Are you a young man who drives for a living? Do you drive a bus? A truck? A taxi? Think you’ll still have that job by the time you’re 40? Not if Mercedes Benz has its way, you won’t. And if they somehow fail, there’s always Nissan, and Audi, and Google, and IBM…

According to the automotive industry, self-driving cars will be in production by 2020. A few weeks ago, Mercedes-Benz drove (heh, heh) their point home by sending their S500 Intelligent Drive research vehicle on a 103 km trip and making it through without knocking down any light posts or flattening any cats. And this is just the start, it is predicted that within a decade or two such vehicles will be safer than those driven by humans!

It may seem cool, the idea of a self-driving car, but think of how many jobs will be lost once these technologies are perfected and implemented in vehicles other than the family car. In the U.S alone, over 3 million people drive trucks for a living, and that’s not counting all the bus drivers and taxi drivers. That’s a lot of people who will be out of a job within twenty years. Though the cars are predicted to become fully viable somewhat sooner than that, about ten years from now, it will probably take a few years more for people to become comfortable with the idea of driverless juggernauts tearing around their streets. But how long will that reluctance last once we start getting hit with study after study showing that thanks to sensors, radar and numerous safety features, the new self-driving taxis and trucks are actually safer than the ones driven by actual humans? And unlike a taxi driver I once hired, autonomous vehicles aren’t likely to be shouting at other drivers “Where did ya get ya drivin’ licence? I should slit ya throat, ya fucking cunt!”

No, that will be my job…

Take another step into The Coming Darkness here.