Robots are taking military jobs too
Add military jobs to the long list of occupations under threat due to automation. The US has 1.3 million active personnel, including 323,000 in the navy.
The latter number may dwindle in the future because defense contractors are designing unmanned ships that operate at a fraction of the cost, operate in more-dangerous conditions and never need to bring sailors home.
Bloomberg reports that the navy faces pressure to develop unnamed aerial vehicles, subs and surface ships. A test ship for anti-submarine warfare is already built.
To me, if the world's armed forces are mostly robots, it seems more likely they would open fire on each other.
In other automation news, Microsoft CEO Nadella is out with a book where he talks about using AI to augment human capability instead of using technology to replace people.
That's a bold goal but it's increasingly difficult to imagine a future where there are enough jobs for everyone. Maybe we'll all build robot ships to attack other robot ships in a never-ending battle.
