by Sixstrings » Fri 26 Mar 2010, 21:07:06
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('heroineworshipper', 'F')orget 1960. There were more jobs in native American times. That's failure.
You know, I'm starting to think that the fundamental problem with the economy is really TOO MUCH productivity. There comes a point at which productivity kills jobs.. when one man can do the work of a hundred, then 99 men go without, you know?
The only way for humans to compete with machines and robotics is on price -- such as in China, where the labor of human hands is still cheaper than a machine. Which is saying a lot, since machinery and robots are incredibly cost effective over the long term (they don't strike, work 24/7, no breaks, no pay, they don't have kids that get sick).
Now I do of course realize that historically leaps in productivity have been a good thing -- the printing press comes to mind here. All I'm saying is that perhaps we're approaching the upper reaches of healthy productivity. Think about how many everyday jobs productivity kills.. grocery stores used to have baggers, then Walmart just had to design a register where the cashier has to be the bagger too. Boom, there goes all the bagger jobs.
Then, my local Walmart tried to get rid of the cashier jobs too with those self-checkouts (this didn't last long, but only because of customer theft). Think of video stores.. Blockbuster is on the verge of bankruptcy because of Netflix, and even drug stores have DVD rental vending machines now. You can say these jobs are crappy anyway, but then most jobs in America are crappy. It can't be better that people stay on the public dole rather than work (even a crappy bagger job or video store).
The list goes on and on.. ATMs reduced the need for tellers, the internet has rendered travel agents all but extinct, I know I've taken care of all my insurance needs over the internet for years now so surely some local agents must have lost jobs. Even the local tax collector employs less people than years ago, since so many do their local taxes on the internet.
I'm not a luddite, and I love these conveniences as much as anyone. But surely there must come a point where labor productivity is so incredibly high that we no longer have enough jobs to go around. We'll have a real crisis then, and we may have already reached that point now (people talk about 20% unemployment being the new normal). So in spite of all these fantastic consumer conveniences, we may end up with 1/3 or 1/2 the population barely getting by on a permanent unemployment dole.
I don't know what the answer will be, but it seems to me that some form of heavy socialism or even a new communism will need to be implemented. There's just no other option, when machines, robotics, and hyper-efficient technologies have eliminated the need for everyone to work. I would say all the newly redundant labor could be artists, but think how productive and efficient even art is -- one writer can entertain millions, one actor or musician or game developer can entertain millions, etc.
So that's my concern, when everything is mass produced and mass efficient, where are the jobs going to be? You can't have everyone working in finance and real estate, we saw where that got us.