You speak like they would have to do something 'aggressive'. If you can achieve a circular economy, where robots produce products for the benefit of a lucky few who can live off of their investments (in the robots), then the rest of the population will 'naturally' go away.

You might say "but why not use just 1% of that GDP on making sure the rest of humanity lives in at least minimal comfort"? But clearly -- we already choose not to do that today. 1% of the GDP of the developed world would be more than enough to solve many horrifying problems in the developing world -- what we actually give is a far smaller fraction, and ultimately not enough.

The Davos class was highly concerned about ecology before Davos was even a thing. In America, their minions (the “coastie” class) are coming to see the liquidation of the kulaks as perhaps not such a bad thing. If it devolves into a “let them eat cake” scenario, one has to wonder how things will play out in “proles vs robot pinkertons”. Watch what the sonic crowd control trucks did in Serbia last week.

Of course there is always the issue of “demand”—of keeping the factories humming, but when you are worth billions, your immediate subordinates are worth hundreds of millions, and all of their subordinates are worth a few million, maybe you come to a point where “lebensraum” becomes more valuable to you than another zero at the end of your balance?

When AI replaces the nerds (in progress), they become excess biomass. Not talking about a retarded hollywood-style apocalypse. Economic uncertainty is more than enough to suppress breeding in many populations. “not with a bang, but a whimper”

If you know any of “them”, you will know that “they” went to the same elite prep schools, live in the same cities, intermarry, etc. The “equality” nonsense is just a lie to numb the proles. In 2025 we have a full-blown hereditary nobility.

edit: answer to ianfeust6:

The West is not The World. There are over a billion Chinese, Indians, Africans…

Words mean things. Who said tree hugger? If you are an apex predator living in an increasingly cloudy tank, there is an obvious solution to the cloudyness.