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We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

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Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#41

Post by AdamTReineke »

georgieporgie wrote: post #30

"Don’t fill potholes. That won’t fix the economy." I'm not certain of the author's intent, but the one and only way that government can actually create jobs is to improve infrastructure. A better transportation network built today will have payoffs 20 years down the line. Unfortunately, it's hard to build a political career on such long-term goals. One of my favorite Planet Money episodes deals with this: http://www.…

I read it more as a metaphorical pothole, like just patching small holes instead of fixing bigger problems.

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#42

Post by bprater »

dreamdu5t wrote: post #25
dreamdu5t wrote: post #2

LoL Don't fill the potholes? Who the fuck fills them then!?

Downvoted because my post is snarky? My point is factually valid. Public works DO create jobs, it's an empirical fact. Just because the OP hates the idea doesn't mean public works don't create jobs. Maybe he thinks UPS should fill the potholes, but either way, the only way to fill them is to hire people to fill them, whether the government or private business does it doesn't change the fact that someone was hired to…

Downvoted because it's not the kind of humor we prefer here. We enjoy well-thought out intellectual debate. You final paragraph here is what you should have posted initially -- it has substance.

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#43

Post by AdamTReineke »

tsotha wrote: post #34
AdamTReineke wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haven't we finally reached the point where all the discoveries of the Industrial Age and Information Age are coming together to enable companies to produce goods as efficiently as humanly possible? And won't advances in AI and robotics enable us to push beyond those human limits? I'd say that it hasn't in the past because up until 60 years ago, humans were the decision makers doing everything.

So what's the big technological difference between this year and, say, four years ago? Why was unemployment below 5% then?

I suppose my argument wouldn't hold if you look at just 4 years, but I think it would if you look over a few centuries, as pg noted.

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#44

Post by arohner »

pg wrote: post #24

"Our new economy is shrinking because technology leads to efficiency over growth." Anyone who wants to make the claim that technology is net killing jobs has to be prepared to answer the question: why now? Technology has been killing (but not net killing) jobs for centuries. It's possible that technology could start to net kill jobs. But why now, when it hasn't in the past?

I think a better way of putting would be "technology is killing old jobs, and people aren't stepping into the new jobs fast enough". The author is exactly right that the gov't and mainstream are trying to hold onto the old ways.

I think the mainstream is surprised by this technology shift, because technology is finally replacing non-tech industries that didn't expect to be replaced. Nobody was surprised when blacksmiths were replaced, because they were "old tech" being replaced with "new tech". When brick&mortar retail or law get replaced, there's a lot of gnashing of teeth.

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#45

Post by recampbell »

pg wrote: post #24

"Our new economy is shrinking because technology leads to efficiency over growth." Anyone who wants to make the claim that technology is net killing jobs has to be prepared to answer the question: why now? Technology has been killing (but not net killing) jobs for centuries. It's possible that technology could start to net kill jobs. But why now, when it hasn't in the past?

There is a net increase in jobs, but that's mostly in developing countries. Technology (the internet, container shipping) has actually enabled an explosion of job growth in those countries. Unfortunately, these trends destroy jobs in developed countries.

So I think you are correct that there will be a net increase in jobs, but it may take quite a while for developed countries to experience this. In the meantime, they are on the look-out for explanations.

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#46

Post by olefoo »

pg wrote: post #24

"Our new economy is shrinking because technology leads to efficiency over growth." Anyone who wants to make the claim that technology is net killing jobs has to be prepared to answer the question: why now? Technology has been killing (but not net killing) jobs for centuries. It's possible that technology could start to net kill jobs. But why now, when it hasn't in the past?

One possibility is that we have reached a point where the barriers to entry in what would be the job creating sectors are being held artificially high by a combination of regulatory capture and a global intellectual property regime that is tilted towards incumbent rights owners and against new entrants. Call it the Deadlock Hypothesis. You see it in medicine, where it's clear that there is a 30 year backlog of potential new technologies that cannot be brought to market because the process for clearing patent rights is too expensive for any organization small enough to be truly innovative (automated pathology labs to pick one example).You see it in the payment industry where it's effectively impossible for new entrants to innovate without the permission of the established players (cf. the story of Square). For all the rhetoric and ideology of free markets our regulatory infrastructure is geared towards incumbents in ways that make it insane to invest in industries that would be creating new jobs now and in the future.

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#47

Post by ken_railey »

dreamdu5t wrote: post #25
dreamdu5t wrote: post #2

LoL Don't fill the potholes? Who the fuck fills them then!?

Downvoted because my post is snarky? My point is factually valid. Public works DO create jobs, it's an empirical fact. Just because the OP hates the idea doesn't mean public works don't create jobs. Maybe he thinks UPS should fill the potholes, but either way, the only way to fill them is to hire people to fill them, whether the government or private business does it doesn't change the fact that someone was hired to…

Public works also destroy jobs, since the wealth to fund them has to first be extracted from the public.

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#48

Post by jerf »

dreamdu5t wrote: post #25
dreamdu5t wrote: post #2

LoL Don't fill the potholes? Who the fuck fills them then!?

Downvoted because my post is snarky? My point is factually valid. Public works DO create jobs, it's an empirical fact. Just because the OP hates the idea doesn't mean public works don't create jobs. Maybe he thinks UPS should fill the potholes, but either way, the only way to fill them is to hire people to fill them, whether the government or private business does it doesn't change the fact that someone was hired to…

"Public works DO create jobs, it's an empirical fact."

No it's not. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesn't. It's never that simple. Along with the obvious broken window fallacy problems, you have to look at how you are paying for that public work. Taxing a net two median-pay jobs out of existence to create a single public works median-pay job is destroying a job, not creating one.

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#49

Post by pyrhho »

tsotha wrote: post #39
dreamdu5t wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While I agree with you, history also shows that unemployment and wealth disparity often do rise high enough to cause massive civil unrest. Yes, high unemployment isn't permanent or a long-term trend. That isn't really relevant though when you're talking about the prospect of blood in the streets prior to returning to decent levels. The US seems completely arrogant in the sense that they don't seem to think this can h…

Or maybe it's not wealth disparity that causes civil unrest, but rather the absolute level of poverty on the low end. Here in the US there's no sign of any kind of generalized unrest. Far less than there was in the 70s when, according to the "disparity causes unrest" theory there should have been even less.

Seems like it would take a bit of both. If everyone is at least comfortable enough, no one will violently revolt and risk losing it (Counter-examples?). Conversely, if everyone is impoverished who do you rise up against?

Re: We’re not going to have a jobless recovery. We’re going to have a jobless future

#50

Post by ajross »

tsotha wrote: post #34
AdamTReineke wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haven't we finally reached the point where all the discoveries of the Industrial Age and Information Age are coming together to enable companies to produce goods as efficiently as humanly possible? And won't advances in AI and robotics enable us to push beyond those human limits? I'd say that it hasn't in the past because up until 60 years ago, humans were the decision makers doing everything.

So what's the big technological difference between this year and, say, four years ago? Why was unemployment below 5% then?

There was a speculative bubble in the world real estate market. This led to a lot of real cash circulating (e.g. people refinancing to pay for kitchen remodels so that they can flip their home). That popped, and all the excess economic activity disappeared with it.

The article posits a broad trend. Short term boom and bust fluctuations will always happen.

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