Scale Is All You Need? Part 4-2: The Post-AGI-World

Note: If you haven’t seen Part 4-1, you can read it here.

1 Global economy in the post-AGI era

The advent of AGI will fundamentally change the economy as we know it. While previous industrial revolutions have already brought about massive changes, their scope is limited compared to the changes that will be made possible by AGI. AGI has the potential to almost completely replace the importance of human labor. Where machines previously served as tools, AGI will turn them into autonomous actors that can independently take over many complex human activities. This raises questions ranging from the necessity of the market principle to a fundamental realignment of our economic structure.

Today's economy is based on wage labor as the primary foundation for prosperity and consumption. In a post-AGI world, however, production costs could tend towards zero, since machines and artificial intelligence could efficiently handle both the production and distribution of goods without human intervention. Such a radical change would pose new challenges for the economic system: If AI can take over almost all tasks, the question arises as to how human work is defined at all. It is possible that work, which in the past was structured by wage incentives, will take on a new meaning in the future as an expression of one's own creativity and identity.

In the post-AGI era, a shift from a market economy to a cooperative system could take place, in which collaboration rather than competition forms the economic framework. This notion represents a radical break with previous principles and raises the question of the extent to which people can realize themselves in such an economy. If the costs of goods and services are largely minimized, consumption could become less important and new values such as self-realization, social exchange and creative expression could come to the fore.

In this chapter, we will explore how the post-AGI era could shape an economic landscape characterized by profound changes in production, consumption, and human labor. We will address the question of what role humans will still play in an automated economic system and whether the efficiency gains made possible by AGI will usher in a new era of prosperity or a new form of social challenge.

Is all human activity work?

In many discussions that I have on X or in my private life, I repeatedly notice false conclusions based on a misunderstanding of AI. If we look at human history, we see that prosperity has come to humanity since the industrial revolution in the second half of the 18th or 19th century. Even if social justice at the beginning of the industrial age cannot be compared in any way with today's social justice, equality and security, it cannot be denied that the incredible social wealth has its origins in technological development. Even a foe of capitalism like Karl Marx had to acknowledge this without envy. Although he was antagonistic towards the capitalist system, he never denied its incredible productivity, but rather paid tribute to it.

It was industrial production that first made mass production on the assembly line, “just in time” and on an unimaginable scale possible; today in its fourth iteration, the industrial revolution 4.0. Less than a century ago, Fordism made it possible for even the average worker to afford a car. Industrial production enabled an exponential increase in productivity, which on the one hand multiplied production volumes and on the other hand caused production costs to fall rapidly. This is how we are able to produce billions of smartphones today, which, in terms of efficiency and computing power, even outperform the high-performance computers of NASA that were used for the moon landing. Or to put it another way: technological progress through Fordist production has created wealth worldwide and raised the standard of living globally, but – and this is also part of the truth – it has not completely eradicated poverty.

Technical progress has made people more efficient. It has increased their work performance many times over, and at regular intervals. But: technology and progress remained instruments of man and an appendage of his work. Technology improved people instead of replacing them. This is also shown by the increasing demand for human labor worldwide.

In previous technological revolutions, technology has always served to make people more efficient, expand their abilities and increase their productivity. From mechanical looms to steam engines to computer-assisted work processes, the role of technology has been to optimize human work, not replace it. The human being has always been at the center, and technology has been the tool that helped them accomplish more complex tasks faster and with greater precision.

However, with the development of artificial general intelligence, humanity is entering a new technological age. AGI represents a fundamental departure from previous mechanisms, as it aims not only to make humans more productive, but to replace them in many ways. AGI is capable of solving complex problems, recognizing connections and making decisions independently that were previously only accessible to the human intellect. This ability means that AGI can replace humans not only as assistants, but also as workers in many areas, since it works more precisely, faster and with fewer errors than any human being when performing specific tasks.

This qualitative change will be even more profound when you consider that AGI is increasingly being linked to robotics. There are already signs in automation today that suggest that physical work traditionally performed by blue-collar workers can increasingly be automated. Once artificial intelligence is able to control robotic systems, mechanical units could perform activities such as construction, maintenance or logistics more efficiently and without human intervention. This simulates and exceeds the capabilities and range of human activities in a way that seemed unthinkable just a few decades ago. And it is modern AI that has helped it to make the necessary breakthrough.

AGI is thus fundamentally changing the world of work. It is not just a tool that relieves people of work, but could replace them altogether in many occupations. This opens up new perspectives on the role of people in society and the meaning of work – and it raises fundamental questions about the shape of the future economy and the self-understanding of human productivity.

This is the qualitative change we are facing, and it is often not understood. For the first time in human history, technology is making humans not more efficient, but completely replaceable! It is making humans economically redundant!

In a world with AGI, work becomes a voluntary activity and form of expression rather than an economic necessity. People might devote themselves to work because they feel the need to create something of their own, be it art, crafts or intellectual projects. Just as people today might work with wood or garden purely for the joy of it, work in a post-AGI society could also be a creative expression of being, free from the pressure of having to earn a living from it.

At this point, it should be noted that in discussions about the post-labor society, I am often referred to the argument that competition and the urge for profit are said to be inherent in human nature. To put it bluntly: there is no such thing as human nature per se, and this is also the state of sociological science, which deals with the question of what kind of social and cultural being humans are. Man is a creature that is structured and shaped by its social circumstances. And admittedly, there are also genetic predispositions. However, this does not allow us to derive a natural or biological interpretation of a human-natural competitive creature. Man is as much a competitive creature socially as he is a cooperative creature. Man can be both, and neither is inherent in him. Man is an intelligent being and seeks out the type of work and collaboration that is most beneficial for him. However, the question of how work is done is a social question and not a biological one!

The complete integration of AGI into the economy raises the question of whether the market economy is still relevant in its current form. If humans no longer have to create value because machines do it for them, the principle of supply and demand based on scarcity loses its importance. An alternative model could be based on a universal basic income (UBI) financed by the high productivity gains of AGI. Another possibility would be a wage-free economy, in which production costs approach zero and goods and services are available for free or almost free of charge. Even at the risk of antagonizing some libertarians: money as a means of distributing scarce resources could also go down in history as a historical medium. Without scarcity, there is no need for distribution. And that would make the implementation of a UBI obsolete, which enables the distribution of scarce resources by means of money. (This example in particular illustrates the unpredictability of the future mentioned above).

In such a system, economic activity could be based on cooperation and demand optimization instead of competition and profit maximization. People would be freed from existential constraints and would have the freedom to invest their time in creative, social or charitable projects. Competition could become a relic of the past when artificial intelligence improves and optimizes itself in the future. From then on, people could cooperate instead of competing, because progress is driven not only by competition but above all by cooperation. But things can also turn out differently, and it turns out that competition between AGI entities is a productive form of knowledge generation. All I'm saying is that anything is possible! Nothing is predetermined, the future is completely open, contingent as they say in science. Freed from the necessity of gainful employment, people would be able to fully develop their potential in creative, artistic or spiritual fields – a freedom that was previously reserved for utopian pipe dreams in books like Thomas More's Utopia.

The advent of the age of AGI challenges us to question fundamental concepts about the role of labor and market mechanisms. In earlier forms of society, the market economy served to efficiently distribute scarce resources, often under the principle of competition. But if AGI and robotics take over all productive work, the question arises as to whether competition is still meaningful or necessary at all. AI could completely relieve humans of work and thus create a system in which prosperity is achievable for all, without anyone having to work for a living. What's more, competition as a component of social coexistence should be philosophically questioned and not a priori accepted as second nature to humans, so to speak.

An economic model could then be based on cooperation and exploration – a vision already hinted at in fictional utopias like Star Trek, in which people no longer work to survive but to learn, discover and fulfill themselves. 

These perspectives suggest that we are moving towards a profound change not only economically, but also culturally, in which the old definition of work and the market takes on a completely new meaning.

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