Who’s at the wheel?
Isn’t there anyone left in the world with any common sense? If the Pentagon and our politicians’ computers can be been hacked, what makes anyone think the computers in cars and semi-trucks won’t be?
Can you imagine driving down a street with your kids in the car and a semi is coming along from the other direction, when someone hacks into the semi’s driving system and steers it into your car?
Not everything in the world needs to be computerized. I think computerization of everything creates disasters and will lead to an even greater loss of jobs. Just who does corporate American think will buy their products made in China when no one has a job anymore? Shirley Conley Gardena
White working class voters are understandably nervous about their future as they see their livelihoods diminished by globalization and automation. Neither political party, if elected to office, is going to arrest the march of time and restore lost, obsolete jobs. I believe Donald Trump, promising to “make America great again,” implies the restoration of white workers’ primacy over those of color and immigrants. This drives the growing cohort of non-white and immigrant voters to Hillary Clinton.
If elected, as appears likely, Clinton and the Democrats had better deliver relief to white working class voters, or they'll be replaced by a less flawed, non-racist Republican candidate who will gain African American and Hispanic voters next time.
While obsolescent jobs eventually will disappear, America still has much work to do, rebuilding and modernizing its antiquated, crumbling infrastructure, and better educating its future workforce. Government can be indispensable in accomplishing both.
The best way to “make America great again” is to return to the more redistributive tax policy of the past and invest those revenues in our infrastructure and in educating all of our children so that they can have a fair chance to succeed in the economy of the future. Frank King Coronado
If history is any guide, self-driving trucks will leave blue collar jobs behind. This is what happened to telephone operators when the automated switchboard was introduced and practically every other form of automation. This also raises a question: Why isn't technology developed to help people instead of displacing them, especially since much of it is financed on the taxpayers' dime? Steve Varalyay Torrance
It's worth noting that fully autonomous trucks will create higher paying jobs while reducing the lifestyle burdens of truckers.
I see the trucker of the future as an autonomous logistics officer — who will manage the fleets from a remote command center in multiple shifts a day. Companies that own and operate the fleet of autonomous trucks will see increased efficiencies and lower costs as the trucks will now be able to operate 24 hours a day, seven days a week.
While the autonomous truck logistics officer focuses on logistics, the autonomous truck is focused on driving and safety. An autonomous truck has a much faster reaction time compared to a driver. This reaction time will increase safety on the roads for all individuals. Grayson Brulte Beverly Hills
Author Steven Greenhouse has added more proof that the great job killer in the U.S. is not higher taxes, not China — but technology. Uber, the “friend” to people looking to make a few bucks with their spare time and cars will now add to the ranks of robots on the assembly line and in warehouses to put more Americans out of work.
Of course Greenhouse’s “silver lining” is his fantasy that there will be ample public sector jobs to absorb all of the out-of-work drivers. Greenhouse’s good news is that people will have more spare time in driverless cars to take care of their daily tasks. Many will have to use the time to look through the want ads. Joe Braun Los Angeles
Hanson himself or the Trump supporters he claims to represent are ill-informed: holding antiscience, anti-intellectual views that present easy or half-baked solutions to complex problems, blaming whoever else they want to scapegoat for their current lot in life. Is that not victimization?
I wonder if they ever felt the same concern for those “others” who have always felt and experienced little “recognition or credit,” and have always experienced the negative and real effects of “white privilege” that these Trump supporters are supposedly going through now? Chris Fite Spring Valley, Calif.
As a first generation Mexican American, born and raised in Texas through no fault of mine, I am responding to Hanson’s assertion that 2nd and 3rd generation Mexican Americans hardly speak Spanish and don’t have the same values as their parents and grand-parents. Gee, I wonder how they were able to co-exist in the same home and communicate their issues on a daily basis? I think Trump’s view of Mexicans, including Mexican Americans, has a bona fide racist undertone. It is only subtle to those who do not have a grasp on reality.
Every ethnic group that has come to America from somewhere else feels that way at one time or another. If we would all honor the word equality, maybe we would not be in this hateful political climate. Homer Alba Glendale
This op-ed on Trump supporters in California was about as perfect a representation as possible of how Donald Trump has been running for president the past two years. Like many of Trump's speeches, it begins by talking about the huge numbers of Trump supporters in California (although few could be found to provide an actual quote in the piece).
It then defines who the very-scary “they” are (elites, bureaucrats, firstgeneration Mexican immigrants) and who the real Californians are (practical, muscular, working-class miners, apparently).
Much like Trump's campaign, throughout the piece I see a strong reliance on what feels true (rising crime, serial terrorist attacks) as opposed to the actual truth. Tyler Bonstead Los Angeles
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I also am a 5th generation Californian, but I have a very different world view than the conservative Hanson, who is a fellow for the Hoover Institution. As for the Trump voters, Trump has offered no rational working plan to solve any of the problems of the poor working whites, or any of the many problems Hanson say California has. That they are ignorant of that fact proves to me that they are “ill informed.” Alex Magdaleno Camarillo
I have never understood people who whine about how they hate their state but do nothing to change their deplorable condition. Our left-wing legislature has never passed a law requiring you to stay. There is no “really beautiful wall” surrounding the state keeping you here.
To paraphrase the conservative icon Ronald Reagan, you can vote with your feet. Many people say that there are millions and millions of very, very, very great jobs in red states waiting for you. So, disgruntled inland Californians, load up that car, truck or mini-van tomorrow and hit the wide-open highway. No one is stopping you. Believe me. John Spadafore Palm Springs