Quote (Kayeto @ Nov 6 2020 09:55am)
I think there's a distinction between "automation" vs. what I'm talking about, which is the more general idea that machines have been increasingly carrying the load for humanity. My examples of furnaces and guns aren't something we would refer to as automation, but they have fed into the idea that humans shouldn't do the heavy lifting of supporting themselves.
If "automation" was here in 2020 to bridge the resource gap that was lost by the dissolution of the middle class and their careers in production jobs (like steel mills), then I wouldn't have any negative feelings. But right now we are staring down the barrel of the foreseeable future being a declining economy.
the context maybe you're missing is that while machines continually DISPLACED labor throughout human history (cotton gin replaced cotton sorters, baseball seamers replaced baseball seamstresses, electric car replaced buggy cab drivers, etc) automation in hte modern era isnt labor displacing, its labor replacing.
the actual number of labor hours available to the american people will lower year after year, as it has been for some time. whereas before this wasnt true, labor hours was always increasing, even as certain jobs were automated. also, corporate america could take the labor hours we have no and cut them into pieces in a matter of years, they just wont because then they lose consumers. and also would have to pay for it themselves. instead they do it slow, avoid panic, and the US tax payer slowly pays for their own demise.