What Donald Trump, Bernie Sanders, and Elizabeth Warren think of workforce automation

As we mentioned in our first article, economic anxiety during the 2016 presidential election was closely linked to the likelihood of one’s job being automated in the near future. This, in turn, was a strong predictor for voters who sided with Trump.

It’s interesting to note, then, that Trump has not actually spoken about automation directly in the last 18 months of campaigning — instead his rhetoric has focused more broadly on jobs, immigrations, and free trade.

So far, one week after his election, most of the President-elect’s job creation policy seems to be revolving around (1) an infrastructure stimulus and (2) trade tariffs to encourage production coming back the U.S. Due to automation, however, an increase in U.S. production is unlikely to recoup any of the manufacturing jobs that Trump voters are so eager to see return.

Thanks to Reddit, however, we can compare that with what Bernie Sanders thinks about the subject:

Very important question. There is no question but that automation and robotics reduce the number of workers needed to produce products. On the other hand, there is a massive amount of work that needs to be done in this country. Our infrastructure is crumbling and we can create millions of decent-paying jobs rebuilding our roads, bridges, rail system, airports, levees, dams, etc. Further, we have enormous shortages in terms of highly-qualified pre-school educators and teachers. We need more doctors, nurses, dentists and medical personnel if we are going to provide high-quality care to all of our people. But, in direct response to the question, increased productivity should not punish the average worker, which is why we have to move toward universal health care, making higher education available to all, a social safety net which is strong and a tax system which is progressive.

So Bernie Sanders’ argument is that productivity increases due to automation are inevitable and the answer to softening that blow will be a stronger social safety net.

Elizabeth Warren has taken a similar stance:

Her stance is pro-innovation, and therefore focused completely on the safety net: all workers should have benefits (retirement, healthcare, paid leave); labor laws should be enforced and clear so that employers cannot ignore their workers; and workers should retain the right to organize and bargain.

But the problem comes when innovation moves so quickly that government regulation cannot hope to keep up.

This is certainly true in the gig-economy, where Uber and Lyft have mostly had their way with classifying workers as contractors, thereby shirking responsibility but also providing workers with flexibility.

In a closed-door meeting with UC Berkeley students in April 2016, David Plouffe, now a board member at Uber, described the desired Uber driver profile: someone who wants to make some extra cash on the side and drive in their spare time. Importantly, that means Uber does not want people to use the service as their main means of income generation. Still, many of their drivers obviously are, even if it is discouraged.

This is certainly at odds with the labor protections that Elizabeth Warren and, presumably, Bernie Sanders support.

It seems safe to say that we are bound to see conflict appear on the liberal side of the political spectrum if automation in transportation and trucking occurs in way that overloads the social safety net and its ability to support the ensuing collateral damage.

It’s too early to say where Trump will land on the coming fight.