ClaimsScott Alexander

“There will not be a Truckpocalypse before 2023.”

Scott Alexander, blogger (2018 prediction) 2018 Grading My 2018 Predictions For 2023 (Astral Codex Ten) archived copy

Prediction AI, the economy and work

There will not be a 'Truckpocalypse' before 2023.

Resolved true The record shows it happened or was so.

Prediction: Statements about events outside the person's control, checked once they fell due: did they come true?

The second judge would not resolve this claim; the verdict shown is the first judge's.

What would count as true or false

A 'Truckpocalypse' means large-scale loss of truck-driving jobs to autonomous or driverless trucks (mass unemployment of truck drivers caused by automation). The horizon is 31 December 2022. TRUE: through 2022, US truck driver employment (for example BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers) shows no large automation-driven fall from 2018 levels, and driverless trucks were in no more than limited pilot or commercial testing use. MOSTLY TRUE: no Truckpocalypse happened, but there was some measurable, localized job displacement attributable to autonomous trucks. MIXED: there is credible evidence of significant but not mass displacement that observers dispute as a 'Truckpocalypse'. MOSTLY FALSE: substantial automation-driven job losses began before 2023 but fell short of a full collapse. FALSE: before 2023, autonomous trucks displaced a large share of truck drivers (for example a double-digit percentage fall in employment attributed to automation).

Set before the research began.

Evidence (4)

  1. E1 Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2022 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics · 25 April 2023

    “| Employment (1) | Employment RSE (3) | Mean hourly wage | Mean annual wage (2) | Wage RSE (3) | |---|---|---|---|---| | 1,984,180 | 0.9 % | $ 25.52 | $ 53,090 | 0.3 % |”

  2. E2 Occupational Employment and Wages, May 2018 U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics · 29 March 2019

    “| Employment (1) | Employment RSE (3) | Mean hourly wage | Mean annual wage (2) | Wage RSE (3) | |---|---|---|---|---| | 1,800,330 | 0.6 % | $21.91 | $45,570 | 0.2 % |”

  3. E3 Will Automation Reduce Trucking Jobs? Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis (Open Vault blog) · 10 August 2022

    “Companies such as FedEx and TuSimple have been testing their new self-driving feature on semitrailers in the Southwestern U.S. for the past two years.”

  4. E4 Progress in 2022: Pilots, product updates, and more Aurora (autonomous trucking company) · 21 December 2022

    “made important advances toward the launch of our commercial autonomous trucking service, Aurora Horizon, by the end of 2024.”

Reasoning

BLS Occupational Employment and Wages pages for occupation code 53-3032 (heavy and tractor-trailer truck drivers) show employment of 1,800,330 in May 2018 [E2] and 1,984,180 in May 2022 [E1]. That is a rise, not a fall driven by automation. In August 2022, the St. Louis Fed described self-driving semitrailers as still in testing [E3]. In December 2022, Aurora said it was still working toward launching a commercial autonomous trucking service by the end of 2024 [E4], so driverless trucks were limited to pilots and testing through 2022. No Truckpocalypse happened before 2023.

Cite this claim

Scott Alexander, “There will not be a 'Truckpocalypse' before 2023.” (said 2018). Verdict: resolved true. Reliability API, claim c_0502637b321b, method 0.1.0+8bea457b, dataset release v1.1.2. https://epistacklabs.com/claims/c_0502637b321b

This claim is in dataset release v1.1.2, with the same verdict.

Reply to this claim

For Scott Alexander, or someone speaking for them: a correction or counter-evidence. Replies are read before anything is shown; an approved reply shows your name, role, date, statement and link. Your email address is never shown and is deleted 30 days after the decision (privacy).

More prediction claims by Scott Alexander

  1. Resolved true Prediction 15 February 2018
    “Technological unemployment will continue to be a topic of academic debate that might show up if you crunch the numbers just right, but there will be no obvious sign that it is happening on a large…”

    Through 2023, there will be no obvious sign that technological unemployment is happening on a large scale.

  2. Mostly true Prediction 3 April 2025
    “Our scenario focuses on coding in particular because we think coding is what starts the intelligence explosion.”

    The authors of the scenario think coding is what will start the intelligence explosion.

  3. Mostly true Prediction 3 April 2025
    “We expect that as the AI labs become more capable, they tell the government about this because they want government contracts, they want government support.”

    In the AI 2027 scenario, as AI labs become more capable they tell the government, seeking government contracts and support.

  4. Mostly true Prediction 3 April 2025
    “In our scenario, that starts with cyber warfare, the government sees that these AIs are now as capable as the best human hackers, but can be deployed at humongous scale.”

    In the AI 2027 scenario, the government sees via cyber warfare that AIs are as capable as the best human hackers but deployable at huge scale.

  5. Resolved true Prediction 3 April 2025
    “So they become extremely interested and they discuss nationalizing the AI companies.”

    In the AI 2027 scenario, the government becomes extremely interested in AI and discusses nationalizing the AI companies.

All of them

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