Wednesday, October 10, 2012

We've become too efficient for our own good

This problem goes back to the beginning of the industrial revolution. Back then it took two guys a whole day to cut down a tree. There was more work than people to do it. Horse and buggy was the order of the day. That was great for the horse breeders, carriage makers and buggy whip producers. It also provided jobs for poop scoopers and dead horse removers. Not so any more. What used to take three dozen guys a 10 hour shift 6 days a week to do can now be done in less than a day with a machine. Not saying that progress is a bad thing necessarily but it sure is putting stress on the population. Watching over the last few decades as the need for workers shrinks and with each new and more efficient method the need grows less. Steel mills that once employed thousands are now reduced to a skeleton crew all automated with one operator, a small clean up crew and a repair man or two. At one time entire floors of office buildings were filled with secretaries and typists who kept the lines of corporate communication open. Replaced with a cheap desktop and word processing app. Regular mail is dying and even the competition is feeling the pinch.

What's left when there's no need for the hoards of workers who built this country? A few glimmers of hope but manufacturing is just about gone. Service jobs are done mostly by immigrants legal or otherwise. No, it seems somebody's pulled the ladder to success up through the ceiling and onto the roof and they don't want any company up there. Really what's left? The medical field would seem to be a logical choice with an aging population but even there efficiencies have thinned the prospects. What used to take several hours to produce an xray now takes minutes and you don't need that much training with the new computer systems. There's computers. But that would take years of training and constant updating just to keep up with the changes. It's also being outsourced to far off lands at a lower cost. Even in the automotive field what used to take a high school diploma now requires ongoing high tech training. There was a time not long ago when you could do a tune up for $25 and it would take you an hour or less. Not so with today's cars. They have more computers than a NASSA rocket and good luck if your keyless entry system fails.

No we've gotten so efficient that there isn't a need for the scores of workers necessary to keep things going but there in lies the problem. No work equals no demand to produce more products which equals no work. A vicious downward cycle. But what this is doing at the moment is creating desperation and desperate people. Never before have I witnessed more scams, embezzlements, and cons. Our infrastructure is falling apart. It's time to get working before those with the knowledge die off or get too old to care.  

7 comments:

S.W. Anderson said...

You've cited a real and growing problem. On this side of the mountains where the highways are lined with large wheat farms, you rarely see more than one person driving one tractor or combine. At harvest time back in the day, large numbers of field hands were needed to get the crops in. They worked from dawn to dusk six and seven days a week, because there's a limited window of opportunity and the weather can ruin the whole thing overnight.

What we need to do in the short run is cut the standard work week. In the long run, we might need to pay some people who don't work right along with those who do, and instead of raising the retirement age, reduce it. The idea isn't to promote laziness or make people dependent on the government. It will be to maintain a decent standard of living and human environment for everyone. Some people love to work. They thrive on it. Others simply work to get by. They thrive on things like tying flies and going fishing, painting pictures or building a model train layout. Let the go getters go get. Let the rest do their thing as well, as long as it's not harmful to them or others. Consider transfer payments to the nonproductive (in commercial terms) the cost of having a civilized, decent community and country to live in.

This is a very different paradigm from the work ethic inculcated in most of us, but if automation and other efficiency measures continue to destroy jobs, we could have to adopt it. The alternative is periods of oppression, widespread poverty and high crime rates leading to periods of violent, destructive revolution.

BBC said...

I'm sorry I sold my autoparts store, they're more high tech now but I really liked that business.

Demeur said...

Problem is there are more who like to work than those who'd stay on the sidelines. It's a defining factor for most people. First question most people ask is what you do for a living?

You were right to sell that store Billy. The people now are clueless. Went in one time for a fly wheel and the gal behind the counter insisted I needed a flex band. I gave up the argument and took the car to a friend who owned a transmission shop. He put in a new fly wheel.

BBC said...

The gal behind the counter at the Auto Zone here is pretty damn sharp.

BBC said...

The manager at Auto Zone asked me to apply for part time work there, told him if I was going to work for an idiot it would be me.

Randal Graves said...

No way in hell I need to be in the library 40 hours a week. Twenty, max, then I could spend the other twenty exploring the human condition, like taking up photography, or watching Star Trek reruns.

The Blog Fodder said...

In Ukraine, still recovering from the Soviet era, things are pretty labour intensive. Like masses of women sweeping the streets with brooms and piling leaves using canvas sheets to carry them. Wages are extremely low and poverty is the ruling factor. In Soviet times everyone was employed (underemployed). They got a months holidays each year, more if they worked in the Arctic and travel was cheap, plus they were sent for two or three weeks to spas for preventative maintenance so to speak.