Will autonomous Cars replacing drivers? Millions of Americans make a living by driving trucks, delivery vans, taxis and ride-hailing cars. When technology takes the wheel, what will happen to their livelihoods? That question is growing more urgent as the advent of self-driving vehicles accelerates. Major companies like Ford, Volvo and Tesla Motors have introduced concrete plans. In Singapore, autonomous taxis are already on city streets, and Uber’s first fleet hits Pittsburgh in August 2016. There are predictions range of major unemployment and economic collapse to utopian views of new job categories, increased efficiency, and dramatic decreases in deaths and injuries from vehicle crashes. Elon Musk, CEO of Tesla, said that this new technology …show more content…
As most drivers know autonomous cars are coming; it’s just a matter of when. There will be one day where robots take over the driving business, but it won’t happen within a few minutes. It will happen slowly enough for drivers to adapt and find other ways to earn money. Studies show that majority of Lyft and Uber drivers work part time. Many drivers already plan to transition to other work, as the price cuts by Uber and Lyft have hurt their income. Although, many are finding an alternative way to make money, there are still some people believe that robots still got a long way to go before it can replace them. Some commercial truck drivers believe that robots still got time before it can drive an 80,000 pound machine at 80 miles per hour. Driving a truck is not a simple task, unless the autonomous trucks have their own special lanes on highway. The director of advanced engineering for Daimler, the world’s leading truck manufacturer, have a different opinion. He said this new technology could help attract younger drivers, who are badly needed in an industry that saw a shortage of 48,000 drivers in 2015, according to the American Trucking Association. Drivers are aging rapidly, are nearing
However, when using Uber taxi services, the hassle of getting transportation to your next destination is decreased dramatically, compared to a typical taxi service. With the touch of a smartphone, people are able to order a cab to arrive at their precise location in no time at all compared to all of the other taxis. My personal experiences with Uber have been great and would choose Uber over taxis at any time. Uber drivers have offered to charge my phone, play music of my choice, and feel secure. The biggest portion of the population that is against Uber, happens to be taxi cab drivers who have lost business to the fast growing service. If taxi cab drivers would migrate to driving for Uber than their taxi, they would most likely see increases in wages as well. Unfortunately, not all cab drivers can make the transition as the cab service may be their own, or they do not have a vehicle to being transporting people (a vehicle is required in order to qualify as an Uber driver). In order to continue to grow as a community, we must learn to adapt to new technology. Many people had second thought about the internet being created, and now most people use it every
Major incumbent companies expect that the autonomous driving systems will be ready for the market in five years. This may be optimistic, but by 2050, cars that drive themselves could well be major production units for companies like General Motors. GM first revealed in 2010 that it had been working on self-driving cars[1]. Last year, GM demonstrated that the prototypes can follow the pace of traffic, while allowing the driver to have his hands off the steering wheel.
As mentioned earlier, seventy-five percent of truck drivers are above the age of 35 with majority of them being in their fifties (Rafter). This makes it difficult for the young truck drivers to match the wisdom and seasoned driving experience of veteran drivers. The government should recognize the truck driving profession as an official skilled trade and companies should help train new generations of recruits for their trucking business. Furthermore, building a partnership with driving schools is viewed as a good initiative for hiring and recruitment of new truck drivers (Husley). Many companies in the transportation industry should employ this strategy as a solution for the truck driver shortage, where they can easily recruit newly licensed truck drivers for employment.
With driverless cars becoming more and more of a possibility in the near future, it has brought up questions about how it will affect our economy, as well as the jobs of the public. Uber drivers, truck drivers, cab drivers’ jobs are at risk along with the companies that provide them. Many industries may also be affected. There are an approximate “1.8 million heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers in the U.S. earning a median income of $40,260 per year” (Bureau of Labor Statistics). 1.8 million people may seem like a small number compared to the 318.9 million individuals living in the U.S., but it will have a large effect on those drivers when they have to find a new job to support themselves
Self-driving cars are now hitting a few roadways in America, and are showing people just a small glimpse into what could be the future of automobiles. Although Google’s self-driving cars are getting a lot of attention now, the idea of a self-driving car has been around for quite a while actually. These cars have been tested to their limits, but the American people have yet to adopt the technology into their everyday lives. A brief description of their history, how they work, and finally answer the question, will self-driving cars ever be adopted widely by the American public?
Driverless Cars Vs Auto Insurance New technology emerges every day in today’s world of computers and innovation. While new technology has the ability to make life easier for consumers it can also cause harm to some traditional industries. One of the industries that are currently in danger of becoming extinct is the auto insurance industry. With the development of new self-driving cars this puts auto insurers in danger of becoming obsolete if they do not adapt to the changes that are already beginning in the auto industry.
Again, it makes the headlines; an older driver causes a dangerous automobile crash. As the amount of elderly driving has increased in the past decade, the risk for others to be out on the road has increased. In 2012, there were 36 million licensed older drivers in the United States. (Federal Highway Administration, Department of Transportation (US)) As a 34% increase from 1999, it has been noted that seniors are driving past their ability by an average of 10 years. (Federal Highway Administration, Department of Transportation (US)). Elderly continue to drive despite the prominent physiological changes that worsen as they age. The amount of automobile collisions suggests that prevention must occur in order to make the roads safer. By examining older drivers’ medical complications, older drivers must be retested to be able to drive a vehicle.
But are they safe? On March 24 2017, an Uber autonomous car was involved with a 3 way crash in Tempe Arizona. With no serious injuries, everyone walked away with a few bruises and cuts from the Uber’s overturned car; but the accident had nothing to do with a “glitch” or a “compilation error” but instead a distracted driver trying to merge and side swiping the Autonomous suv. This and Google’s accident (One of their self driving lexus SUV’s cars drove slowly into a bus {2 mph kek}) have cast a shadow that AV (autonomous vehicles) are “unsafe” and “computers can't do what a human can” that's been dampening their reputation and slowing their development on making them safer, even though, statistically, there 70% more efficient than a human driver.
Roughly one and half million Americans are working in the trucking industry. It is one of the last well-paying job markets still available to people without a college education. But self-driving technology could replace some of those workers and it could happen soon. To make the trucking industry more cost-effective and labor-saving, many different companies have been researching to find a solution for many years. One of the cargo truck companies that focus on producing fully autonomous trucks is OTTO.
Companies like Google, Tesla and Nissan, among others, have announced over the past few years that their companies are trying to develop self-driving or autonomous cars [Ref. 1 and 2]. Self-driving cars can provide many benefits to the average consumer. Studies have shown that because computers can react and process information many times faster than a human being, crashes on streets and roads can be decreased with quick and consistent evasion maneuvers by the autonomous car. They can also help maximize fuel economy by calculating the most direct and fastest routes. When the driving of an autonomous car demonstrates that the computer can safely and reliably transport the passengers to their destination, this frees up the passengers to do other things that they would not normally be able to do if they were driving the car manually. For this reason, self-driving cars can help maximize productivity of their passengers.
Did you know that we could be saving over 160 billion dollars on gas and time wasted on traffic if we switched over to self driving cars? Self driving cars could be the future of our cars, because we will pay less for thing we usually buy for the cars, we could save time to our destination, and we will send less people to the emergency room. First off, we will pay less for things we usually buy for our cars. Self driving cars may be electric which you will save money on by not buying gas instead by using electric, we already spend way too much money on gas so if we have the electric cars it would be cheaper. (USAToday, 2016)
This decision by Tesla has made a turning point in the race to develop the fully autonomous vehicles. This is a challenging game. This decision of the company involves some remarkable milestones.
Technology is evolving faster than ever these days, however there is one technology that could revolutionize the transportation industry. This technology is called autonomous cars, also known as self-driving cars. Autonomous cars can be defined as a vehicle that is capable of sensing its environment, and navigating without human input. Using different techniques such as GPS and radar, autonomous cars can detect surroundings, thus removing the human element in driving. This would have a positive effect in more ways than we could ever imagine. Research suggests that self-driving cars will become more abundant in the future because they will be more cost-effective, enhance safety, and decrease traffic congestion.
The engineering that goes into a driverless car covers all areas of mechanics, computing software and so on which still tends to frighten some drivers of its monstrosity on the inside. In the article “Google Cars Becoming Safer: Let the Robots Drive” it states that, “The economic lift from ridding the roads of human-driven vehicles would be over $190 billion per year. That would primarily come from reducing property damage caused by low-speed collisions”(Salkever). The point is that when driverless cars hit the road the cost of low-speed collision and save consumers money will be reduced. In the article “ Google Driverless Cars Run Into Problem: Cars With Drivers” Slakever states that “One Google car, in a test in 2009, couldn’t get through a four-way stop because its sensors kept waiting for other (human) drivers to stop completely and let it go. The human drivers kept inching forward, looking for the advantage — paralyzing Google’s robot”(Bosker). Current drivers have never followed the rule of the road, which have made the road more prone to any accident. Drivers have found the upper hand on not following traffic laws that makes manufacturing driverless car more meticulous to decrease accidents and breaking traffic laws. The fact that driverless car sensors can detect the errors of other human driven car is extraordinary. Human driven cars are trying to stick to the status quo of the roads when in reality human driven cars are breaking valuable innovation that will make the roads safe for generations to
For example, the self-driving car fleet from Uber is already under active development and testing in Pittsburg. Competitiveness with Google Translate and Apple Siri show promise with language learning. With improvements in computer vision and legged locomotion, robots for unstructured environments become practical; these might include agricultural and service settings and helping humans (especially the elderly and infirm) with domestic chores. Finally, as machines improve their grasp of language, search engines and "personal assistants" on mobile phones will change from indexing web pages to understanding web pages, leading to qualitative improvements in their ability to answer questions, synthesize new information, offer advice, and connect the dots. AI may also have a substantial impact on areas of science, such as systems biology, where the complexity and volume of information challenges human abilities. (Russell,