The future of the work force

[MadImmortalMan]

What it means in theory is higher productivity per person which drives up wages. Then the excess spending money starts going to creating new markets which the other ten people can work in.

Of course it doesn't drive up wages so much of Bernanke is running the printers full blast.

[Berkut]

What it means in theory is higher productivity per person which drives up wages. Then the excess spending money starts going to creating new markets which the other ten people can work in.

Of course it doesn't drive up wages so much of Bernanke is running the printers full blast.

Yeah, that is a great theory. Sounds kind of like wishful thinking though.

Who is to say that excess money even if spent to open new markets won't just open new markets that are also very non-labor intensive?

We live in a finite world. At some point, the need to have people doing shit to produce shit is going to be exceeded by the number of people sitting around looking for someone to pay them to do shit, right? Isn't that the inevitable end point of continued increases in productivity along with a continual increase in the overall labor pool?

If I could wave a magic wand and make all human labor 100 times more productive, is it not the case that the result MUST be a decline in the value of that labor?

I don't buy the idea that higher productivity leads to increased wages in the general sense - and the reality seems to bear that out. We've increased productivity my immense amounts in the last 100 years, yet real dollar wages have not increased anywhere near those amounts. They certainly have increased, but more as a result of the crap we buy becoming cheaper rather than our incomes becoming greater.

[Malthus]

I am not an economist, so I'm not sure I understand the difference between "incomes becomming greater" and "the crap we buy becomming cheaper".

[Eddie Teach]

Stuff that doesn't get cheaper, such as land and cars and fuel, stays expensive. If your income was higher, they'd be more affordable too.

[Berkut]

I am not an economist, so I'm not sure I understand the difference between "incomes becomming greater" and "the crap we buy becomming cheaper".

Neither am I, and I am probably mostly talking out my ass.

But it seems like since the turn of the century (1900ish), we have seen this incredible increase in productivity. And this has resulted in an explosion in the availability of consumer goods at very low relative prices, such that the middle class can afford lots and lots of "stuff".

So the cost of goods that we buy has gone down, meaning our standard of living has certianly gone up because we can all afford washing machines, a few TVs, couple cars, etc., etc. But our relative income has not really changed, and hence our ability to buy things that are not much easier to produce (say houses and things like that) has not really changed much.

This suggests to me that the increased productivity of labor is great, but it isn't really translating into increased markets as a general rule. It probably does when you ahve a lot of untapped markets, so you do (and have) seen  some of that excess production used to open markets that were previously not worthwhile. But at some point, you run out of those markets. At some point, we just have this one planet, and eventually even the chinese and indians get a middle class, and then what?

You can create new markets of course, but even those are finite (if theoretically unknown). At some point, the idea that there MUST BE some match between increased availability of labor due to increased productivity driving down the need for that labor in traditional roles and the oh so happy need for that labor in some other previously unexploited market becomes spurious. It strikes me as kind of ::just so" economic theory, something we want to be true, but fundamentally isn't really true.

If I could magically create a infinite army of cost free robots to do all the manual work everywhere in the world for no cost, I don't buy into the idea that there would be some matching magical power that would create new markets for all that suddenly worthless labor.

[Valmy]

I am not an economist, so I'm not sure I understand the difference between "incomes becomming greater" and "the crap we buy becomming cheaper".

Well...this may not be what Berkut is talking about but a big problem is that fuel, food, and realestate are not becoming cheaper.  Luxury goods like cell phones and big screen TVs though are becoming ridiculously cheap.  It is a great time to have disposable income, not so great to be scraping by.

[Berkut]

I am not an economist, so I'm not sure I understand the difference between "incomes becomming greater" and "the crap we buy becomming cheaper".

Well...this may not be what Berkut is talking about but a big problem is that fuel, food, and realestate are not becoming cheaper.  Luxury goods like cell phones and big screen TVs though are becoming ridiculously cheap.  It is a great time to have disposable income, not so great to be scraping by.

I ama ctually trying to take an even greater "meta-view". As in looking at the sweep of human history and humanities future.

It seems to me that technology is going to continue to make the value of actual labor continue to decline, while the number of people available to do that labor continues to rise (or maybe just stay steady, at best).

What I am hinting around at is that perhaps humans need to start considering what an economic system might look like that is not driven by a fundamental scarcity of labor. I think that is a really hard thing to understand, because humans have never, ever, EVER been in such a situation.

Will people in a 500/1000/2000 years have "jobs" at all? Will the idea that humans spend the bulk of their time engaged in an activity that has something to do with producing "things" be an anachronism?

[MadImmortalMan]

Population growth seems to be slowing down a lot too. Maybe that will keep pace with the advances. Maybe we'll get fusion power and replicators and won't really need to work unless we want to. I don't know.


Edit: There will always be a demand for some types of work though. Like art and entertainment.

[crazy canuck]

I am not an economist, so I'm not sure I understand the difference between "incomes becomming greater" and "the crap we buy becomming cheaper".

Well...this may not be what Berkut is talking about but a big problem is that fuel, food, and realestate are not becoming cheaper.  Luxury goods like cell phones and big screen TVs though are becoming ridiculously cheap.  It is a great time to have disposable income, not so great to be scraping by.

I ama ctually trying to take an even greater "meta-view". As in looking at the sweep of human history and humanities future.

It seems to me that technology is going to continue to make the value of actual labor continue to decline, while the number of people available to do that labor continues to rise (or maybe just stay steady, at best).

What I am hinting around at is that perhaps humans need to start considering what an economic system might look like that is not driven by a fundamental scarcity of labor. I think that is a really hard thing to understand, because humans have never, ever, EVER been in such a situation.

Will people in a 500/1000/2000 years have "jobs" at all? Will the idea that humans spend the bulk of their time engaged in an activity that has something to do with producing "things" be an anachronism?

Its an interesting question.  Futurists seem to go to one of two extremes.  You get the ones who imagine a future that when humanity is freed to pursue endeavors that are not tied to producing the necessities of life that a great new culture of art, philosophy and science will emerge.  Some would argue that is the direction we ought to head now.  The other view is the dystopia of humans being viewed as largely unneeded except for the few that run things and then in the most extreme dystopias even they are uneeded and discarded.

[The Brain]

The whole omg singularity stuff makes my head hurt.

[Malthus]

I am not an economist, so I'm not sure I understand the difference between "incomes becomming greater" and "the crap we buy becomming cheaper".

Well...this may not be what Berkut is talking about but a big problem is that fuel, food, and realestate are not becoming cheaper.  Luxury goods like cell phones and big screen TVs though are becoming ridiculously cheap.  It is a great time to have disposable income, not so great to be scraping by.

I ama ctually trying to take an even greater "meta-view". As in looking at the sweep of human history and humanities future.

It seems to me that technology is going to continue to make the value of actual labor continue to decline, while the number of people available to do that labor continues to rise (or maybe just stay steady, at best).

What I am hinting around at is that perhaps humans need to start considering what an economic system might look like that is not driven by a fundamental scarcity of labor. I think that is a really hard thing to understand, because humans have never, ever, EVER been in such a situation.

Will people in a 500/1000/2000 years have "jobs" at all? Will the idea that humans spend the bulk of their time engaged in an activity that has something to do with producing "things" be an anachronism?

Its an interesting question.  Futurists seem to go to one of two extremes.  You get the ones who imagine a future that when humanity is freed to pursue endeavors that are not tied to producing the necessities of life that a great new culture of art, philosophy and science will emerge.  Some would argue that is the direction we ought to head now.  The other view is the dystopia of humans being viewed as largely unneeded except for the few that run things and then in the most extreme dystopias even they are uneeded and discarded.

I guess a future in which humans spend all of their time eating potato chips and playing video games isn't usually foreseen by futurists. 

[crazy canuck]

I guess a future in which humans spend all of their time eating potato chips and playing video games isn't usually foreseen by futurists. 

[Eddie Teach]

The future is now.

[Maximus]

We had this discussion 11-12 years ago on paradox OT. It was sparked by a guy spending some ridiculous amount of real money, something like $20k, on real estate in an MMO.

At that time I proposed a future where humans are no longer required for productivity and we determine our relative financial statuses by playing games.

[Ed Anger]

We had this discussion 11-12 years ago on paradox OT. It was sparked by a guy spending some ridiculous amount of real money, something like $20k, on real estate in an MMO.