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How can startups destroy more jobs?

danielharan.posterous.com

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Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#21

Post by cabalamat »

wisty wrote: post #10
danielharan wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I actually used to work in one. A couple years after I left, the center relocated to another province. It was a shit job. As a society we're not doing a great job of helping workers move on. In any case, it really shouldn't be up to startups to protect jobs, any more than car companies had to compensate carriage manufacturers or nail factories helped blacksmiths.

As a society, we do a terrible job at helping workers move on. You go to school for 12 years, then possibly uni for 3-7, then are unlikely to receive more than a couple of months of formal training throughout the rest of your life, even if you change careers . Virtually nobody does a university course after graduating. I don't think that's because university is useless (though there is room for improvement), or that…

I agree. I'd make more sense for many career paths if people did maybe 1 year university, then work for maybe 5 years, then 6 months uni, work for 5 years, etc.

Why do all undergraduate courses last the same length of time? Not because the amount of time it takes to master every subject is the same, but because of administrative convenience.

Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#22

Post by rdl »

tomjen3 wrote: post #19
danielharan wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That triangle ignores worker productivity and resource efficiency. To prevent pollution, we need workers producing LED lights instead of wasteful incandescents or mercury-laden (and ugly) compact fluorescents.

Have you actually used an LED light? I have - and they are insanely expensive (okay thats to be expected) but what is worse is that they give very, very little light, not enough to light even a dinner table, let alone a small room. Those compact fluorescent lights? Yeah not only do they flicker (which is bad for your eyes, even though it is not fast enough that you can see them just like the old CRT monitors) and the…

You're right that LEDs aren't there yet in terms of price, but in new installations where you build LED lighting in rather than trying to retrofit existing incandescent fixtures with LED bulbs, you can get some amazing lighting with LED which isn't possible any other way.

On the environment, the low hanging fruit is to make electricity incredibly cheap -- I want PV solar and wind for grid resilience, but huge nuclear fission (U-233/Thorium, or reprocessing of U-235/Pu-239) using standardized designs in large quantities.

Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#23

Post by rick888 »

danielharan wrote: post #14
trotsky wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am struggling to understand how this whole thing doesn't boil down to "we should eliminate jobs that I used to do and hated, and get more people doing jobs like the ones I enjoy and have now"

Lots of career paths (not necessarily jobs!) add value to society, and I'm not about to do them. Daycare worker? They should be paid WAY more given the value they provide. Even if the salary was higher than mine, there's no way I would consider that as an option. Conversely, there are lots of dirty, dangerous and demeaning jobs I've never held which don't seem worth it. How many people die in coal mines every year? W…

"If anyone figures out how to use robots to entirely automate their job or engineers manage to make wind and solar scale up cheaply, I would say that's a net positive for humanity."

The unions have prevented many jobs from being automated.

Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#24

Post by danielharan »

tome wrote: post #18
stretchwithme wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are only finite natural resources if you're talking about a fixed number of atoms of each variety being available on the earth, but we don't have finite resources. We are creating new things all the time that lessen our need to consume natural resources. And if we stopped subsidizing consumption, we'd see even more such creativity. Any natural resource that gets scarcer even as demand for it increases naturally…

As use of a resource becomes more efficient the rate of consupmtion actually increases not decreases: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox

It's an unproven proposition, and usually only applied to industry. If my refrigerator is more efficient, I won't buy a second one. A more efficient car might give me an incentive to drive more, but that seems really marginal.

Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#25

Post by HeyLaughingBoy »

tomjen3 wrote: post #19
danielharan wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That triangle ignores worker productivity and resource efficiency. To prevent pollution, we need workers producing LED lights instead of wasteful incandescents or mercury-laden (and ugly) compact fluorescents.

Have you actually used an LED light? I have - and they are insanely expensive (okay thats to be expected) but what is worse is that they give very, very little light, not enough to light even a dinner table, let alone a small room. Those compact fluorescent lights? Yeah not only do they flicker (which is bad for your eyes, even though it is not fast enough that you can see them just like the old CRT monitors) and the…

This is a problem with LED lights, but it's not a problem with the technology.

LED are expensive now, but the price/performance ratio and efficiency are improving rapidly. And as the other poster said, when designed in properly into new installations they can have excellent performance. But their lighting and heat dissipation characteristics are so different that they really don't do well when retrofitted into fixtures that were designed for incandescents or fluorescents.

The problem is that most of the "LED bulb replacements" and fixtures available to the consumer now are low-efficiency, expensive incandescent replacements that only exist to capture the buyer's money, not to offer better performance.

Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#26

Post by eru »

danielharan wrote: post #24
tome wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As use of a resource becomes more efficient the rate of consupmtion actually increases not decreases: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox

It's an unproven proposition, and usually only applied to industry. If my refrigerator is more efficient, I won't buy a second one. A more efficient car might give me an incentive to drive more, but that seems really marginal.

People who hadn't brought refrigerators before, might be a first one, though. And if there are extremely efficient, we might even switch to living inside refrigerators [1] in summer.

[1] Some people already do.

Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#27

Post by maigret »

cabalamat wrote: post #21
wisty wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a society, we do a terrible job at helping workers move on. You go to school for 12 years, then possibly uni for 3-7, then are unlikely to receive more than a couple of months of formal training throughout the rest of your life, even if you change careers . Virtually nobody does a university course after graduating. I don't think that's because university is useless (though there is room for improvement), or that…

I agree. I'd make more sense for many career paths if people did maybe 1 year university, then work for maybe 5 years, then 6 months uni, work for 5 years, etc. Why do all undergraduate courses last the same length of time? Not because the amount of time it takes to master every subject is the same, but because of administrative convenience.

Also because it has just been so. In the old times, you used to do the same thing as your parents, and capabilities didn't usually go obsolete during the course of one's work life, even less if that was at a college level.

Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#28

Post by [deleted] »

tome wrote: post #18
stretchwithme wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are only finite natural resources if you're talking about a fixed number of atoms of each variety being available on the earth, but we don't have finite resources. We are creating new things all the time that lessen our need to consume natural resources. And if we stopped subsidizing consumption, we'd see even more such creativity. Any natural resource that gets scarcer even as demand for it increases naturally…

As use of a resource becomes more efficient the rate of consupmtion actually increases not decreases: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox

[deleted]

Re: How can startups destroy more jobs?

#29

Post by stretchwithme »

tome wrote: post #18
stretchwithme wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are only finite natural resources if you're talking about a fixed number of atoms of each variety being available on the earth, but we don't have finite resources. We are creating new things all the time that lessen our need to consume natural resources. And if we stopped subsidizing consumption, we'd see even more such creativity. Any natural resource that gets scarcer even as demand for it increases naturally…

As use of a resource becomes more efficient the rate of consupmtion actually increases not decreases: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jevons_paradox

It is true that when a resource is difficult to use and produces little, its not in great demand. And when more efficient and productive ways to use it are found, the resource is more widely used.

But this doesn't mean that it will not become more expensive as it gets used up and more careful use of it will be made. Human nature will continue to function.

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