An Introduction
On August 19, 2021, Tesla's Elon Musk announced to the world that the firm would be developing a robot that, over time, will be powered by AGI or Artificial General Intelligence. The bot would be named Optimus, probably about the robot named Optimus Prime. The bot, which resembles a human form, would be capable of interacting with the world like humans. As AI converges with AGI in the limit, the potential use of this bot but focusing on the AI (self-learning software) will grow (potentially without limitation).
I am invested in Tesla (approximately 60% of my portfolio), focused on the growth of the auto business and robotaxis. I began to include Tesla Energy and Insurance in 2020, which improved the potential development of Tesla's valuation. Now incorporating the likely economic thrust provided by the approaching of AI to AGI via the bot, Tesla's investment potential improves a lot further than when I initially invested in October 2019.
If Tesla's Optimus bot can do many of the tasks that humans can do today or in the future for longer hours, fewer breaks, complaints, errors, etc. One needs to consider the potential for massive labor substitution for capital. Depending on what time scale this transition happens, it might impact the what might be the scale for societal changes that lend more on the negative side. If the growth was on the order of several generations, the transition might go very smoothly. The massive unemployment might lead to societal dysfunction if the change was only five to ten years. In the following paragraphs, I will cover a sample of boring, repetitive, and dangerous jobs that Optimus bot might replace and what future jobs might be available.
Optimus bot and low-hanging fruit jobs
I consider many jobs to be low-hanging fruit for the bot. The jobs that fit the bill are those that are redundant, difficult, and or boring. Elon Musk mentioned that the jobs (tasks) that the bot could remove would be those jobs that are repetitive, dangerous, and boring. A simple, repetitive job is a package handler (employed by companies like FedEx, UPS, Amazon, etc., these individuals move packages, materials, etc., from point A to B. A dangerous job risks life, limb, etc., for those employed, including firefighters who fight fires and assist people in hazardous situations, which a bot might replace. A rather boring job is being a security officer; imagine walking up and down an empty warehouse from 8 pm to 4:30 am, often with little to no human interaction. Such a job is not the best for one's mental health.
The bot weighs around 125 lbs, but it might be able to do things humans cannot do. Humans' productivity will improve as robots' ability to do something like walk underwater, enter radiation zones, climb walls, and enter flames to save lives. One day, a robot can form itself on a protective table inside a building through an earthquake, providing a human with the ability to survive one of nature's most punishing disasters.
I think Tesla will produce various model(s) of the Optimus branded bot. Maybe Tesla will have nanobots to larger bots that make the gigafactories look small. Not sure what the future might hold, let's continue on the adventure to discover what might the future hold.
Optimus might send the Axe at these jobs.
According to Clever, the following twenty jobs might be the first to be automated in mass by pure software and bots like Optimus or others. [ Number of employed by profession in the USA. ]
Drivers [ 2.2 M ]
Pilots [ 104 K ]
Paramedics and Nurses [ 5.8 M ]
Surgeons [ ¾ M ]
Astronauts [ N/A ]
Janitors[ 2.2 M ]
Teachers [ 4.5 M ]
Babysitters [ 1 M ]
Lab technicians [ ⅓ M ]
Salespersons [ 13.8 M ]
Postal Service [ 500 K ]
Security Guards [ 1 M ]
Soldiers [ 2.8 M ]
Cashiers and tellers [ 4.2 M ]
Baristas [ 600 K ]
Food Handlers [ 2.4 M ]
Referees [ 20 K ]
Models [ 2 K ]
Sex workers (including only fans) [ 3 M ]
Writers [ 171 K ]
The above list is a short list of jobs that bots could replace. Still, it does show that we as humans need to be flexible in learning new things to remain economically viable in an ever-changing labor market. Almost 45.4 million jobs are at risk of being displaced by robots in the next couple of years by companies like Tesla. Currently, the nation of 333 million employs 158.3 million.
The Growth of Optimus Bot
In my base case, Tesla would have produced 4.1 million Optimus bots by 2034, assuming they can create the value of 51.8 million average male workers in the United States. It is safe to think that Tesla would be able to replace the workers, as mentioned above, in a little over ten years. I assume that Tesla sells robots only in the United States and that they can complete most of those jobs' tasks in the next ten years. It should be clear if thousands of robot entrepreneurs train those millions of bots for the necessary functions of those jobs instead of Tesla. The firm could achieve the level of AI faster than it could in-house.
In a more bullish case, one can see a point where multiple companies produce similar bots but license the software, AI, etc., from Tesla. Tesla might rent its bot AI software to firms like Boston Dynamics. Similar to the idea that Tesla might lease its full self-driving to other automakers. Then the need to prepare these workers for the future beyond their current employment becomes alarming.
In my hyper-bull case, with Tesla not leasing the in-house AI to other firms, the company might have the ability to have produced a total of 1.05 billion bots (equivalent to 22.4 billion people). One might ask this; what can Tesla achieve with a 20-year improved AI (more knowledgable than today) working through the equivalence of more than 22 billion adult males?
The future Job that AGI will propel
I’ll keep this short; I don’t know what specific job might come apart from the Optimus bot. I see the future for robopreneurs whose entire profession would be to develop business models centered on using these bots and other robots to deliver value to consumers at the price, time, and place they desire and want.
In short, roboprenuers will become the kings and queens of the fourth industrial revolution.
Summary
Tesla is an AI company currently tacking how to make efficient cars that drive themselves without killing passengers. In the process, it is working on taking their experience in solving AGI. To take AI to the limit as AGI, Tesla is developing a general-purpose robot named Optimus bot. This bot will turbocharge the economy. That will improve humanity by eliminating our need to do boring, repetitive, and dangerous work. In the United States, with a simple look at twenty professions. One can see that Optimus might be on the path of making those currently employed in those career fields unemployed by the middle of the next decade. In the future, far larger than we can even think is possible without linear thinking brains. With that in mind, we need to focus on retraining billions of people to be flexible in how they earn a living to remain economically viable in the fourth industrial revolution.
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