Limits to the Useful Workforce

[USS Triumphant]

It has occurred to me for some time now that, as automation and other factors continue, fewer and fewer people will actually be required to work to provide necessities to all of humanity. Even now, we may be at a point where the vast majority of "work" is just plain unnecessary - middle management, creation of products nobody really wants, excesses in governments, and so forth.

Since this is TrekBBS, I will add that this notion seems to be taken for granted in Star Trek's depictions of the 24th Century - everyone is fed, given medical treatment, shelter, and pretty much anything you want comes out of a wall panel. Only people motivated to provide for the common defense or maintain the energy collection facilities, for examples, actually do. Everyone else does hobbies, or hobby-work, like running a real restaurant in a society where food can be replicated.

If this is true, then I see four scenarios in the relatively near future:

1. Increasing numbers of people will be unsatisfied with the "work" they are doing in life, as more and more make-work is used to keep humanity occupied.

2. The people who are doing the useful work decide to rid themselves of the useless portion of the population.

3. Without a conscious decision to resolve this problem being made, other negative population checks, such as war, famine, plague, etc, will decrease the population back to a size where most or all have a useful job again.

or 4. We, as a society, and especially including the people who do the useful work, decide that it is okay that some or most of us do not work. Possibly, as a consequence of this, we provide the workers with some useful perks as thanks and recognition of their role in the new way.

4a. This works out alright - especially if extraplanetary/undersea colonization begins to give humanity more and more to do.
4b. The idle hands of the majority become the devil's playground, which leads back to 2 or 3.

Thoughts?

 

[Plecostomus]

Here in New York we have programs to encourage companies to create "jobs" rather than invest in new technologies. According to thinking here it's better to create 50 positions on an assembly line with the associated wages, healthcare, health-and-safety and legal costs than it is to build a flexible automated/robotic assembly system.

That's what is really stifling growth. It's time to realize that not everyone CAN have a high-paying job, some of us have to take lower paid positions because frankly not everyone can become an optical technician or a CNC programmer.

...I'm seriously considering becoming a truck-driver because the living I make doing manufacturing work is harder and harder to sustain every year.

 

[Ward Fowler]

It has occurred to me for some time now that, as automation and other factors continue, fewer and fewer people will actually be required to work to provide necessities to all of humanity. Even now, we may be at a point where the vast majority of "work" is just plain unnecessary - middle management, creation of products nobody really wants, excesses in governments, and so forth.

Since this is TrekBBS, I will add that this notion seems to be taken for granted in Star Trek's depictions of the 24th Century - everyone is fed, given medical treatment, shelter, and pretty much anything you want comes out of a wall panel. Only people motivated to provide for the common defense or maintain the energy collection facilities, for examples, actually do. Everyone else does hobbies, or hobby-work, like running a real restaurant in a society where food can be replicated.

If this is true, then I see four scenarios in the relatively near future:

1. Increasing numbers of people will be unsatisfied with the "work" they are doing in life, as more and more make-work is used to keep humanity occupied.

2. The people who are doing the useful work decide to rid themselves of the useless portion of the population.

3. Without a conscious decision to resolve this problem being made, other negative population checks, such as war, famine, plague, etc, will decrease the population back to a size where most or all have a useful job again.

or 4. We, as a society, and especially including the people who do the useful work, decide that it is okay that some or most of us do not work. Possibly, as a consequence of this, we provide the workers with some useful perks as thanks and recognition of their role in the new way.

4a. This works out alright - especially if extraplanetary/undersea colonization begins to give humanity more and more to do.
4b. The idle hands of the majority become the devil's playground, which leads back to 2 or 3.

Thoughts?

Nice topic and accurate insights. Another possibility is that the "useful workers" are asked to cut back on their work in order to provide useful work for others. It is certainly a problem that will have to be dealt with in a fairly short amount of time, perhaps in the next 20 years. Part of the solution may be a guaranteed minimum income for everyone in the United States. It has been suggested before.

 

[Plecostomus]

Question: How is a "guaranteed minimum income" different than the Minimum Wage laws?

 

[RoJoHen]

It would probably mean that you would make a guaranteed yearly salary regardless of the hours you work.

 

[Ward Fowler]

^correct

 

[Ward Fowler]

That's what is really stifling growth. It's time to realize that not everyone CAN have a high-paying job, some of us have to take lower paid positions because frankly not everyone can become an optical technician or a CNC programmer.

That's very very true. That's also a very good argument against the idea of "creative destruction" when talking about free trade.

 

[Plecostomus]

What is interesting (at least to me) is China's combination low wages, moderate skill and intense automation. Three or four low wage workers with moderate math and technical skills (roughly equal to a trade program or an 18-month college cert) running automated work cells can outproduce an American company with fifty "senior" level workers (30+ years experience).

Some of it has to do with cost, some of it has to do with China sitting back and waiting for the rest of the world to develop the automation and some of it has to do with the absolute inflexibility and "traditional mindedness" of the American workforce.

Person in China isn't going to care if that's not the way it was always done, person in China is grateful for a chance do be useful and earn a wage.

I think America needs to go through a far far more severe crash than the one we are experiencing now before attitudes will change. Lets say Unemployment hit 50% with 95% of our goods and services being imported before the needed changes will be enacted.

 

[Ward Fowler]

I think a lot of the inflexibility comes from trying to maintain a certain standard of living in the US. As you said, most Chinese are just grateful to make a wage even if it's low. You're right in saying that it would take a much larger crash to get us to that point. Who knows, we might get there yet. However, I'd rather see chinese wages rise rather than see US wages fall. Enhanced productivity due to automation is also a big threat to living standards, so something will have to be figured out.

 

[Plecostomus]

In reality (as I understand the math) having 4 people running a workcell would save the company enough money to invest in other production cells (requiring 4 more people) and so on. The initial step, the one everyone feared and Unionized to prevent was the initial job-loss while the new technology was implemented.

There will always be a need for someone to monitor and tend the automation, yes it's not $40 an hour but as the numbers show it's not economically possible to sustain a workforce at those wage levels. It's not possible to keep a huge number of retired workers on payroll (pension payments).

America has to change, plain and simple. Not super-sexy imaginary election-year "change" I'm talking a fundimental change in our outlooks and ways of thinking.

No one needs two snowcats, three ATVs, a motorcycle, TV and entertainment system in every room, sports car as graduation present for each of the five children and two SUVs parked in the driveway. That's not a "living wage" that's far far FAR in excess.

...yeah it was fun but I don't forsee being able to live like ^ my parents did simply because that sort of work just doesn't exist for my generation. What little of it is left is rapildy being offshored to India and China.

I'd be happy as a mushroom in shit with guarenteed heathcare, a steady job that doesn't evaporate three months and affordable housing. I *want* ^ all that extra stuff but I *can* live without it. Hell all I really need to amuse myself is some books and a laptop.

 

[Ward Fowler]

^When you're right you're right. The period we're going through now is a harmonization of standards of living. All the wealth was concentrated in the western world and now its being spread around. So as the undeveloped world's standard raises, ours falls. At what level we meet is anyone's guess. I think you're right in saying that it will be much lower.

 

[Plecostomus]

Sadly Ward Fowler I know what is happening, I can rationalize it and I can change along with it but the Vast Majority want their toys and comforts... and our system is based on glorified "mob rule" so we are going to struggle on for awhile before meaningful change occurs.

It's a bit like learning you have cancer and it's inoperable. You know what is happening and what is to come but you can't do anything about it.

 

[Ward Fowler]

Well, hopefully enough wealth can be created and the right legislation implemented to provide everyone a decent standard of living, a roof over their head, health care, and enough to eat. After all that's been covered maybe there will be enough for a toy or two. But I agree with you that expectations must come down from their current lofty heights.

 

[Holdfast]

Good wide ranging discussion here. I've enjoyed reading this thread.

I'd disagree with the idea that as the 3rd world's standard of living rises, the 1st world's will necessarily drop.

This firstly assumes that there is a finite amount of capital in the world and there isn't - there's only as much capital as there is willingness to create it since most countries these days use fiat money.

There's a better argument to suggest there are finite resources, and so as some places use resources faster, others must use it less (or, more strictly, the cost of purchasing the resource has a steeper curve than the ability of the purchasing country to print money without devaluing its currency by a greater amount). Even here though, I would disagree since there is always potential for technological development to either use resources more efficiently or find ways of utilizing previously low-value resources.

Returning from this aside back to the OP's topic, there is a fundamental question of definining "useful" work. As long as the majority of society BELIEVES their work is useful, there will be no wide-scale disturbance. This is all about social conditioning, and often dependent on semi-mythic archetypes to sustain it (you could consider the concept of "The American Dream" one such motivational model). As long these models are widely accepted, even if people are employed in objectively "useless" roles, they will still happily (or rather, acceptingly) continue to work.

If a population breaks free of its societal model on a large scale, then revolution results and a new model is implemented. What would it take for the model to fail Western countries? Well, a large scale collapse in the free flow of liquid capital would do it. That's why national governments are desperately attempting to bail out the financial sector. It threatens international stability in a way the collapse of other industries simply does not, because the free movement of capital is intrinsic to how we live our lives.

Projecting forward into the future, I think a lot rests on our pace of technological development. Sufficiently rapid development should allow us to escape the "energy well" we're currently struggling against (our demand for energy rises more or less as quickly as our ability to generate it). Break free of the energy well, and we'll be able to facilitate a Star Trekkish future where leisure time and vocational activity is widespread. While we're in the energy well, life & work will be more of the same, in more variants.

 

[Plecostomus]

In reply to Ward's post:

You are counting on the Government which is run by the Masters of said wealth, who are manipulated by others with wealth. Meaningful change to society won't occur until that wealth is lost and people who REALLY know "what it is like out there" take power. I mean working-class shlubs like myself, the single-income mother raising two children out of wedlock and the fellow who lost everything because someone convinced him to invest his future in what amounts to an unregulated gambling hall.

 

[Ward Fowler]

Good wide ranging discussion here. I've enjoyed reading this thread.

I'd disagree with the idea that as the 3rd world's standard of living rises, the 1st world's will necessarily drop.

This firstly assumes that there is a finite amount of capital in the world and there isn't - there's only as much capital as there is willingness to create it since most countries these days use fiat money.

There's a better argument to suggest there are finite resources, and so as some places use resources faster, others must use it less (or, more strictly, the cost of purchasing the resource has a steeper curve than the ability of the purchasing country to print money without devaluing its currency by a greater amount). Even here though, I would disagree since there is always potential for technological development to either use resources more efficiently or find ways of utilizing previously low-value resources.

I agree. I don't believe it has to be a zero-sum game. However, I feel that that is how it has mostly played out so far. Good paying jobs went overseas and not many good paying jobs have been created in their wake. At least not in the numbers needed.
Good point on resources as well. I think that that is the main detriment in this situation. As you say, there's not even a hard limit on them thanks to technological advances, but they are going to have to start coming faster. Until then, the west will have to learn to be more efficient to make room for the developing world's growing consumption.

 

[Ward Fowler]

In reply to Ward's post:

You are counting on the Government which is run by the Masters of said wealth, who are manipulated by others with wealth. Meaningful change to society won't occur until that wealth is lost and people who REALLY know "what it is like out there" take power. I mean working-class shlubs like myself, the single-income mother raising two children out of wedlock and the fellow who lost everything because someone convinced him to invest his future in what amounts to an unregulated gambling hall.

I'm afraid we're doomed then, because the average joe will never have true power in government. The powerful are too good at protecting what they have and manipulating us into accepting things we shouldn't. I think the most we can hope for is eventually being represented by people in government who might have a bit of conscience and throw us down a few more crumbs to get by on. It's either that or revolution, and technological advances make that problematic.

 

[garamet]

The 40-hour work week is an artificial construct, wrested from factory owners by unions. It's not written in stone, and I'd submit it's been obsolete for a long time.

The idea that most white-collar workers have to be chained to a desk in a cubicle in order to get the job done is also obsolete. Many, many white-collar jobs can be done via telecommute, but too many managers still believe they have to stand over their employees in order to get the job done.

Flex-time, job sharing and onsite childcare would increase productivity, but most corporations are too hidebound to venture into these things.

People should be paid for the work they do, not the time they put in. That way lies progress.

 

[Hoser]

No one needs two snowcats, three ATVs, a motorcycle, TV and entertainment system in every room, sports car as graduation present for each of the five children and two SUVs parked in the driveway. That's not a "living wage" that's far far FAR in excess.

What did your parents do? O.O

My dad worked at Ford's for 35+ years before retiring, and we never got half of that! Tenth even....we had two cars because the company gave my dad one after his suggestion saved them a couple billion dollars. Other than that they've just been getting by on what he gets now, thankfully they had a small mortgage.

I'd disagree with the idea that as the 3rd world's standard of living rises, the 1st world's will necessarily drop.

Isn't that what's happening now?

 

[Holdfast]

I'd disagree with the idea that as the 3rd world's standard of living rises, the 1st world's will necessarily drop.

Isn't that what's happening now?

By what measure are you suggesting that?

Standard of living is a fairly nebulous term, but I believe that by PPP (a common enough measure) the USA's standard of living has risen decade by decade, alongside rises in many other countries. That argues against a necessary fall in one country's standard of living if another country is to benefit.

As the world becomes ever more intertwined, the possibility of one country's PPP rising faster than another should actually fall, since the economies become more interdependent. The fewer tariffs, and other protectionist measures, that are in place, the less scope there is for one country's PPP falling while another rises.

We're seeing this right now - China, previously almost completely isolated from the global economy due to its more isolationist policies of the past, is now suffering from the current recession in the West, as its export sector is now very heaviliy dependent on the West. GDP figures are collapsing rapidly, though still currently positive.

Further, they hold signficant assets and debts in Western economies, so as the West struggles, the value of their holdings also falls. That limits rises in their PPP, until the West also starts to recover. Big chunks of their economy are still segregated though, so they have some internal protection from wider changes.

Anyway, I digress, but the point I'm making is that I don't see a zero-sum game here, to use Ward's appropriate turn of phrase.