I think the root cause of most of these problems, is that most people don't add economic value. That isn't to say they are bad people (of course not!), but that we have reached a stage in technology driven capitalism where only a small percentage of people can gain large pieces of the pie (software engineers and CEOs), while middle income jobs are too inefficient to survive (lawyers displaced by discovery software, accountants with TurboTax, truck drivers etc.). The jobs that are left available are all low skill and pay accordingly (it is hard to automate burger flippers, but people are trying).
All of this is being greatly exacerbated by climate change. As people consume more things and the worlds' resources are reduced there is a greater incentive to automate as once previous costs in production become too much. As fewer people are hired because of automation, there is less money to buy quality long lasting goods, so manufacturers aim to make cheap disposable products at scale to sell to the poor, thus exacerbating climate change.
All of this I think is pretty obvious. What I've just shown is only one of any number of negative feedback loops that are growing worse and will probably cause huge social conflicts and war. The interaction between poverty, populist governments, tariffs which increase in trade wars and more poverty is another good example.
Most people in the first world (>50%) by my estimation, will be net economic drains on society within 20-30 years because of technological advancement and globalization. We will also start to see mass starvation in the third world as climate change makes potable water rare and changes to regional climates disrupts food supply chains. We could very well see mass migration and conflict that will appear similar to what happened around the time of the Mongol invasion of Rome (again, migrants searching for food are obviously not bad people).
The issue is that in order to solve these problems we need to address root causes that are impossible to stop. Knowing the solution does not make enacting that solution any easier. The only steps that I can see that would solve these problems would be the following:
- People voluntarily stop having (as many or any) children worldwide.
- People stop eating meat. It is the number one greenhouse contributor, and it shameful that people eat meat (which requires farm animals to consume food in order to be made), while any other people go hungry.
- There is a basic needs allowance. We have enough resources to feed, cloth, and shelter everyone in the world and the lack of these resources is what causes the poor to take up arms. Show me a conflict and I'll find the people going hungry.
- The benefits of capital and technological automation have to be widely distributed. That means the profits as well.
But these are hard problems to solve, because it means convincing people to share. I don't think most people ever really learn how. The alternative to doing the hard work of sharing is to keep going down the path we're on now. Eventually there will be enough reports that all the increases to productivity only go to the rich for people to stop believing that hard work matters.
I don't know man. When I was younger I thought knowing the solution was enough, but as I get older I'm more and more convinced the world is a bad place because some people just suck.