Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Why isn’t new technology making us more productive?

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

11–20 of 603 posts

Re: Why isn’t new technology making us more productive?

#11

Post by adolph »

Bubble_Pop_22 wrote: post #3
uejfiweun wrote: post #2

I have a hard time believing this thesis that modern technology doesn't help productivity. Think about CRM software. Could you imagine having to go through hundreds of filing cabinets and massive systems just to get information about a customer? What about 100 SDRs doing this at the same time, every day? How about trying to meet with someone on the other side of the country? Or having to hire hundreds of assembly lin…

All the productivity gains are nullified by a drop in risk-taking.

+ increased "compliance" measures

Re: Why isn’t new technology making us more productive?

#12

Post by mensetmanusman »

After a certain threshold, it is clear that human behavior exhibits many types of compensations, risk compensation as one, but I’m sure (from my personal experience) that there is productivity compensation.

Analysis done over the last century across many countries show that everyone is working fewer hours per year as we transition from an agricultural to a knowledge based economy; this likely means that people want to relax and that new productivity gains will be compensated by fewer working hours and more relaxation.

Re: Why isn’t new technology making us more productive?

#14

Post by ALittleLight »

uejfiweun wrote: post #2

I have a hard time believing this thesis that modern technology doesn't help productivity. Think about CRM software. Could you imagine having to go through hundreds of filing cabinets and massive systems just to get information about a customer? What about 100 SDRs doing this at the same time, every day? How about trying to meet with someone on the other side of the country? Or having to hire hundreds of assembly lin…

I think the non-super rich see a lot of advantages from the modern economy. As an example, just yesterday, I was picking up an order at Walmart. The guy who brought the bags to my car had Airpods in. The existence of Airpods (and phones, Internet, Bluetooth, streaming services, etc) may not have made this guy more productive, but it probably improves his life somewhat.

Re: Why isn’t new technology making us more productive?

#17

Post by gumby »

wvenable wrote: post #10
uejfiweun wrote: post #2

I have a hard time believing this thesis that modern technology doesn't help productivity. Think about CRM software. Could you imagine having to go through hundreds of filing cabinets and massive systems just to get information about a customer? What about 100 SDRs doing this at the same time, every day? How about trying to meet with someone on the other side of the country? Or having to hire hundreds of assembly lin…

I'm not sure how they're measuring productivity. From my own experience as a software developer, I've seen how software makes individuals more productive. But the end result of this productivity is not 2x as much output overall but 0.5x as many people to achieve the same level of productivity. We're decreasing costs but maybe the market doesn't need 2x or 5x more productivity. There just isn't that kind of demand any…

"Productivity" means "amount of input required to get a given output." I think you might be thinking of "productivity" as a synonym for "output".

Usually in economics the input is labor hours, but for example "energy intensity" is the productivity of how much energy a process uses. In the macroeconomic case it's GDP divided by total energy used, but some industries are more energy intensive than others -- they have lower productivity from their energy use.

Thus 2X the output and same output with 1/2 the people are identical: both describe doubling productivity.

Re: Why isn’t new technology making us more productive?

#18

Post by lifeisstillgood »

I am actually writing a book about this - and my thesis is "software literacy". Software is a form of literacy and people need to a) be literate b) have tools and permissions and culture to allow people to basically code their own solutions.

Most large companies have a sort of process-killing-glass-ceiling where only excel spreadsheets can pass through.

Re: Why isn’t new technology making us more productive?

#19

Post by deanCommie »

There is an infamous anecdote from the turn/mid of the 20th century:

People believed that innovations in vacuum cleaners, washing machines, etc would cause people to have more leisure time because of how much time it saved in cleaning.

But it didn't happen. Why?

Because people's expectations for hygiene and cleanliness went up. And as it became easier to clean houses and clothes, people were more comfortable with having larger houses, and more clothes.

Technology innovation is much the same way. As capabilities increase so do expectations. And the "economy" is all about expectations and aspirations.

Post reply on HN