Whether or not you are attracted by Andrew Yang’s run for the presidential Democratic nomination, he has some ideas about the future of America that bear evaluation.

Yang is a progressive who backs UBI (“Universal Basic Income”), which he has labeled a Freedom Dividend. This would provide a payment for every American over eighteen of $1,000 per month. While UBI has both advocates and critics, the topic has led to a greater discussion of what the minimum floor should be for the less-advantaged in a country as prosperous as ours.

Yet his platform is not all about the money. Yang also advocates for “Human Centered Capitalism.” We don’t live in a pure capitalist system. We have protections against business abuses, programs to feed the poor, rights for the disadvantaged. Yang points out that human well-being is more important than only money. Thus, the focus should not be merely on economic metrics in dollars, but also on maximizing human welfare—e.g., health, free time, family, community.

These ideas are not unique, but Yang has come to his beliefs in a different way. He sees the rapid growth of technology as capable for both good and bad. Wired magazine indicates “His whole message is premised on the dangers of automation taking away jobs and the risks of artificial intelligence.”

Not everyone agrees. An article in the Libertarian magazine Reason correctly notes that the U.S. has accommodated technology advances in the past, from the introduction of the horseless carriage to the rise of a computerized world. “Even disruptive economic change unfolds at a pace to which we can generally adapt.”

The difference between Yang and pure capitalists is found by evaluating “displacement.” Free marketers can correctly point out that, at least today, for every job lost through automation there are other jobs available. Yang’s position, in contrast, is akin to saying that it is unreasonable to expect the Appalachian coal miner to move himself and his family into the big city for a new job.

Yang’s advocacy for “human capitalism” recognizes that overall numbers like Gross National Product don’t mean much to the thousands of former automobile and steel workers who have moved from lives of dignity to lives of just-getting-by. According to the American Enterprise Institute, a ton of American steel required ten man-hours to produce in 1980. In 2017 in took 1.5 man-hours. That is great for industry as a whole, and not so great for the steel worker out of a job. Yes, disruption always happens, but what are we going to do to minimize its adverse effects on some of our fellow citizens? Our political position is and must be something beyond we don’t care?

A study by McKinsey Global Institute provides perspective on the two sides of the automation coin. Between now and 2030:

Millions of jobs could be phased out even as new ones are created. More broadly, the day-to-day nature of work could change for nearly everyone as intelligent machines become fixtures in the American workplace.

Thus, if we are speaking of net jobs lost, the future may be okay. If we are speaking of even greater displacement, the future looks bleak.

Yang has a different take on the 2016 election than most. Explanations for how Donald Trump became President include social media, false equivalence, Russia, an email server, and Clinton campaign stumbles, plus a bit of xenophobia. From the Reason article, Yang says:

Donald Trump is our president for one simple reason: We automated away 4 million manufacturing jobs in Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Missouri, Iowa, all of the swing states that Donald Trump needed to win.

Today, we see the beginnings of the next set of disruptions. Self-driving cars are becoming a reality (displacing cab drivers). Retail stores are employing self-checkout lines (displacing clerks). Restaurants have started to employ robots to prepare food (displacing fast food workers). Even the lower rungs of the employment ladder are being affected by these changes that are now underway or will soon be.

The McKinsey study estimates the percentage of workers that will be displaced for various job categories. For their 2030 “midpoint” scenario—neither overly optimistic or pessimistic—some of the larger impacts are as follows:

Bookkeeping, accounting, & auditing clerks 49%

Cooks, restaurant 47%

Stock clerks and order fillers 46%

Office clerks, general 34%

Secretaries & administrative assistants 30%

While McKinsey addresses the year 2030, technology and automation will not be stopping at that point. What else will be coming down the pike in the two or three decades after that? We can make a couple illustrative projections.

For highway construction, once the initial design is set, robotic earth movers will be faster and better at leveling the ground, laying the asphalt, and painting the lane lines. Machines should be able to install roof shingles quickly and accurately. The walls of new homes can be assembled with precision by on-site robots.

Trucking will become self-driving. The American Trucking Association states that in 2018 there were 3.5 million truck drivers. What will they do when robots replace them? Perhaps they could become taxi drivers, or retail clerks, or a fast food cooks, but wait, those jobs will be disappearing, too. (The total number of full-time employees in the U.S. is about 130 million.)

The simple conclusion is that we cannot take a pure free market approach to the disruption that accelerating technology provides. Will enough of the American public and our elected officials recognize this? We can assess the question by evaluating how decisions of earth-shaking impact on American lives have been addressed in the past.

In the 1970’s, economists knew that the U.S. was changing from a manufacturing economy to a service economy, but little was done to affect the steel, automotive, textile, and other manufacturing industries. Pockets of despair developed even while the country as a whole was advancing.

In current times, many continue to have their heads in the sand about climate change, while cities like Miami are increasingly flooded.

Given these two examples, the prospects for proactively addressing the widespread adoption of robotics and automation appear dismal.

In that pessimistic scenario, the robot revolution will result in continued and growing disparity between economic winners and losers. Some workers will have high-paid, successful jobs, while others will be at an even lower rung with low-paid, menial jobs, or no job at all.

Yet an opportunity exists for robotics and automation to be a “happy problem.” The issue can be addressed in a way that turns into an opportunity, the lemon turned into lemonade. In that more optimistic future, since robots can do even more work for us, we humans have the potential for more leisure time for our friends and family, for volunteering in our community, for the Jeffersonian ideal of “the pursuit of happiness.” But this occurs only if we live in a culture where the difference between rich and poor is based on equitable standards of decency. (This is not the same as “equal.” It is not socialism.)

In this future world, with robots making our lives better on an overall basis, is there a way for some to not be left behind? One way to look at this is to evaluate which of these outcomes is best for the country as a whole:

· Out of every three workers who want a job, two work a standard 40-hour week and one is unemployed.

· Out of every three workers who want a job, all three work a new standard baseline of 30 hours.

The latter provides a job for all who want it, and also provides the benefit of more free time for family, community, and outside activities. Depending on which scenario occurs, robotics potentially can lead to a happier life for all, or significant disruption for some.

Nowhere does it say that a 40-hour work week is carved in stone. The 60 hour-plus work week came under pressure in the 1800’s. Henry Ford adopted a 40 hour work week for his employees in 1926. This level was legislated by Congress by actions in 1938 and 1940, which stipulated that overtime pay was required for hourly workers once 40 hours was reached. (Many non-hourly professionals today work well beyond 40 hours per week, especially with the constant connectivity from cell phones and email.)

In a future world of massive robotics, there may be no need for humans to work as much as currently, just as was the case from the Industrial Revolution over a century ago. This is not the only approach for making our world a better place, but illustrates a type of thinking that can lead us to a better outcome.

Without this type of proactivity, we could have a Hunger Games future, where residents of the big cities have all the trappings of a utopia, while those in the outlying areas are either out of work or effectively enslaved in unfulfilling work for the benefit of the rich masters.

The better potential is for all of us to have greater leisure time, to have freedom to pursue our individual interests, and to serve our communities and our country even more broadly in ways beyond mere economic contribution.

This does not turn away from capitalism and free markets, but expands them by asking a fundamental question. What is the underlying purpose of our economic system? It is not to create winners and losers for their own sake, but to create sufficient incentives for a greater good. Our future, with appropriate planning, could achieve even further freedom in our life choices, while continuing to incentivize hard work and creativity.

Even Adam Smith, of Wealth of Nations fame, did not believe in unfettered selfishness. As a recent article reveals, this father of the free market “clearly despised greed and crony capitalism, arbitrary power and favoritism.” Our economics can survive and prosper while being even more closely coupled to concern for all of America.

These are the thoughts that come about from the Yang prophecy. Free markets coupled with protections created by regulations and social programs have always adapted to changing times, and must continue to do so especially as those changes accelerate. That ability for adapting to the situation before us is a best hope for providing what the Preamble to our Constitution indicates.

To form a more perfect Union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity.

Yang may not win the Democratic nomination, let alone become President, but his concerns about addressing robotics and automation deserve to be fully considered in the years ahead.