This is a clip from a conversation with Kai-Fu Lee on the Artificial Intelligence podcast. You can watch the full conversation here: http://bit.ly/2ZxznpQ If you enjoy these, consider subscribing, sharing, and commenting below.

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Kai-Fu Lee is the Chairman and CEO of Sinovation Ventures that manages a 2 billion dollar dual currency investment fund with a focus on developing the next generation of Chinese high-tech companies. He is the former President of Google China and the founder of what is now called Microsoft Research Asia, an institute that trained many of the AI leaders in China, including CTOs or AI execs at Baidu, Tencent, Alibaba, Lenovo, and Huawei. He was named one of the 100 most influential people in the world by TIME Magazine. He is the author of seven best-selling books in Chinese, and most recently the New York Times best seller called AI Superpowers: China, Silicon Valley, and the New World Order.

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I'm not sure if you're familiar with Andrew Yang.

So there's a candidate for president of the United States whose platform, Andrew Yang, is based in part around job loss due to automation and also in addition, the need perhaps of universal basic income to support jobs that are folks who lose their job due to automation.

So what are your thoughts about his concerns, him as a candidate, his ideas in general?

I think his thinking is generally in the right direction, but his approach as a presidential candidate may be a little bit ahead of the time.

I think the displacements will happen, but will they happen soon enough for people to agree to vote for him?

The unemployment numbers are not very high yet and I think you know he and I have the same challenge.

If I want to theoretically convince people this is an issue and he wants to become the president, people have to see how can this be the case when unemployment numbers are low.

I do agree with him on the displacement issue.

So people need to be incented, not by just giving a monthly $2,000 check or $1,000 check and do whatever they want because they don't have the know-how to know what to retrain to go into what type of a job.

And retraining is needed because historically when technology revolutions, when routine jobs were displaced, new routine jobs came up.

But with AI and automation, the whole point is replacing all routine jobs eventually.

And AI will create jobs, but it won't create routine jobs because if it creates routine jobs, why wouldn't AI just do it?

So therefore, the people who are losing the jobs are losing routine jobs.

The jobs that are becoming available are non-routine jobs.

So the social stipend needs to be put in place is for the routine workers who lost their jobs to be retrained and Then take on a job that will last for that person's lifetime


Speaker 0: I'm not sure if you're familiar with Andrew Yang.

Speaker 1: Yes, I am.

Speaker 0: So there's a candidate for president of the United States whose platform, Andrew Yang, is based in part around job loss due to automation and also in addition, the need perhaps of universal basic income to support jobs that are folks who lose their job due to automation. So what are your thoughts about his concerns, him as a candidate, his ideas in general?

Speaker 1: I think his thinking is generally in the right direction, but his approach as a presidential candidate may be a little bit ahead of the time. I think the displacements will happen, but will they happen soon enough for people to agree to vote for him? The unemployment numbers are not very high yet and I think you know he and I have the same challenge. If I want to theoretically convince people this is an issue and he wants to become the president, people have to see how can this be the case when unemployment numbers are low. So that is the challenge.

I do agree with him on the displacement issue. I think the main issue is retraining. So people need to be incented, not by just giving a monthly $2,000 check or $1,000 check and do whatever they want because they don't have the know-how to know what to retrain to go into what type of a job. And guidance is needed. And retraining is needed because historically when technology revolutions, when routine jobs were displaced, new routine jobs came up.

But with AI and automation, the whole point is replacing all routine jobs eventually. And AI will create jobs, but it won't create routine jobs because if it creates routine jobs, why wouldn't AI just do it? So therefore, the people who are losing the jobs are losing routine jobs. The jobs that are becoming available are non-routine jobs. So the social stipend needs to be put in place is for the routine workers who lost their jobs to be retrained and Then take on a job that will last for that person's lifetime

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Andrew Yang is Ahead of His Time - Kai-Fu Lee | AI Podcast Clips