David Autor on the Scars That Money Can’t Heal

So I give you a simple answer to the question, have we learned anything? And the answer is no. I mean, our political system has learned nothing. In fact, to the degree it's learned anything, it's learned the wrong lessons. And now the good fight with Yasha Monk.

Today's conversation is all about the past, present, and future of work. What kinds of opportunities are available? to average people in the job market today? Was the economic pessimism which characterized public discourse in the 2010s assuming that returns to labour were going to be much lower than returns to capital justified? Or were we actually overly pessimistic in our reading of that situation?

Has the China shock, the shock from China entering the World Trade Organization, lastingly led to economic carnage in the American Midwest, or has a lot of the American workforce recovered since when? And perhaps most importantly, how is artificial intelligence going to play into all of these questions? Is artificial intelligence a systematically different technology from one's that humans have faced before?

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