on because robots are doing all the work for free.

 

[Bikeman78]

In the event of 100% automation, money would be useless to a notional owner of robots, as there would be nothing to spend it on because robots are doing all the work for free.

Hopefully I will be gone long before this becomes reality. I find the whole AI thing quite disturbing. Films like I,Robot ought to be a warning about the possible pitfalls.

 

[Towers]

Hopefully I will be gone long before this becomes reality. I find the whole AI thing quite disturbing. Films like I,Robot ought to be a warning about the possible pitfalls.

Indeed.

Sadly, we see time and again that the human traits of greed and consumerism very much outweigh those of self preservation. Short term thinking appears to be always greatly more appealing than critical thinking, spurred on by those who rule over us and their relentless need to amass ever more wealth and control.

Ho hum!

 

[AlastairFraser]

Situations like that could be handled by having a human on call at the warehouse and most of the "easy driving" done unsupervised

I wasn't really thinking about warehouses, I was thinking about multi-drop delivery routes (I've been a driver's mate for that kind of operation in the past).
I would not trust an automated driving service to be able to quickly reverse down this drive to a delivery point that my old employer used to drop off at, and likely still does (Leigh delivery point.
This isn't an isolated example either.

 

[The exile]

Many people said the same when trains first came on the scene. Driving is a dangerous monotonous job, and around a third of deaths on the road involve someone driving for a living.

While that’s a sad fact, it’s a bit of a non statistic - people who drive for a living spend far more time in a position to die on the road than someone who pops down to Tesco in the car twice a week.

 

[deltic]

While that’s a sad fact, it’s a bit of a non statistic - people who drive for a living spend far more time in a position to die on the road than someone who pops down to Tesco in the car twice a week.

If any industry had that death rate it would be closed down overnight - it is strange that we accept such a situation, over 500 deaths every year, as a "sad fact". It's a scandal that HSE don't treat such deaths as rigoursly as those occurring on the shop floor. These deaths include non-workers killed by someone driving in the course of work.

 

[johncrossley]

Hopefully I will be gone long before this becomes reality. I find the whole AI thing quite disturbing. Films like I,Robot ought to be a warning about the possible pitfalls.

Like most people my age, I have had to work for decades in order to survive. People in the future won't have that problem. No more working in horrible jobs in warehouses, take aways etc. No more (or at least vastly fewer) unnecessary deaths on the roads. Housing won't be the problem it is now.

 

[The exile]

Like most people my age, I have had to work for decades in order to survive. People in the future won't have that problem. No more working in horrible jobs in warehouses, take aways etc. No more (or at least vastly fewer) unnecessary deaths on the roads. Housing won't be the problem it is now.

And what is everyone going to do to get the income to survive on?

 

[birchesgreen]

Like most people my age, I have had to work for decades in order to survive. People in the future won't have that problem. No more working in horrible jobs in warehouses, take aways etc. No more (or at least vastly fewer) unnecessary deaths on the roads. Housing won't be the problem it is now.

Because everyone will be dead?

 

[johncrossley]

And what is everyone going to do to get the income to survive on?

As mentioned earlier, money will no longer be required as robots don't need to be paid.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 26 Feb 2026 ==

Because everyone will be dead?

Because robots will be able to build as much housing as necessary for free.

 

[Baxenden Bank]

Like most people my age, I have had to work for decades in order to survive. People in the future won't have that problem. No more working in horrible jobs in warehouses, take aways etc. No more (or at least vastly fewer) unnecessary deaths on the roads. Housing won't be the problem it is now.

Logan's Run, everyone swanning around serenely, then being killed off at 21 (or 30 in the film) to maintain equilibrium. Lives totally controlled by a computer.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 26 Feb 2026 ==

Because robots will be able to build as much housing as necessary for free.

Why would they? Robots don't need houses.

 

[renegademaster]

Because robots will be able to build as much housing as necessary for free.

The problem isnt getting people to get them built , its that nobody wants new neighbours.

 

[johncrossley]

The problem isnt getting people to get them built , its that nobody wants new neighbours.

It isn't just a NIMBY problem. There is not enough capacity in the construction industry to build houses at a sufficiently fast rate and developers have been sitting on land because they want to wait for a more profitable time to build. Those constraints would no longer apply in a future with unlimited free automated labour. It would be not be controversial to build dozens of new 100 storey tower blocks in places like Croydon and Docklands, where there are already quite a few tower blocks in existence already.

 

[renegademaster]

would be not be controversial to build dozens of new 100 storey tower blocks

Croydon's Tory mayor won on a platform of no more tower blocks

 

[johncrossley]

The possibilities are endless. The Boris Island proposal for replacing Heathrow seemed pie in the sky at the time, but of course with limitless automated free labour that could be done, with a new city for housing built at Heathrow. That's not even considering possible future inventions using AI. Air travel as we know it might be replaced by some new technology, making all airports redundant.

 

[MotCO]

Air travel as we know it might be replaced by some new technology, making all airports redundant.

It's called Zoom or Teams

 

[GusB]

Costs may well have shrunk to such a low level that it isn't a big deal to produce a number of vehicles to meet peak demand. Fully automated driving doesn't necessarily mean a ban on personal ownership but shared taxis would be the natural choice for most if they are available at much lower cost, with negligible waiting times and no worries about parking.

No matter how cheap these Robotaxis become, no company is ever going to have enough to cover periods of extremely high demand; you'd simply end up with thousands of cars twiddling virtual thumbs and not making any money for their owners (as well as creating congestion). There will be enough to cover routine maintenance (if they don't skimp on that), charging and perhaps a handful of surplus vehicles to give a capacity boost at known peak periods, but don't expect there to be a massive increase in the number of available cars when there are large events (football matches, concerts etc.) taking place. Those companies will simply whack up their prices at peak times.

I'm not sure that you'll have negligible waiting times, either. In an ideal world you'd have a car patiently waiting at the end of every street; in reality, those cars will be heading back to locations where the jobs actually are, as happens with ordinary taxis at the moment.

Parking bans may well be the thing that kills personal ownership, as it will seem incredibly wasteful to sacrifice road space and land for parking.

It will be a long time before it kills personal ownership; it may become viable for people who either live in or close to city centres but I can't see it being an option for those in suburban or rural areas.

 

[Bikeman78]

Like most people my age, I have had to work for decades in order to survive. People in the future won't have that problem. No more working in horrible jobs in warehouses, take aways etc. No more (or at least vastly fewer) unnecessary deaths on the roads. Housing won't be the problem it is now.

Good luck with your utopia. I don't fancy my chances when the robots decide they don't need humans anymore.

 

[WelshBluebird]

As mentioned earlier, money will no longer be required as robots don't need to be paid.

Maybe we should get to the point of not needing money for housing or food etc first before taking away the jobs people need to earn money to pay for those things?

 

[birchesgreen]

Good luck with your utopia. I don't fancy my chances when the robots decide they don't need humans anymore.

We're fine for now, robots apparently can't click a box on a web page yet

 

[stevieinselby]

Taking it to another extreme, people’s working hours might become so flexible that the “rush hour” ceases to exist, as commuter travel demand spreads out throughout the day. This would be much better as it avoids that peak surge in demand, and should be incentivised.

If it hasn't happened up until now, why do you think anything will be different in the future?