patrick.net

Having said that, conservative US Chamber of Commerce types have yet to explain to me what the average person is supposed to do to make a living in this country after they offshore or automate all the jobs away.

How did all those typists make living after electronic wordprocessors made their jobs obsolete? How did candle makers make a living when electricity made their jobs obsolete? How did 78% of population that used to be farmers make a living after mechanized farming made it only necessary to have 2% of the population as farmers?

When 80% of the population had to be farmers, more interesting jobs like professional sportsmen/women, pop musicians, etc. simply did not exist.

Jobs are nothing more than catering to what people want, and get paid for it. When people have more money left over in their pockets because necessities get cheaper, they have money to enable new jobs. It is for the entrepreneurs to find what these job opportunities are, take a chance, and be richly rewarded for it, until more and more pigs crashing on the party and make job unprofitable, then it's time to look for something else..

6 thomaswong.1986 2014 May 11, 11:07am

How did all those typists make living after electronic wordprocessors made their jobs obsolete?

They still typed on a word processor.. like a WANG wp for their manager.

Last I checked typists are now called Administrative Executives.

They are still around...

Those that made type writers went on to make printers...

Ribbons makers went on to Ink Cartridges... Jobs actually expanded during the period...

7 thomaswong.1986 2014 May 11, 11:10am

The conservative answer of "got mine fuck you" is only going to work for so long, but what scares me is that in the modern surveillance police state, it's going to be more doable to have our militarized police keep public order as our formerly middle class society goes down the tubes.

no! the conservative answer is make people able to create their own destiny their own business and trade. How else has free markets
create many industries and jobs.

8

Bellingham Bill 2014 May 11, 12:07pm

thomaswong.1986 says

the conservative answer is make people able to create their own destiny their own business and trade

like all conservative bullshit that sounds great in the unexamined abstract but not going to work given all the rents being extracted from the middle-class / entrepreneurial economy.

it's no accident food trucks are in a boom time; they're a necessary end-run around the commercial storefront real estate rent-seekers.

plus, again, not all of us can be entrepreneurs, that's just the libertopianism talking.

9

Bellingham Bill 2014 May 11, 12:09pm

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNS11300060

When people have more money left over in their pockets because necessities get cheaper, they have money to

bid up their cost of housing and other goods & services with inelastic demand and monopolistic suppliers.

10

Bellingham Bill 2014 May 11, 12:16pm

participation

imagine what that'd be if conservatives had their way and cut government employment to the bone like they say they want to

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=AoK

gov't outlays as percent total wages

11 thomaswong.1986 2014 May 11, 12:27pm

like all conservative bullshit that sounds great in the unexamined abstract but not going to work given all the rents being extracted from the middle-class / entrepreneurial economy.

its not the conservatives who are pumping "inflation" in home prices,
rents or oil.

12 thomaswong.1986 2014 May 11, 12:33pm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marginal_propensity_to_save.

bid up their cost of housing and other goods & services with inelastic demand and monopolistic suppliers.

only a portion goes to consumption while the rest to savings.

it's no accident food trucks are in a boom time; they're a necessary end-run around the commercial storefront real estate rent-seekers.

Food trucks have been around for 50 plus years... ding ding ding..
its the ice cream man.... they might even deliver milk and cream
to your doorstep each morning.

13 futuresmc 2014 May 11, 3:03pm

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/MANEMP

How did all those typists make living after electronic wordprocessors made their jobs obsolete? How did candle makers make a living when electricity made their jobs obsolete? How did 78% of population that used to be farmers make a living after mechanized farming made it only necessary to have 2% of the population as farmers?

When 80% of the population had to be farmers, more interesting jobs like professional sportsmen/women, pop musicians, etc. simply did not exist.

Jobs are nothing more than catering to what people want, and get paid for it. When people have more money left over in their pockets because necessities get cheaper, they have money to enable new jobs. It is for the entrepreneurs to find what these job opportunities are, take a chance, and be richly rewarded for it, until more and more pigs crashing on the party and make job unprofitable, then it's time to look for something else..

Back then technology couldn't adapt faster than humans could retool for a new profession. Now it can and does. Any new job created will be obsolete within a decade at best. Where are people supposed to find the money for five or six retraining educations in a lifetime and still buy a home? Face it, we are looking at a new world where Moore's Law has disenfranchised too many working people and globalization picks off even more. We need to build a system where survival isn't based on being able to get a job or have the seed capital to start a new one. Otherwise you are looking at mass poverty as technology makes more and more workers redundant and unemployable in any profession for more than a few months at a stretch.

14

Bellingham Bill 2014 May 11, 3:11pm

thomaswong.1986 says

only a portion goes to consumption while the rest to savings

one, housing isn't consumed it's just occupied and the rent is the cost of excluding other people from the leased housing good itself.

two,

15

Bellingham Bill 2014 May 11, 3:20pm

futuresmc says

Back then technology couldn't adapt faster than humans could retool

we also had a great shift to a middle class economy of office clerks, retail salespeople, and factory workers.

OA -- office automation -- is slaughtering the former, internet sales is taking out retail, and of course it's more economic to pay migrant Chinese workers $300 a month for their labor than US workers the $3000+/mo they think their labor is worth.

shows mfg doubled in size, 1940-1980 but since 1980 we've lost 40% of the jobs even though the prime-age workforce has increased 30%

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNU00000060

25% of electronics/appliance retail jobs have disappeared since 2000:

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/CEU4244300001

creative destruction is great -- we can't hold onto the past -- but at some point we need to realize the Invisible Hand isn't going to appear with a solution to the challenges we face, that laissez faire conservatism is just a dressed up version of devil take the hindmost.

16

Bellingham Bill 2014 May 11, 3:30pm

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=Apc

is the divergence between real GDP (red) and retail employment (blue)

1948 = 100.

Shows real GDP is 30% greater than 2000, yet retail employment is the same.

Productivity! If you need a job in this country, FUCK YOU, you should have chosen your parents better.

17

monkframe 2014 May 11, 3:38pm

I don't see any relationship in this story between the minimum wage and the job market.
The fact of automation and the, how should I say it?, increasing irrelevance of human workers, is really what is being reported on.
I had to laugh at a story in the Mercury News, wherein they reported that the fall in the birthrate because of the economic collapse may "please some activists" but is "bad for the economy."
WTF is wrong with their thinking skills? The fewer people we bring onboard the sinking ship, the better.

18

Bellingham Bill 2014 May 11, 3:50pm

monkframe says

The fewer people we bring onboard the sinking ship, the better.

my thoughts exactly, though I don't think our economy is 'sinking' per se.

We can make the wealth to provide all of our needs and wants -- we are living in the Jetsons economy already, but the 1% own too much of everything and we've let conservatives structure things to benefit them way too much (e.g. rolling back the progressive reforms of the 1930s and 40s).

Now, India is screwed demographically. China has a hard row to hoe, too -- even though their population is finally topping out, 1.4 billion people to feed is a real challenge.

We're going to have ~450M people here by 2050, so it's not going to necessarily be a better place.

We tried Reaganism, expanded it with the 1990s Contract With America and Slick Willy jazz, and of course had 6+ years of Bush's brain trust to really fuck things up, like the Harding-Coolidge-Hoover years fucked over the nation. We need to figure out "Change" -- we had a guy promise that in 2008 but got impatient and threw his party out of power in 2010.

One key problem is that the media is at best useless, and the rightwing has their propaganda outlets in WSJ and Fox now to actively distort reality for people.

Stiglitz, Warren, at times Krugman. There's not much sanity here any more. Just bullshit up to our ears.

19 Mark 2014 May 12, 2:00am

The answer is pretty simple, soon we will be a two class society. The uber-wealthty and everyone else. With the exception of the mid 1940's thru 1960's the U.S. has always been pretty much that way. I'm curious how the "shop till you drop consumerism" economy will keep running when most people will be too poor to buy anything but bare essentials.

20

John Bailo 2014 May 12, 2:14am

we are living in the Jetsons economy already, but the 1% own too much of everything

Alternatively, you can see the economy (the Earth really) as only capable of providing a truly modern lifestyle to only 1% of the current population.

Hence the somewhat arbitrary and casino-like selection of the members of the elite.

So it's really a one-class society, and everyone else will be expected to disappear over time.

21 corntrollio 2014 May 12, 5:26am

monkframe says

I had to laugh at a story in the Mercury News, wherein they reported that the fall in the birthrate because of the economic collapse may "please some activists" but is "bad for the economy."

They say that because decline in population could mean decline in GDP. That's why some people say we shouldn't use overall GDP as a measure, but rather GDP per head or something like that.

22 drew_eckhardt 2014 May 12, 5:37am

thomaswong.1986 says

They still typed on a word processor.. like a WANG wp for their manager.

Last I checked typists are now called Administrative Executives.

They are still around...

Not really.

When I was in grade school my father worked as an engineer and had a secretary he shared with a few other people.

As an adult working as an engineer I need to do all my own typing.

Only executives get assistants these days which implies the positions are much less numerous.

23

Dan8267 2014 May 12, 5:51am

Miike says

want to raise minimum wage? Here you go...

It does not matter what the minimum wage is, machines will always be cheaper. Any job that can be automated out of existence will be regardless of the minimum wage.

Raising the minimum wage does not result in jobs being automated. Automation is entirely determined by what is practical using the current level of technology.

However, one can make a damn good case for a minimum guaranteed income from the profits of automation, which essentially all of society has paid for over countless generations.

24 Reality 2014 May 12, 6:15am

Reality says

When people have more money left over in their pockets because necessities get cheaper, they have money to

bid up their cost of housing and other goods & services with inelastic demand and monopolistic suppliers.

"Inelastic demand" means demand that is much affected by price change. You probably meant "inelastic supply." In any case, technological changes have profound effect on not only the type of jobs but also what you consider "inelastic supply" and "monopolistic suppliers":

During the same time frame that turned into 80% of the population from farming into doing more interesting jobs that did not exist before, the following took place drastically increased housing supply:

1. Elevators in mid to late 19th century, enabling buildings more than half a dozen stories;

2. canals bringing food from the midwest rendering farming jobs unprofitable in Manhattan also made the same land available for more houses and residential development;

3. trains enabled the start of commute to Long Island;

4. subways and cars making commute to Long Island and parts of Connecticut convenient;

5. Let's also not forget the bridges and tunnels bringing vast supply of housing to people who want to work in Manhattan but can commute from outside. Ironically, it's the government's own rapacious toll collecting that keeps the Manhattan price premium in place;

25 Reality 2014 May 12, 6:30am

futuresmc says

Back then technology couldn't adapt faster than humans could retool for a new profession. Now it can and does. Any new job created will be obsolete within a decade at best. Where are people supposed to find the money for five or six retraining educations in a lifetime and still buy a home? Face it, we are looking at a new world where Moore's Law has disenfranchised too many working people and globalization picks off even more. We need to build a system where survival isn't based on being able to get a job or have the seed capital to start a new one. Otherwise you are looking at mass poverty as technology makes more and more workers redundant and unemployable in any profession for more than a few months at a stretch.

I have fundamentally changed my own profession thrice in the past two decades. I don't remember paying a dime in formal education to do any of that myself. In fact, when I really needed helpers to scale my business, I had to train new people myself. By the time the universities were churning out graduates in the field by the thousands each year, I knew it was time to move on to a different field altogether.

There are only 3 ways of survival at decent living standards:

1. rendering a useful service to others in peaceful exchange for the fruits of their labors; for we can not maintain our current standards of living without division of labor;

2. having capital saved up (or gifted) and capable of living off it; this way of living is actually more feasible in a stagnant society instead of a dynamic one;

3. looting. You, sir, sound like advocating looting.

26 Reality 2014 May 12, 6:37am

It does not matter what the minimum wage is, machines will always be cheaper. Any job that can be automated out of existence will be regardless of the minimum wage.

Raising the minimum wage does not result in jobs being automated. Automation is entirely determined by what is practical using the current level of technology.

Hopefully almost all jobs known today will be automated at some point in the future, so that people can move onto more interesting jobs. That's just human progress. Raising minimum wages do have an effect on how soon those jobs get replaced by robots. It is not the end result that we live for (do you live in order to die?); life is a process.

However, one can make a damn good case for a minimum guaranteed income from the profits of automation, which essentially all of society has paid for over countless generations.

So, if we decide to share a cake, I eat my slice, then I pay you $5 to buy your slice, after I eat that slice too, can i have my $5 back from you as well? I mean, didn't "we" pay for the cake and earn that $5 at some point between the two of us?

Who owns which capital is a result of numerous transactions of historical significance. Wiping out all book keeping and claiming everything belongs to everyone . . . well, we know what that led to. Never mind whether you believe in the sanctity of private property, the practical result is that the disincentive to produce and make economical decisions would plunge the whole society into famine and war.

27 Reality 2014 May 12, 6:41am

corntrollio says

monkframe says

I had to laugh at a story in the Mercury News, wherein they reported that the fall in the birthrate because of the economic collapse may "please some activists" but is "bad for the economy."

They say that because decline in population could mean decline in GDP. That's why some people say we shouldn't use overall GDP as a measure, but rather GDP per head or something like that.

There is also the issue the political class having taken on huge "public debt" in the name of future generations. So if the population decline, the future generation would have a very hard time paying it back . . . leading to generational warfare.

28

Strategist 2014 May 12, 6:42am

CL says

We should ban technology. Ever since we've been using it, workers have been displaced!

How will we log onto Patnet and curse each other out? We could use pigeons.

29 Reality 2014 May 12, 6:44am

http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/graph/?g=Apc

is the divergence between real GDP (red) and retail employment (blue)

1948 = 100.

Shows real GDP is 30% greater than 2000, yet retail employment is the same.

Productivity! If you need a job in this country, FUCK YOU, you should have chosen your parents better.

Or you could try to discover what your fellow men (and women) want, and try to anticipate their needs and wants, instead of wasting all your time bitching about your life being unfair. My parents probably made far less money than your parents did when I was born.

30

Strategist 2014 May 12, 6:48am

Miike says

want to raise minimum wage? Here you go...

It does not matter what the minimum wage is, machines will always be cheaper. Any job that can be automated out of existence will be regardless of the minimum wage.

Raising the minimum wage does not result in jobs being automated. Automation is entirely determined by what is practical using the current level of technology.

However, one can make a damn good case for a minimum guaranteed income from the profits of automation, which essentially all of society has paid for over countless generations.

Sooner or later all jobs requiring no thinking will be replaced by technology. If you raise the minimum wage too high, too quickly, you end up speeding up the inevitable.

31 Reality 2014 May 12, 6:50am

one, housing isn't consumed it's just occupied and the rent is the cost of excluding other people from the leased housing good itself.

You can say the same thing about food: the fecal matter after you digest the food will be good organic fertilizer after some time for more food production. There is a reason why rental unit-time is considered highly perishable goods: time is of the essence, as written in most business contracts. Time value is of critical importance when large amount of capital is involved. That's also why QE is ruining the economy, as it messes up time value in business/employment decisions. Too many of the younger generation are facing the prospects of smoking pot in mom's basement as alternative to productive use of their time; we had the same thing happening in the 1970's, another period of FED mass money printing.

32 BoomAndBustCycle 2014 May 12, 6:54am

clambo says

As labor costs rise, people will find ways to reduce the cost of labor.

Who will eat the crap food they make? Only the lower middle class and poor eat fast food anyway...if they don't have jobs... they are cutting their own share of the pie!

Oh wait.. government EBT... soon that's all they'll accept at McD's.

33 BoomAndBustCycle 2014 May 12, 6:59am

Eventually Technology will render Capitalism obsolete... It already is stressing the foundations of traditional capitalism. Those that hold fast to capitalism like an economic religion, should learn societies evolve and new economic theories come into play eventually.

If we harness the power of Fusion energy before we destroy ourselves and our planet... then we will DEFINITELY need a new economic system. When you can run your automobile off an banana peel and some refuse like in Back To The Future.. it changes society in ways unimaginable.

34

Dan8267 2014 May 12, 7:04am

Strategist says

Sooner or later all jobs requiring no thinking will be replaced by technology. If you raise the minimum wage too high, too quickly, you end up speeding up the inevitable.

As long as we socialize the profits of automation, that's a good thing. The only bad thing is allowing a few "owner" to get all the profits of automation, especially when those owners didn't contribute anything to the building of the automation. They designed no circuits, wrote no software, built no robots, fabricated no chips.

The problem with capitalism is that it takes from the wealth producers (engineers and other workers) to give to non-producers (owners and executives). Any system based on that transfer will eventually collapse.

35

Dan8267 2014 May 12, 7:05am

BoomAndBustCycle says

Eventually Technology will render Capitalism obsolete...

I would argue it already has. Capitalism, like the automobile, is a technology that should have been phased out in the 20th century.

36 Reality 2014 May 12, 7:10am

"Owner" is the one who holds the bag when a specific piece of capital is rendered obsolete by advancing technology.

The constant effort to keep capital up-to-date is the job of the owners and executives.

Dan, if you are tired of writing codes, you can start your own business and take your own chances. Then you don't have to worry about someone else taking the fruits of your labor; that is, besides the taxman.

37 Reality 2014 May 12, 7:13am

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kyklos

BoomAndBustCycle says

Eventually Technology will render Capitalism obsolete...

I would argue it already has. Capitalism, like the automobile, is a technology that should have been phased out in the 20th century.

They tried very hard in the 20th century: first Communism, then Fascism, then a soft-peddling collectivism in the name of social democracy. Human societies go through cycles of liberty, prosperity, tyranny, privation then back to struggle for liberty again. That cycle was noticed as early as 2000+ years ago by the ancient Greeks and Romans.

38 Reality 2014 May 12, 7:15am

39

Dan8267 2014 May 12, 7:19am

They tried very hard in the 20th century:

The fact that you equate capitalism with liberty demonstrates that economics is a religion to you. If anything, capitalism harms liberty as evident by the open system of bribery in our country we call lobbying.

40 Reality 2014 May 12, 7:21am

Reality says

They tried very hard in the 20th century:

The fact that you equate capitalism with liberty demonstrates that economics is a religion to you. If anything, capitalism harms liberty as evident by the open system of bribery in our country we call lobbying.

LOL. Political privileges are feudalism/socialism, not capitalism.

41

Strategist 2014 May 12, 7:54am