Elon Musk has repeatedly said the greatest threat to civilization is population decline [0]. It's such a diametrically opposed narrative compared to what world governments and leaders have been saying over decades now namely that over population is what we should fear.
Surely both those statements cannot be true.
It seems like the answer is of great importance since potentially the fate of humanity depends on it, yet I seldom see it discussed seriously or at least as seriously as anything else like climate change.
It’s “only” a problem because all societies and economies are built like a pyramid where the bottom (working age people) is always bigger than the top. It seems like inevitably that is going to invert as countries get richer
I think you are conflating two different ideas. The first being that automation destroys jobs, that has been disproven. But automation does increase productivity to the point of one person being able to do the work of ten or a hundred. Meaning that we don't have scarcity the same way we used to. Logically this increase in productivity would lead to a decrease in working hours-- but as the comment you are replying to says, our economy is a pyramid scheme. We aren't able to fully benefit from the increase in productivity because of the pursuit of infinite growth.
When elon musk or jordan peterson say we are going to run out of people, its a dog whistle for we are going to run out of 'white' people, you know the productive kind?
Surely both those statements cannot be true.
It seems like the answer is of great importance since potentially the fate of humanity depends on it, yet I seldom see it discussed seriously or at least as seriously as anything else like climate change.
[0] https://twitter.com/elonmusk/status/1483484932961972227?lang...