The efficiency of our production is rising for centuries indeed. Once, a peon on a field could hardly produce for his own family, a modern day farmer can supply food for thousands of people.
Same can be seen in almost all industries.
For centuries this trend was offset with appearance of new kinds of production. New fields opened new markets and new places for work.
Lets ignore the current situation and ponder where does it lead us. It is inevitable that in the future most of day-to-day stuff we use will be produced by robots with minimal up to none human oversight.
There is only that much that we can consume. There is only that much of different kinds of produciton we can require. And we can not all be working in a creative capacity, inventing new stuff and inventing new markets. Inavitably a day will come when it will be technologically possible to supply all day-to-day the needs of world's population with stuff and services supplied mostly by robots.
What will happen then?
From several hundreds years ago, when people produced mostly for themselves, to the distant future when we all be serviced by robots and efficient production chains we see a definite trend. Somewhere along the path there should be disruptive events for this to happen, when a 'tension' produced by efficiency leads to massive losses of jobs.
For most of the time during the whole history the argument "it is not different then the previous time it happen" will be valid, but there will be definitely times it wont be the case. And it is possible that now is one of those times. Rise in effeciency must lead to loss of jobs eventurally. May be the time is now.
Oh, and this future is not necesserily a very dark one. After all, having most stuff produced effectively only means that most of the population will not have to work. Mey be it will lead to large portion of the population being a "dead weight", burning their life in leasure, and small energetic minority engaging in moving us forward, I don't know. May be it will lead to a large production 'surplus' that we will use to colonize the solar system and beyond? May be something else...
But I think we need to start thinking of what the society will look like when most people will not have to work to lead a decent life? What incentives will we need to invent to still have enough people to move forward? How to prevent degradation? I don't think artificial limits on automation and technology is the answer, but we might eventually come to this. I can see a politician introducing a SaveTheJobsBill to outlaw massively automated factories. We need to start thinking about it now, before it actually happens.
Same can be seen in almost all industries.
For centuries this trend was offset with appearance of new kinds of production. New fields opened new markets and new places for work.
Lets ignore the current situation and ponder where does it lead us. It is inevitable that in the future most of day-to-day stuff we use will be produced by robots with minimal up to none human oversight.
There is only that much that we can consume. There is only that much of different kinds of produciton we can require. And we can not all be working in a creative capacity, inventing new stuff and inventing new markets. Inavitably a day will come when it will be technologically possible to supply all day-to-day the needs of world's population with stuff and services supplied mostly by robots.
What will happen then?
From several hundreds years ago, when people produced mostly for themselves, to the distant future when we all be serviced by robots and efficient production chains we see a definite trend. Somewhere along the path there should be disruptive events for this to happen, when a 'tension' produced by efficiency leads to massive losses of jobs.
For most of the time during the whole history the argument "it is not different then the previous time it happen" will be valid, but there will be definitely times it wont be the case. And it is possible that now is one of those times. Rise in effeciency must lead to loss of jobs eventurally. May be the time is now.
Oh, and this future is not necesserily a very dark one. After all, having most stuff produced effectively only means that most of the population will not have to work. Mey be it will lead to large portion of the population being a "dead weight", burning their life in leasure, and small energetic minority engaging in moving us forward, I don't know. May be it will lead to a large production 'surplus' that we will use to colonize the solar system and beyond? May be something else...
But I think we need to start thinking of what the society will look like when most people will not have to work to lead a decent life? What incentives will we need to invent to still have enough people to move forward? How to prevent degradation? I don't think artificial limits on automation and technology is the answer, but we might eventually come to this. I can see a politician introducing a SaveTheJobsBill to outlaw massively automated factories. We need to start thinking about it now, before it actually happens.