The Liberal Gun Club Forum

If what McAfee and Brynjolfsson are suggesting is true, then , in my opinion, without radically rethinking -- on a global scale -- our approach to socio-economic governance, there will be no humane resolution to our world wide economic woes.
http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/ ... h_20120709

One solution to the problem is an international labor movement, it will be tough because the foreign companies supplying the work forces kill and imprison labor leaders and union organizers.

LibShooter wrote:If what McAfee and Brynjolfsson are suggesting is true, then , in my opinion, without radically rethinking -- on a global scale -- our approach to socio-economic governance, there will be no humane resolution to our world wide economic woes.
http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/ ... h_20120709

The solution is a simple one, the implementation however is highly complex verging on impossible. The solution is A better educational system coupled with democracy for the economic sector. Yes I'm talking about socialism, the same tired old argument people have been ignoring for years. That willfull ignorance will continue for years even decades to come but the truth is still the same. The problem lies in a system that creates an imbalance in production compensation and then weights that to the side of the well off. The cause of this is partly the supply and demand nature of which we have already discussed, but also it has to do with the imbalance of power in the owning class and the working class. Short of making them equal the only solution is to eliminate the owning class (note, not the managerial Class) and give equal representation in the economic sector to those that are to be exploited. Meaning that in order to be exploited directly the workers must vote to do so, I.E. if an externality has an effect on the workers that is too great in comparison to the reward as seen by the workers it won't be done. In otherwords, the CEO of widget corp can't close shop here in america and move overseas to cheaper labor because A) The people over seas will not have a say and won't be so cheap and B) if you move to close shop it must be done with the consent of the workers, ... anyone here want to vote to close your workplace to move it overseas? anyone? Now there are problems with democracy of this sorts as has been seen in the federal government but as I have said previously, these are not unfixable problems.

This is a very thought provoking article. The two authors are primarily addressing automation (including of intellectual work), rather than offshoring of jobs -- although technology clearly facilitates that as well.

Working in IT, I have some perspective on this, as my field as a whole has accelerated both trends tending to hollow out the U.S. middle class. I'm not proud of that, but a guy's gotta eat, and it's better than making nuke missile guidance systems, I tell myself.

One take on this is that technology thus far has eliminated mostly middle management jobs -- the b-school buzzword is "flattening" of management -- but there's no reason why upper management jobs couldn't be automated by sophisticated analytical software as well. Good riddance.

Then, following this to its logical conclusion, the investment decisions of those who control accumulated capital could also be automated. But wait, how about making those decisions in the public interest? Hmmmmmm.... No need for the 1%.

On another tack, McAfee and Bjornlinson (sp?) are missing one key point. Whether you're talking about steam engines or computers, technology doesn't replace human labor with empty space. It leverages ENERGY to replace human labor. Cheap energy. Remove cheap energy from the equation, and we're back to needing a lot a labor to do things by hand.

larrymod wrote:This is a very thought provoking article. The two authors are primarily addressing automation (including of intellectual work), rather than offshoring of jobs -- although technology clearly facilitates that as well.

Working in IT, I have some perspective on this, as my field as a whole has accelerated both trends tending to hollow out the U.S. middle class. I'm not proud of that, but a guy's gotta eat, and it's better than making nuke missile guidance systems, I tell myself.

One take on this is that technology thus far has eliminated mostly middle management jobs -- the b-school buzzword is "flattening" of management -- but there's no reason why upper management jobs couldn't be automated by sophisticated analytical software as well. Good riddance.

Then, following this to its logical conclusion, the investment decisions of those who control accumulated capital could also be automated. But wait, how about making those decisions in the public interest? Hmmmmmm.... No need for the 1%.

On another tack, McAfee and Bjornlinson (sp?) are missing one key point. Whether you're talking about steam engines or computers, technology doesn't replace human labor with empty space. It leverages ENERGY to replace human labor. Cheap energy. Remove cheap energy from the equation, and we're back to needing a lot a labor to do things by hand.

There's a saying, "You Can't Go Home Again".

in laymans terms,,,,we're fucked,lets drink