$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('phaster', 'i')n other words many mfg jobs are now being brought back to the USA because of advances in robot mfg technology, so in effect those low skill workers in china who displaced low skill US workers are now going to have to compete w/ robots
like it or not this world is going to change between the have and the have nots!
those who have knowledge are going to be able to leverage that ability to adapt to a world where energy is going to cost much more that the historical norms of the past 100 years
PeakOil is You
getting use to the new economic normal?
Re: getting use to the new economic normal?
by AgentR11 » Sun 15 Sep 2013, 14:31:10
This notion of "haves" really gets to the issue that its really not the 1% or even the 0.01%'ers that are the problem. Its the 20%. All the graphs that people post show a marked inflection at the 20% point, those above have done increasingly well, those below are getting hammered ever more harshly. I see this in my own work, as technology improves, my ability to control and manage more processes increases; I displace more and more man-hours every year, while I keep doing about the same 50-60/hr/wk. I don't really see this coming to a plateau any time soon, I still get 'capped' by what the tech can do; and I'm really not all THAT exceptional. Its why I think of the world the way I do, as in terms of a liege and retainer relationship between the 1%-0.01%'ers and their 20%-1% professional operators. An operator experiences our economic world very differently from the guy flipping burgers, or the 55yo that got greedy and priced himself out of the market, or even the low end salaried government paper pusher. What happens in the economy when an operator with a room full of tech displaces half the jobs in a material manufacturing plant? What happens when one dirt farmer and a tiny crew can plant, tend, harvest, and deliver 100 sq miles of corn? 1000?
Obviously the lower 80% is getting hosed, but they have to eat, they have to be entertained/distracted in some fashion.... Are there really enough valid work processes to serve the needs of the 20% to provide wage employment for the 80%? I have my doubts, and its a real conundrum; because this high end automation will only accelerate with increasingly expensive energy.
What happens to the economy if it ever gets to 10% and 90%?? Can it even function if 10% of the population crafts and delivers every need and desire of the entire population? What does just compensation look like? Income gap, poverty levels? What margins of efficiencies drive competition between skill levels of operators at that point?
Myself, I'm doing well, doing what I do. I worry about these long term trends, coupled with energy, climate, and war. And I worry about how this Elysium could come apart if the social contract fails either the 80% OR the 20%&1%. Its a very dangerous game playing out beneath the cover of excess grain calorie production, and fragility is only increasing over time.
Yes we are, as we are,
And so shall we remain,
Until the end.
And so shall we remain,
Until the end.
- AgentR11
- Light Sweet Crude
- Posts: 6589
- Joined: Tue 22 Mar 2011, 09:15:51
- Location: East Texas
Re: getting use to the new economic normal?
by americandream » Sun 15 Sep 2013, 16:40:47
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', 'T')hat's funny, the Marxist lecturing on the necessity of 'gainful employment' while paying his bills by playing the market 
What do you suggest I do. Take employment in a market that is being rapidly outsourced, knowing capitalism's propensities as I do? That would be a wise strategy for a trouble free life, would it not?
- americandream
- Permanently Banned
- Posts: 8650
- Joined: Mon 18 Oct 2004, 03:00:00
Re: getting use to the new economic normal?
by americandream » Sun 15 Sep 2013, 16:49:40
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', 'Y')es, but this completely misses my point Rock. Either you get what I'm on about or you don't. It's not about specific means of 'making a living' it's about what bullcrap it is that if people don't 'work' (be 'productive') they starve.
By and large, that bullcrap as you term it, is correct. Capitalism is a cultural mindset...those capable of living outwith that mindset are few and far between and largely on the fringe of society. More often than not as well, dependent on the social order for some form of subsidy. I should know as I spent almost a decade living a subsitence lifestyle (crofting by fishing, growing my own produce and selling sea weed) on a remote Scottish island where subsistence living was invariably subsidised to some degree by the larger order.
- americandream
- Permanently Banned
- Posts: 8650
- Joined: Mon 18 Oct 2004, 03:00:00
Re: getting use to the new economic normal?
by radon1 » Sun 15 Sep 2013, 18:09:40
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('SeaGypsy', 'T')heir 'work' is so often of no import to anything or so little it's laughable,
Someone views themselves as a "self-employed professional", another - as a "talented MBA", another - as a "successful banker", while in fact they all are a part of the state bureaucracy. State bureaucracy has an immense propensity for self-reproduction. At the empire stage it expands externally, in the course of the "empire-building" process, at the nation-state stage is expands internally, in the course of the "nation-building" process. It is not until the limits are reached does the true kafkian nature of the state bureaucracy become apparent.
- radon1
- Intermediate Crude
- Posts: 2054
- Joined: Thu 27 Jun 2013, 06:09:44
