Ed Elson

Someone might make the argument that when they came up with the credit card, they eliminated the friction of paying with a check or paying with cash, and so therefore friction is gone.

No, the friction has just been handled by someone else.

And now the value and the money is accruing to a different player.

The same thing is going to happen with these AI agents.

And the same thing is going to happen for, as you say, you're taking the money away from here.

And now I'm going to spend it on something that is also worth my time.

And so the money is going to go to someone.

The only real concern, if this, I mean, if the doomsday scenario actually plays out, would be that all of the value is sucked up and gone.

literally hoarded with no redistribution mechanism whatsoever into the hands of literally just like the few people that own the AI companies.

Now, that's not a totally ridiculous statement because we're already seeing how that's kind of playing out in our current economy.

But

It's not going to go to the extent that I think that this article assumes.

You're going to need some level of consumption in the regular economy for the value to go up and for the value to accrue somewhere.

And that's the part that the article doesn't really acknowledge enough.

I do want to say one more point.

This was a YouTube comment that I read this morning that was responding to Josh's view that I think is kind of similar to us, that this article is a little bit out there and it's fiction, it's not going to happen.

So I just want to get your reactions to this YouTube comment.

This guy says, Okay, Josh, but what happens when AI renders my kid's $250,000 finance undergraduate degree useless because he can't get an entry-level analyst job because the jobs have all been assimilated under some AI chatbot?

Or...

if their law degree is useless because they can't get an associate job because the partners have discovered AI can get rid of 80% of their associates and paralegals.