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Average Is Over

nytimes.com

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Re: Average Is Over

#41

Post by joelrunyon »

simonh wrote: post #30
dave_sullivan wrote: post #10

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. I think he's right about many things there: manufacturing jobs are leaving and not coming back. Automation is becoming more and more advanced, particularly if you factor advances in robotics and ml since 2006 or so. Things move faster and average just doesn't seem to cut it when you can manufacture excellence. Hell, lawyers and doctors will be next, how about faux ai that c…

>how about faux ai that can write simple web apps or come up with good designs? A major class of workers that software has a tendency of replacing is programmers themselves. Bespoke solutions are replaced by what used to be called shrink-wrapped applications. In the web area, look at how services such as Squarespace replace bespoke sites by providing easy to use site design tools.

Isn't the solution here to get better skills and stay ahead of the "average" curve?

Re: Average Is Over

#42

Post by [deleted] »

_delirium wrote: post #39
exit wrote: post #3

did you mean to link to the comment field in particular, or the entire article? in any case, it reminded me of http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_income_guarantee

I tend to agree with that solution, though I think there are more and less sustainable vs. conflict-inducing ways of structuring it. The simplest way is just to pay out cash collected from taxes, but that's always subject to conflict around "my tax money going to support lazy bums" type stuff, and easy to cut (or fiddle with in various ways to meet other budgetary goals). More sustainable basic incomes tend to be str…

[deleted]

Re: Average Is Over

#43

Post by mindcrime »

wavephorm wrote: post #15

Welcome to Peak Capitalism. This is the peak of our current socio-economic system, and I'm fairly certain that everyone in the White House is now well-aware and convinced of what's likely going to happen over the course of the next 10 years. I hope they're preparing for it right now. I believe the coming collapse of the capitalistic-democractic system is imminent, and America needs to very seriously start planning fo…

I still haven't seen any convincing argument that socialism is going to result in anything besides "trickle up poverty." How that's supposed to be better than what we have now remains a mystery to me.

I'm also unconvinced that the basic premise of this entire discussion (that technology is going to completely obviate the need for human labor) is sound. Alarmists have been crying this out since at least the Luddites[1] and it hasn't come true yet. But since economies tend to be cyclic, and since we are in the midst of a pronounced (and unfortunately long) downturn right now, it's hard to say if the current malaise is just a "local minimum" of sorts, or an actual sign of some long-term trend. My feeling is that it's more the former than the latter.

[1]: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Luddite

Re: Average Is Over

#44

Post by muyuu »

mtts wrote: post #18

Ridiculous. The solution to average people becoming less relevant in the economy (which I don't dispute, btw) can of course never be to make everyone above average as that is by definition impossible. It's a feel good message for average folk that papers over the truth, which is that average folk that used to make a decent living doing average work will become poor. All of them, eventually. How poor exactly? Well, yo…

The solution is none. There is no "solution" because it, in itself, is not a problem. The problem is that everybody feels entitled to a top 10% salary and many would kill for "their fair share" when nowadays even the lower 10% have their basic needs covered and some left for leisure.

The problem is that a society where everybody have similar incomes is somehow fairer, when there is no logical chain leading there and to top it off it causes ruination. Did cause it already just after industrial revolution, when this disparity in productivity first became natural, and does more and more now.

Having everyone highly educated would solve many things. Not salary disparity though, as it isn't a problem in the first place. The problem is having a significant chunk of the population hungry or homeless. This can perfectly be eradicated "even" with a higher disparity.

Re: Average Is Over

#45

Post by mtts »

hammerdr wrote: post #23
dave_sullivan wrote: post #10

I've been thinking about this a lot lately. I think he's right about many things there: manufacturing jobs are leaving and not coming back. Automation is becoming more and more advanced, particularly if you factor advances in robotics and ml since 2006 or so. Things move faster and average just doesn't seem to cut it when you can manufacture excellence. Hell, lawyers and doctors will be next, how about faux ai that c…

In the case of a "everything is automated, only a small portion of people are needed to produce essentials and even advance" society, would we just be better off with a system that relied on the altruism of the few to make the lives of everyone better and everyone else could just exist? That sort of society has a slew of issues that could be better explored in futurist science fiction (things such as psychologic issu…

I think you're already seeing societies like this in North Western Europe: large numbers of unproductive, uneducated and essentially useless people are kept fed, housed and clothed as that is the humane thing to do, but their lives are absolutely meaningless and empty (mostly - there are of course people who can make it work for themselves). Occasionally they revolt, like they did last summer in England, but even their revolts are absolutely meaningless and empty.

Re: Average Is Over

#46

Post by joelrunyon »

Better titled

Average is looking less attractive than it did 10 years ago

There will always be a place for average. However, I don't think it's going to be as attractive of a place to be as it has been. It's going to be much more costly to try and coast through life.

Re: Average Is Over

#47

Post by joelrunyon »

joelrunyon wrote: post #46

Better titled Average is looking less attractive than it did 10 years ago There will always be a place for average. However, I don't think it's going to be as attractive of a place to be as it has been. It's going to be much more costly to try and coast through life.

It's also worth noting that it's never been as affordable or easy to escape "average" as it has been today - interestingly enough, thanks to technology.

Re: Average Is Over

#50

Post by ericd »

goatslacker wrote: post #20

Post high school education is overrated. In fact the American school system won't really prepare you to face the reality. Yes it seems like the need for these "average" jobs are decreasing but in the end it will all balance itself out and there will be new areas that would need to be filled.

It absolutely isn't overrated for many fields. Software is something of an exception, but I also think even coders usually benefit from formal training, which they're not really going to get in high school.
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