I came across an article from a while back discussing the impact of technology on employment.
I’ve been arguing that as machines and software become more capable, they are beginning to match the capabilities of the average worker. In other words, as technology advances, a larger and larger fraction of the population will essentially become unemployable. While I think advancing information technology is the primary force driving this, globalization is certainly also playing a major role. (But keep in mind that aspects of globalization such as service offshoring–moving a job electronically to a low wage country–are also technology driven).
The economists sometimes mention technology, but in general they find other “structural” issues to focus on.
I’m not sure I agree with his thesis. People will eventually do different things than they did in the past. Just as they eventually did after collapse of farm labor in the 1930s. But the change was wrenching and it took 15 or 20 years to complete. More or less a generation.
We are in for rough sledding for quite a while longer if we count the beginning of the reorganization as 2008. We are well under a 1/4 of the way through the change.
In any case the author has made his book available for free (you can pay any amount you like too) at The Lights in the Tunnel.
This post was prompted by the comments to this article: The Technosponge.
Cross Posted at Power and Control
Comments
8 responses to “Technology And Employment”
From the third paragraph of The Technosponge:
However, now that a depression has been averted, and the recession has ended…
The author lost me there. Reading through the rest was just so much noise, words without backing or substance.
As to your comment that “we’re in for rough sledding for quite a while longer” – that’s only true if the government doesn’t get out of the way.
Here’s a long, personal anecdote which explains how it’s within reach of each of us to throw off the old and start over. Nothing is out of bounds.
In the winter of 1964 a college student was living in the basement of an old house in Reno attending the University of Nevada. The house belonged to his friends divorced mother, who ran a unique mail order business out of it which allowed her to live very comfortably. She was a matchmaker; that is, she published a number of newsletters sent to black people in the South, and overseas to various African countries, as well as Haiti, Jamaica, British Guyana, and the Virgin Islands. She had them organized into clubs, like the Rhodesian Club, or the Port of Prince Club. Her living room boasted beautiful hand carved ebony pieces from Africa sent as thank-yous after a successful match up.
Over dinner one evening, the college student asked the woman how she got into the lonely hearts club business. She said that after her Army Air Corp husband was shot down in the last days of WW2 leaving her a pregnant, broke widow, she leaped into a loveless marriage of convenience with what turned out to be an abusive alcoholic. He would take off to Reno and the whore houses at Fernley and Wadsworth.
And then one day she woke up to the realization that she was no different than the whores. She’d sold her body for security, and in the process ended up a legal prostitute. So she decided that since she was already a whore, why not become a madam. And the idea was born to start the clubs. She bought an old mimeograph machine, got ads going in newspapers, and voila, a business. She decided to get a Reno divorce, and ended up staying where she knew her business was, if not respectable, at least tolerated. She finished her story with this advice to the college student: (paraphrase)
You look shocked kid. Are you thinking I’m no better than the stoned hookers who get out of the cabs in front of Harold’s or Harrah’s to party with the clientele? Ha! Wake up and look around at the real world.
The whole damn country is filled with whores who’ve sold themselves on the cheap for a little security. Everyone from old lady pensioners to farmers are on the take. They get their money and comply with the government. Is that how you want to live your life, as a male whore?
So you can’t make it in medicine like your father. You going to just wallow in self-pity and give up? You can do absolutely anything that’s within your talent, power, and drive. Or you can sell your soul for a little security like the rest. And don’t ruffle any feathers kid. The whore-masters don’t like it.
Is that what America has become, a bunch of stoned, zombie whores waiting for the next fix?
Is that what America has become, a bunch of stoned, zombie whores waiting for the next fix?
The vast majority.
I became an aerospace engineer without benefit of a degree. So I know what that woman did can be done in nearly any field.
But most people when confronted with adversity give up when they have been hit “one time to many”. Me? I prefer to keep getting up after being knocked down. Maybe I get up a little slower. But I get up.
I used to know an outlaw back in the day. He used to say: “Don’t take the man’s easy money. You will stop thinking about the big score.” Words of wisdom if applied more honestly.
Live free or die.
BTW it isn’t the stoning that does it. It is the resignation to the quiet desperation.
The government has become so pervasive and invasive that we’ve just about reached a tipping point. Youthful drive that should be there is gone, if the pathetic creatures at the OWS sites are any example.
FWIW all my kids (4) are driven. But they seem to take after their father.
I think you are correct. The government has done its best to crush the spirit of our youth.
But look at the example of the woman you gave. She stands out from her cohort. I think it was always like that. Maybe worse in degree, but not very different otherwise. Most people just want to be part of the herd and remain unnoticed. Take the man’s bread and turn on the circus. We are now going back over 2,000 years.
Most men would exchange their birthright for a mess of pottage. Where are we now? Three thousand years back?
Liberty is a hard sell because it is not easy. It requires discipline and sacrifice. Commodities always in short supply.
I have been in manufacturing since 1976. As engineering manager of a large pharmaceutical plant, as owner of a business selling automation machinery and currently as a consultant in manufacturing efficiency, process, line and machine design.
I have yet to find a task that a human can do that a machine can’t do more reliably. Whether it can do it more economically is another issue which is why we still have lots of labor.
I’ve been hearing about how automation would put people out of work and kill the workforce for as long as I can remember. Back in the 50’s we were hearing how “The worker can be replaced by a button”.
We can go back to the 1700’s and the Luddites to see more examples.
Hasn’t happened. We have lots of automation, lots of machinery but we also have lots more jobs. Not necessarily in manufacturing but good jobs in a variety of fields that may not have even existed 30 years ago.
Even ATMs which are now ubiquitous. Obama says they have replaced tellers and they have. At the same time, we have more bank tellers in 2011 than we did in 2000 or 1990.
Automation creates far more jobs than it kills.
John Henry
Also
We hear about how all our manufacturing has gone offshore.
BS.
The US still manufactures about 20% of all goods manufactured in the entire world. About where we have been for the past 40-50 years.
What has changed is that the good we manufacture are more advanced.
The jobs in those industries, while fewer are more advanced and pay better.
Ever been in a manufacturing plant? They are dirty, dangerous, uncomfortable, physically hard. Work on an assembly line is the most mind numbing work you can imagine. It also, unless you have a skill, doesn’t pay that well. (With a few exceptions in oligarchical industries like autos, steel, tires)
There is also the problem of frequent layoffs in many of these plants. This means that while hourly pay may be great, annual pay may not be.
In other words, most of the unskilled manufacturing jobs that everyone laments are not particularly “good” jobs.
Yes, you are right, we are in for a period of adjustment. It is the same period of adjustment that has been going on for the past 100 years. It will probably go on for at least the next 100.
John Henry
John Henry wrote:
“I have yet to find a task that a human can do that a machine can’t do more reliably. Whether it can do it more economically is another issue which is why we still have lots of labor.”
Machines can’t see new opportunities to make money and figure out how to exploit them successfully (yet). The government has been making good progress passing laws making machine labor more economical than human labor.
Leaving government regulation out of the equation it’s never been easier and cheaper to start up a small-scale manufacturing business; unfortunately the schools are actively working to make sure kids don’t have the skills necessary to be their own boss.