It strikes me that technological change is serving as some sort of intangible yet unstoppable bogeyman in the argument re income inequality. Isn’t it just one factor in a complex situation there? Yes, it can be used by the powerful few to increase that power, but on the other hand access to better tools has given more people the chance to fulfil their potential, and many have/are doing so.

Shouldn’t we be more concerned about how the powerful can use their influence to control legislation etc than whether or not better tools undermine or empower us?

global inequality

Income or wealth thm? Clarification needed.

In this case, income. There has been a shift in income distribution from the developed to the emerging world and that will continue. There is a burgeoning 322m middle class urban Africans emerging rapidly as an example. Income inequality patterns vary depending on your terms of reference. Poorer countries have benefitted at the expense of richer ones.

As the FT article put it earlier (and going back to the OP)

The early 19th century Luddites had it wrong when they destroyed new labour-saving machinery in the north of England. The only way their reasoning would apply today is if you believe human nature in the 21st century is dramatically different: that either there will not be new wants and needs; or that, even if there were, most people would lack the skills to find work in the new fields where those wants and needs are being created.

In this case, income.

Thanks. You may continue. But you ought to make it clear in future.

Yes sir!

Since we were talking about income anyway it wasn’t really necessary but glad to help those who need it! 😉

it wasn’t really necessary but glad to help those who need it!

Hint: I knew it was income you were talking about. It always is.

even the World Bank have recently admitted that trickle down economics is horse sh*t.

Trickle-down has been dead at the World Bank since at least 1973, when MacNamara took over.

THM…. from what I’ve read between country income inequality has reduced but within country inequality….globally….has increased.

If what I remember is correct, then you need to think about statistics properly.

Why would it be surprising that certain existing jobs would disappear? It happens all the time. People adapt as they always have done.

Again, utterly simplistic way of looking at the issue. The problem is that the rate of change is forecasted by some to be unprecedented and the effects of this are expected to cause massive social issues. It would probably be wise to consider social polices that aim to reduce any resultant social unrest.

Are all taxi drivers going to become marketers for taxi companies?

Serious question – what happened to all the hand weavers, spinners and threshers?

Here’s another one: If everything becomes automated, and all these people are out of work – there’s going to be a lot of people looking for work. So the workforce will become cheap again, perhaps? Cheaper than the machines? And if everyone’s out of work who’s going to buy all the services that are being produced by these automated businesses?

Perhaps it’ll self-regulate, as long as it doesn’t all happen at once..

@Tom, I’m not posting it like it’s a blueprint for the future of mankind, just something with interesting points to consider. Which do you find so horestwaddley?

I’ll attempt to read it again when I’m less tired but I felt the writer was disappearing up his own backside about half way through. I’ll try and decipher it again tomorrow.

Serious question – what happened to all the hand weavers, spinners and threshers?

Serious question, did hundreds if not thousands of different jobs become irrelevant within a few decades during the 18th century? No, what became irrelevant was quite literally those three jobs and a couple of others.

So the workforce will become cheap again, perhaps? Cheaper than the machines? And if everyone’s out of work who’s going to buy all the services that are being produced by these automated businesses?

A) Think about your first question.

B) Your second question can be resolved by massive income inequality and a 2 tier economy weighted towards luxury goods…eg answer C in my first/second post.

No they (W Bk) haven’t.

Trickle-down has been dead at the World Bank since at least 1973, when MacNamara took over.

Fair enough, I got suckered by that.

It was a decade later that we had heads of state pushing it though, and there’s still a significant bunch of people who believe (or profess to, for various ends). I think that’s a significant problem when tech and automation can empower them.

I believe in tech as something that can benefit all and increase resilience, but not much seems to encourage that. Seven or so years peripheral exposure to startup people has given me a profound cynicism and disbelief in those generally pushing tech, because a lot of them are just rolling the dice to get rich and exhibit a profound distaste for regular jobs or lifestyle businesses. A lot of startup/tech output is so ambiguous, and as this guy recently put it, the twee way they present themselves is (potentially) kind of like Oppenheimer mugging at the camera and doing a thumbs up after the detonation of Trinity.

(… to overstate it!)

did tens of thousands of different jobs become irrelevant within a few decades during the 18th century?

Different jobs? No. Are you suggesting that’ll happen in a few decades now?

Tens, if not hundreds of thousands of people did become redundant in a very short space of time though.

Seven or so years peripheral exposure to startup people has given me a profound cynicism and disbelief in those generally pushing tech

Yeah, it’s a good way of redistributing wealth though isn’t it? From venture capitalists to graduate software engineers 🙂

What did that Oxford paper say? 47% of all jobs at risk of automation by 2035? Claims and predictions like that need to be scrutinised properly and if they have any outside chance of coming true, policy ideas need to be thought about in the event that it does actually happen. I’ll reread the paper in the morning.

Unless that is, you believe in letting the markets run themselves. I don’t have the same unwavering belief in capitalism that you do Molgrips.

Fairly late to this one so I’m guessing I’ll be going over old ground…

30 years ago I can remember 6 or 7 men working on my dads farm and they were all fairly busy. Through modernisation of buildings, better equipment that number dropped. Now 3 of them run a farm 5 times the size and have time for a couple of decent holidays every year. That and production costs have dropped to meet peoples expectation of cheap food.

Saying nobody is entitled to a job is a bit harsh but nobody is entitled to keep doing the job they are doing now for life. Things change, if you don’t move with it then you probably won’t get a job. Even worse is some of the examples I see over here in Tasmania where people are still in the “I work in forestry, if you get rid of that what will my children do” as if the aspirations of their kids should never go beyond their parents.

I think I didn’t explain my comment on being entitled to a job properly. Everyone should be entitled to the chance to get a job, but that doesn’t mean they should be provided with one regardless. As you say, things change and people have to adapt. That’s just life.

It doesn’t mean their efforts to adapt shouldn’t be supported though. Whilst the tech scene can go over the top with the belief that learning to code can be everyone’s salvation, it isn’t to say people can’t be helped to find ways to apply their skills in new ways.

Would be interesting to see if someone could program something to do that en masse, thereby tech solving the problem it is supposedly destined to create 🙂

Software that endlessly asks questions then matches people up with opportunities to retrain? Dibs on the name OKStupid 😛

Is it not basically this simple… The whole work for wages thing is a great way to get people to do things they don’t want to. A step up from coercion and slavery. But over time, we’ve come up with other ways to get stuff done, which is reducing the amount of work that people need to do. That’s not a problem in itself.

What is a problem, is that the old system is still chuntering along trying to force people to do work, but no longer has work for them to done. So it’s actually striving to put people out of work, while simultaneously punishing people for being out of work.

Essentially there’s a dude standing behind you with a whip, shouting at you to build that pyramid… But they finished building it last year using a jcb.

Automation doesn’t take work from people- it takes away the need for people to work. That’s only half of the process. Essentially we’ve built the tech, we’ve not addressed the morality. Quite a common problem, hard engineering is easier than social engineering.

THM…. from what I’ve read between country income inequality has reduced but within country inequality….globally….has increased.

Yes and no. Yes to the first bit, the more accurate account of the second is that patterns of income inequality are returning to more normal patterns. Apply some historical perspective and you see that quite clearly. Of course, choose your starting point wisely and you can make your common (if misleading) conclusion. History tells you that the low levels of income inequality achieved in the mid 20C were an aberration rather than the norm. There is nothing particularly new about current levels of inequality – over time they are the norm not the exception. Go check….

If what I remember is correct, then you need to think about statistics properly.

You don’t, see above. But thanks for the advice any way. I will bear it in mind.

Again, utterly simplistic way of looking at the issue.

Why thank you. Why keep things simple when you can over complicate and mislead?

The problem is that the rate of change is forecasted by some to be unprecedented and the effects of this are expected to cause massive social issues. It would probably be wise to consider social polices that aim to reduce any resultant social unrest.

Consultant poppycock led by the likes of Tom Peters and the Thriving on Chaos school many years ago. Again history tells us that there is nothing unprecedented about the current rate of change indeed it is far less significant than other periods. It keeps snake oil consultants happy, but is incorrect for most of us.

The policy that affects Europe the most and has created massive income inequality and suffering is the folly of the single currency. Let’s address that one first. BTW, I have long around that social unrest will bring about the eventual collapse of the single currency in Europe and that is probably still valid.

What’s harder – to replicate the knowledge of a doctor or the physical skill of a plumber?

Doctors won’t be around for long, or the legal profession. The whole upper-middle class knowledge based professions will be gone before they know they’re even under threat.

And when the dust settles there’ll just be us directionless arty farty airy fairy types who didn’t do vocational degrees, we’ll be the ones who laugh loudest and longest. Haaaaaaaa! Turns out I did have a career plan all along. I just didn’t know what it was til now

Bow down to the New Effete Elite all you professionally qualified lowlifes with letters after your names from what you term ‘proper degrees’. All thats required now is for us to….. oooo, whats that out of the window? Awwww thats nice…….

What was i talking about?

But footflaps’ B, C and D aren’t just programs to do a job – they are systems that need people to provide input and process output; but more importantly they are probably allowing the business to do new businessy things that it couldn’t do before. And those new things will require people to do the business. There’s no business I can think of that doesn’t require any human input.

They’re normally stuff no one has thought about before and once automated enhance productivity, so you don’t do yourself out of a job, you just keep adding value / improving productivity….

we still struggle to compete with China and the US where the culture is to work like dogs

Really? They are at work for long hours, but not very productive. One of my favourite and quite representative photos of a Huawei engineer hard at work:

[url=https://flic.kr/p/7TvMvx]Huawei engineer hard at work[/url] by brf, on Flickr

They ship 100s of them out to customer sites and then they sit around asleep not fixing any of the issues…

Saying nobody is entitled to a job is a bit harsh but nobody is entitled to keep doing the job they are doing now for life. Things change

Hmm, yes. Perhaps what we need is an organisation to oversee the way the economy and society is changing, to make sure that people don’t get shat on too much. To come up with new ideas for how to keep everyone working where they are needed and where their skills can be put to use, and provide new ones. Something that is not simply a market, because people are not simply commodities. I would call it … Government 🙂

we still struggle to compete with China and the US where the culture is to work like dogs

They may not work like dogs but the do work for lower pay, fewer holidays and less employee benefits.

Hmm, yes. Perhaps what we need is an organisation to oversee the way the economy and society is changing, to make sure that people don’t get shat on too much. To come up with new ideas for how to keep everyone working where they are needed and where their skills can be put to use, and provide new ones. Something that is not simply a market, because people are not simply commodities. I would call it … Government

I would call it the Administration. Calling them Government leads them to believe they should have power over us. Wrong. They should be administering the affairs of the nation for the benefit of the majority. They are our servants, not vice versa.

If you like doublespeak 🙂

I’m just posting in favour of big government, to be honest. What we need is a modern approach to big government. I wish we would spend more time and effort getting government to work rather than simply paring it down. Capitalism is always going to end up with a lot of miserable people and only a few rich happy ones.

EDIT insufficiently checked capitalism, I mean.

I would call it the Administration. Calling them Government leads them to believe they should have power over us. Wrong. They should be administering the affairs of the nation for the benefit of the majority. They are our servants, not vice versa.

A name change is hardly going to affect behaviour of people who are holding the reins, and it’s not like career politicians/voracious climbers suddenly won’t know where to go.

They should be administering the affairs of the nation for the benefit of the majority all.

FTFY

*runs*

Yes and no. Yes to the first bit, the more accurate account of the second is that patterns of income inequality are returning to more normal patterns. Apply some historical perspective and you see that quite clearly. Of course, choose your starting point wisely and you can make your common (if misleading) conclusion. History tells you that the low levels of income inequality achieved in the mid 20C were an aberration rather than the norm. There is nothing particularly new about current levels of inequality – over time they are the norm not the exception. Go check….

You say that like a good thing – historically monarchies, witchburnings, executing turnip thieves and feudalism are perfectly normal.

So not only were you wrong about global inequality – in an attempt to backtrack you also outed your political ideologies here THM ie Darwin meets UKIP.

Tom +1000

20th Century has also given us such aberrations to the historical norm as life expectancy that goes beyond middle age, greater worldwide democracy, female suffrage, abolition of slavery in most of the world, curtailment of the absolute power of feudal masters, massively increased literacy and numeracy etc etc

THM’s argument is frankly bizarre

Tom, what an earth are you talking about? You do not even have to go back very far (we even debated this recently on another thread) to see that current levels of income inequality are by no means unusual in the UK or elsewhere. This is nothing to do with feudalism ect, that is tosh.

Please tell me about where I am wrong about global inequality? I would love to know, since by definition the world bank must be too. There is no backtracking at all. I merely presented an extra element to the suggested (incomplete) conclusions of the World Bank. I have made no reference to whether current levels are good/bad/anything else, so your final barb is misplaced. I have however stated a preference for a freedom to choose rather than blunt gov legislation in response in addition to my first point about the need for education and training as a better solution. I think you will find that this proposal crossed party politics.

Freedom of speech allows people,to make fools of themselves as they see fit. I will place your comments about UKIP in that category along with much of the above.

Olddog, feel free to look at the stats on income inequality over time. They are freely available and I have posted them before. Then repeat the “bizarre” comment as you see fit.

Why would it be surprising that certain existing jobs would disappear? It happens all the time. People adapt as they always have done.

Try telling that to a 55 year old miner.

Populations adapt, as they have always done. Individuals aren’t the same as populations.

Try telling that to a 55 year old miner.

I would, or should we pay them to keep going down a hole and scratch round at rocks all day long?

The bizarreness point is about calling back to historical analyses of inequality but ignoring the fact that the reduction in inequality should be seen alongside a load of other positive changes that have happened in the last 100 years or so.

All the things I mention would be seen as progress as opposed to an aberration to some historic natural order – so why should reductions in inequality not be seen in the same way.

I would also argue that increase in income and wealth inequality to “historic levels” would also lead to an erosion of other progress on such things as health and education – hopefully our imperfect democracies are well formed enough to stop this happening

Individuals adapt also, you have to otherwise you end up like the bitter old mine.

Tom, what an earth are you talking about? You do not even have to go back very far (we even debated this recently on another thread) to see that current levels of income inequality are by no means unusual in the UK or elsewhere. This is nothing to do with feudalism ect, that is tosh.

Please tell me about where I am wrong about global inequality? I would love to know, since by definition the world bank must be too. There is no backtracking at all. I merely presented an extra element to the suggested (incomplete) conclusions of the World Bank. I have made no reference to whether current levels are good/bad/anything else, so your final barb is misplaced. I have however stated a preference for a freedom to choose rather than blunt gov legislation in response in addition to my first point about the need for education and training as a better solution. I think you will find that this proposal crossed party politics.

The data I’ve seen was from the IMF.

Sorry that just confuses a simple soul ike me. I have made reference to the benefits of technology and positive changes – slightly tongue in cheek from page 1

Machines/tech are great – weekly shop done on-line in the middle of the night and delivered in the morning, no need to expensive encyclopedias, just google, ability to compare prices more freely putting power in the hands of the consumer, ability to see global news at an instant, read zillions of bike reviews at the flick of a switch, even debate cycling topics with hundreds of strangers, talk to relatives overseas with pictures and for free. Amazing stuff!

I have not argued that increases are good. Merely pointed out that there (1) is nothing unusual about current levels and seen from a different perspective (2) we have seen a reduction in inequality at the global level. Of course, linked to (2) is the issue of to what extent the low/middle paid workers in developed markets have been the main losers – the WB claims that this is WIP!

Tom, what an earth are you talking about?

I’m not Tom but I think he is questioning your reasoning.

This may be because what you are saying does seem a bit mental. If this isn’t your agruement then applogies but on the face of it you seem to be saying…

“Historically income inequanlity always used to be higher than it is now so we should ignore the fact it’s growing again. There is nothing wrong with high income inequality becuase that is how it has always been.”

Now I’d have some sympathy for an arguement that says the current trend is just regression to the mean and we are worrying about nothing, but a)that doesn’t seem to be what you are arguing and b) It doesn’t appear that the current trend is regression to the mean.

We havn’t seen a reduction in inequality at a global level, just between country inequality.

There’s a massive elephant sized difference between that and general inequality throughout the world that should be measured via within country income inequality. That has got worse.

should we pay them to keep going down a hole and scratch round at rocks all day long?

Are you saying there is no demand for coal ?