The question of whether automation causes unemployment to rise in the long run is addressed in detail here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relationship_of_automation_to_u... TL;DNR for the Wikipedia article: People have worried about machines putting humans out of work for centuries. But the unemployment rate has not risen steadily over the same period even as technology has constantly grown. The long term trend (measu…
Well, to take another example, we don't use horses for labor anymore...Some part of the labor force -has- been replaced.
Just out of curiosity, what happened to all the horses that were left without jobs?
There is theory and there is practice. Before suggesting any additional funds for SBA loans, I would suggest you read David Einhorn's book "Fooling Some Of The People All of the Time". In short, when the govt. guarantees loans, loan standards go down and fraud goes up. Yes, there are checks and balances in place but motivated parties find ways to scam the system. It is a travesty how much wastage there is in the proc…
Perhaps if it were a national system that is centrally-controlled and disbursed end-to-end, fraud could be rampant; but if it were placed in a credit union-type "trusts" managed by each participating states, it would cut down alot more on the inherent single-point-of-fraud scenarios you envision, or at the very least contain it to the few fraudulent areas.
In 5 years all of those trusts will have merged into Small Business Loans of America Corporation, and all the loans will be sold on the derivatives market within a month of origination, and an army of loan brokers will individual figure out how to massage the paperwork originate a bogus loan and collect a commission.
We've done this already.
At best, we might have the benefit of the fraud benefiting a million individuals, like in the housing bubble, instead of a handful, like in the S&L days.
This is why I'm so against the luddite regulations of liberals - they stagnate innovation. Obsession over jobs is a terrible mentality - restructuring is extremely healthy and necessary part of economic growth, and trying to stop it is only going to hurt things. People should be learning skills that are actually useful instead of doing robotic tasks all their lives. Robots will soon be replacing robotic people.
Your statement is disjointed and impossible to follow. Both parties are obsessing over jobs, and both parties have different ways to "fix" this problem. If you want to discuss regulations, lets discuss how the lack of regulation led to the housing bubble and the near collapse of our entire economy. If you want to talk about "robotic" jobs, please discuss how this is supposed to change? Do you want the government to p…
Downvote me all you want so you don't have to face the truth. But if you truly want prosperity, you can't listen to the liars that got us into the problem, you have to listen to the people that knew there was a problem and had a plan to get out.
http://www.ronpaul.com/2008-09-26/ron-paul-on-the-housing-bu...
I'm in my mid-30s. Sure it happened in the 80s - but i was a kid then. What was different about Nu Labour is that they sold snake oil too, a false promise of degree== job. Thatcher was heartless, but she never lied like that. She just said, get on with it.
I'm 40. My point is not that Thatcher was heartless, but that while she was busy privatizing a variety of state-owned UK companies (most of which desperately needed to be have their monopolies abolished), she also triggered a recurring asset-inflation/deflation cycle and popularized the idea of getting rich quick through trading up repeatedly. This culminated in a real-estate boom (& bust) after people were given per…
It was not just a mistake, it was a deliberate attempt to monkey with the unemployment figures before an election! One the electorate fell for. Of course you could make exactly the same case about Thatcher boosting her popularity by winning the Falklands War.
The Nu Labour "project" was very cynically about power for the sake of power, using techniques hitherto reserved for selling consumer goods and pop music. Thatcher, for all her faults, was a true believer in what later became known as Thatcherism. Blair and Brown were so intent on power their whole political careers that they had absolutely no idea what to do when they got it!
I think you're mixing multiple issues into one big ball of yarn. A solid case can be made that America's biggest problem right now is our populations inability to think critically. "here, take this loan with fluctuatings interest rates that only lasts 5 years. don't worry you can refinance in 5 years after your house is worth more". "Don't worry about eating well or exercising, here are some pills that will solve it…
That isn't a solid case for our population's inability to think critically, it's a solid case for the problems caused by the necessity of specialization in a highly complex society. In nearly every interaction outside our chosen areas of expertise, we are all on the wrong end of an information asymmetry. Expecting everyone in society to have at least an intermediate level of expertise in is not the solution. Here's a…
Somewhat related, but when I had issues with my heart, had I blindly followed what my doctor said and not done due diligence, I would have missed a very critical parameter that had to be fixed. The doc (multiple doctors, actually) never suggested the tests, I did my research and found it out, with some push got the test prescribed, lo and behold! That test was positive and was a primary reason for my ill health. Does everyone need to have an understanding of these things? I don't know, but it probably saved me from another heart attack for sure!
I agree with everything you said but the #1 obstacle to owning you own business is seed capital. You don't have to be a genius or rich to start a company, but you do have to be willing to take a potentially big financial risk to do so. People fresh out of college don't have 20k to live off of for 6 months before they can turn a profit on a business. The average household has 10k+ in debt; those people cannot start a…
I don't think seed money is the problem. You start a company in the cloud using basic plans that total to $0/month.
Back in 2006 my brother and I started a business with $0 upfront cost.
1and1 at the time was running a deal for 3 years free hosting. We made a site on there, put up AdSense, made enough money to buy a domain. Then made enough money to upgrade to paid shared hosting, and then dedicated hosting. It's still profitable today.
> Queue I'd understand this better if people didn't always pick the longer word when the short one would be correct.
I believe this particular usage of queue is correct english. You can see it on the TV show "So You Think You Can Dance" where Nigel will often say "queue music" meaning "start the music." 'Queue' is not quite a direct replacement for 'see', there is an additional nuance that what follows it is obvious or inevitable, which is why I used it. I also understand that many HN readers are not native English speakers, and ha…
It's probably clear enough that the word you were searching for is cue, but it strikes me that in the age of Instapaper, ReadItLater and their ilk, your use of queue isn't entirely off the mark.
I think the example to take here is the German education system: They were proponents of the idea that college isn't the only way. They had a second option, which is vocational school. These often have no tuition. This is the type of school you don't usually go to 5 days a week. Instead, you split that time between school and apprenticeship (i.e. internship). That way, you're forced to see the industry from day 1 and…
> "Edit: Now that I think about it, on a slightly unrelated note, why don't universities have mandatory internships anymore? The more, the better." Some do. I went to the University of Waterloo - it's well known for its co-op system (i.e. internships). The program I was under put you through 5-6 4-month internships before you could graduate. Linky McLink: http://cecs.uwaterloo.ca/ I have to say, it is by far the best…
Not at all. Internships are a valid option (well, as long as they're paid), but they certainly are not the only option. You could be contributing to one of the open source projects out there, participating in research on campus, or doing inter-professional projects if your school offers them.
When it comes to education and employment, there is no single right way of doing things.