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A disaster is looming for American men

washingtonpost.com

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Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#71

Post by tzs »

tuna-piano wrote: post #13
mohamedattahri wrote: post #2

> "Job destruction caused by technology is not a futuristic concern. It is something we have been living with for two generations" If American thought leaders such as Larry Summers think that technology destroys jobs and that it's a relatively recent phenomenon, then America is truly screwed.

I'll leave this here for those making the "technical unemployment" argument. After hundreds of years of virtually the same argument being made, I think the burden is on you to say why this time is different. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technological_unemployment#Pre...

Because this time the physical technology replacing jobs is not really new. It is largely old physical technology with better non-physical technology (e.g., software) added.

A self-driving car, for example, is just a regular car (old technology) with some servos attached (old technology) and a few sensors added (old technology) and a computer (old technology), with self-driving software (new technology).

Put a million drivers out of work with self-driving cars, and you don't open up a million jobs building self-driving cars. The number of cars needed doesn't go up much. The demand for servos and sensors goes up, but making those is largely automated already. Maybe some servo or sensor companies have to add another shift...so they hire a handful of humans to watch the machines on the new shift.

Before, when we replaced a human we were generally replacing him with a new machine. Now we are more just making the old machine that the human was operating operate without the human.

Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#72

Post by runako »

falcolas wrote: post #68
runako wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I kind of figured that would be a pushback, but I wanted to use a reproducible source (nerdwallet is more aggressive than Zillow and comes up with a higher number). And per realtor.com ~$1800/mo is about right for all-in (insurance, tax, etc.) in the Atlanta area in that price range. All that said, in Atlanta, 3 BR/2 BA houses are abundant in the under-$150k range. Or under $100k. It's really not approaching necessar…

Not really, once you include the other costs of living (and having children). $1.8k housing, plus $500 for property taxes and insurance, $1,000 for two vehicles (payments, insurance (damned teenage drivers), gas, maintenance), $500 into savings for household emergencies, $800 to feed four, $100 per person for clothing, the occasional ice cream, paying off medical deductables... and you're quickly looking at needing o…

Right -- the $1,800 was inclusive of property taxes and insurance ("all-in"). And again -- there are great houses available for under half that ($900/mo all-in).

(Random nitpick: if you're earning the median income, paying a mortgage while contributing to retirement; and have 2 kids, you are not paying anything close to 30% of your income in income taxes.)

Also you are right that if you save ~30% of your median income ($500 + 10% savings + 10% retirement), the month-to-month gets a little tighter. But then you can retire early. :-)

I'm not arguing that everything is roses, just that tens of millions of people live at the median income and own houses, cars, etc.

You'd have done much better here arguing about the costs of childcare or higher education. Those are a bloodbath, no matter where you are.

Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#73

Post by tdb7893 »

knieveltech wrote: post #18
tdb7893 wrote: post #5

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's all just this century's Luddites

Nonsense. I encourage you to point out a single industry that has cropped up in the last 50 years that generates large numbers of high paying jobs that aren't subject to being automated away. In 1985 people freaking out about computers and networking was luddite behavior. Where are the 3.5 million currently un-filled jobs waiting for the truck drivers who are about to lose their careers en masse?

I don't know. So far unemployment due to more efficient technical advances hasn't lead to overall structural unemployment so I'm not too worried in the long term. For example if we can ship goods much more efficiently it could lead to increase in production of goods, mining of raw materials, even the service industry as people have more disposable income and that's not even counting the jobs running and maintaining the autonomous fleet. I'm not saying the short term might be kinda hard but long term the economy will adjust.

Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#74

Post by internaut »

danieltillett wrote: post #55
hrgeek wrote: post #19

Disaster is already here. In the 1950's you could raise a family with 2.3 children on a 40 hour work week. Today, families are struggling to make ends meet with 60-70+ hour work weeks. Technology was supposed to have made things more efficient. It seems to have had the opposite effect.

The decline happened when the rich realised that expropriation was no longer a risk. The aftermath of the Great War (the rise of communism and the Great Depression) scared the owners of capital into giving a much larger share of production to labor (the split went from 50-50 to 70-30). By the late 1960s the risk of expropriation had gone and so capital owners started taking back their share until we are now back to 5…

Capitalists coordinating together to not make money?

Not sure that is possible.

Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#75

Post by kamaal »

jewel wrote: post #38
hrgeek wrote: post #19

Disaster is already here. In the 1950's you could raise a family with 2.3 children on a 40 hour work week. Today, families are struggling to make ends meet with 60-70+ hour work weeks. Technology was supposed to have made things more efficient. It seems to have had the opposite effect.

The average home size in the 1950s was just 953 square feet. Now it's 2500 square feet. You likely would have a single car. Your utility bill would be a lot lower (no internet, no cable, no air conditioning). You'd eat a lot of home-cooked meals, have a serious vegetable garden, would sew and mend your own clothes, etc. You wouldn't need to pay for your own clothes. I suspect it's quite possible to raise a family on…

This seems to be the case in every country today.

Basically the definition of 'comfort' underwent a huge upgrade without a equivalent upgrade in the perception of costs that would go to afford them. This is largely happening because people are using the term 'working-class' and 'middle-class' to measure to make different measurements in different times.

Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#76

Post by slededit »

Kurimo wrote: post #52
runako wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Today, it takes nearly 2x the median household income to get something resembling that kind of life. In some cities. In other cities, that's just not true. Example: in Atlanta, GA, the median income is right over $55k. According to Zillow, that will get you a house in the $227k range. There are tons of single-family houses with yards in that price range (or even half that) in the city. I ran similar math for Dallas…

If you buy a house in the $227k range on a $55k income (With NO insurance and NO property taxes, the monthly payment would be ~$1,736.53), you will have to live very carefully to get by comfortably (considering $55k after federal/georgia taxes would net about $41,013.75, your monthly takehome would be $3,7k leaving you Zillow and other home pushers are interested in selling houses, not in the consequences for the buy…

Where do your numbers come from? I bought a condo for $225,000 and the mortgage is $1,000 including property taxes and insurance. Even with Condo fees its still less than $1,300.

Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#77

Post by danieltillett »

internaut wrote: post #74
danieltillett wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The decline happened when the rich realised that expropriation was no longer a risk. The aftermath of the Great War (the rise of communism and the Great Depression) scared the owners of capital into giving a much larger share of production to labor (the split went from 50-50 to 70-30). By the late 1960s the risk of expropriation had gone and so capital owners started taking back their share until we are now back to 5…

Capitalists coordinating together to not make money? Not sure that is possible.

Of course they can do this. Nothing like facing a revolution to concentrate the mind. The rich handled this whole risk very well once they realised revolution was a real possibility.

The only thing that amazes me is how strategic they were in handling the situation and how they were willing to sacrifice income and power for generations to win the class war. They are certainly being advised by the best minds available.

Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#78

Post by carsongross »

jewel wrote: post #38
hrgeek wrote: post #19

Disaster is already here. In the 1950's you could raise a family with 2.3 children on a 40 hour work week. Today, families are struggling to make ends meet with 60-70+ hour work weeks. Technology was supposed to have made things more efficient. It seems to have had the opposite effect.

The average home size in the 1950s was just 953 square feet. Now it's 2500 square feet. You likely would have a single car. Your utility bill would be a lot lower (no internet, no cable, no air conditioning). You'd eat a lot of home-cooked meals, have a serious vegetable garden, would sew and mend your own clothes, etc. You wouldn't need to pay for your own clothes. I suspect it's quite possible to raise a family on…

Yes, we've made economic progress. Look at the productivity-per-capita numbers.

Yes, we should still be able to afford raising a family of five with one wage earner.

Re: A disaster is looming for American men

#80

Post by r00fus »

jewel wrote: post #38
hrgeek wrote: post #19

Disaster is already here. In the 1950's you could raise a family with 2.3 children on a 40 hour work week. Today, families are struggling to make ends meet with 60-70+ hour work weeks. Technology was supposed to have made things more efficient. It seems to have had the opposite effect.

The average home size in the 1950s was just 953 square feet. Now it's 2500 square feet. You likely would have a single car. Your utility bill would be a lot lower (no internet, no cable, no air conditioning). You'd eat a lot of home-cooked meals, have a serious vegetable garden, would sew and mend your own clothes, etc. You wouldn't need to pay for your own clothes. I suspect it's quite possible to raise a family on…

You know what, We'd get by without most of those things (obviously no Internet would be painful).

However, due to both me and my wife working, we can't afford to properly raise our own kids, grow a veggie garden (plot size is too small) or sew/mend our clothes.

We have 1400 sqft, don't have air conditioning, don't have cable, and if only one of us had to work, heck, we could do with only one car (bikes were a thing back then and we aimed for a good wike/balk score when purchasing).

I think a lot of the "upgrades to life" are simply the consequence of busier lives, not exactly better ones.

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