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what's the matter with a shrinking population? we keep hearing how automation is going to put so many people out of work anyway. a lower economic throughput isn

what's the matter with a shrinking population? we keep hearing how automation is going to put so many people out of work anyway. a lower economic throughput isn't dramatic if the population gets proportionally smaller. not to mention that population growth can well be cyclical: there used to be a time where the US population was just half of what it is today after all, no reason why we couldn't be headed toward some kind of equilibrium. it doesn't have to be a downward spiral to zero. the real concern seems to be coming from the elites whose leech-like business model is premised on squeezing as much wealth as possible from the consuming masses. it's this uninterrupted funneling that prevents their whole machinery from collapsing.

cimmanom 8y ago
In the long run, yes, a smaller population may be better. It's getting there that would be painful. Part of the issue is that our economic safety nets for the elderly work only if there's a sufficient (working) younger population to fund them. At best, this is a recipe for intense intergenerational political conflict. At worst, it's a choice between bankrupting the younger generation and leaving the older generation out on the streets.
snarf21 8y ago
Like you said, it is a major concern for companies that must show X% growth year over year. Part of that is built into the fact that population keeps growing. It isn't possible for all companies with a negative growth rate. The other issue is that the issues Japan is facing is there are no people to take care of all the elderly. It will be a challenge to make sure they just don't starve to death. There will be a lot of people that may just die at home and no one knows. I do think that as automation increases, more and more jobs will be around elder care.
petre 8y ago
> what's the matter with a shrinking population There's no problem apart from the fact that the gov't doesn't tax robots and the tax burden falls on the shrinking population causing hardship, while the debt keeps rising. I've just read somewhere that this years' interest rates exceed US military expenditure.
- blancheneige 8y ago
  well, that seems to be a bit of an asymmetrical argument. sure, less taxpayers means less tax revenue. but that's only because the work force has been partly replaced by automation, with all the implied savings. you have think about where that lost tax revenue would have gone: infrastructure, military, health care, etc. now if it gets that bad that automation has taken over (yes, even doctors and surgeons...), surely that means these sectors are a lot more cost efficient, thus not as tax dependent as they used to be. if it's done progressively (and it's unlikely it will happen overnight) there is no reason why a good balance cannot be maintained.
  - petre 8y ago
    Health care? Since when is health care in the US paid for by the federal government? Robot doctors and surgeons, not during my lifetime, but robot infantry support is more like it. You still need taxes to pay for those aircraft carriers and the robots and the personnel that maintains and fixes the robots. Then what are they going to do about the interest rates? Devalue the dollar? Start a war like Germany did? Or maybe just get a haircut.
slothtrop 8y ago
The powers that be want to suppress wages. That's the only motivation for unfettered immigration.
- chrchang523 8y ago
  "That's the only motivation" is a strong claim. This is essentially a religious war. In any religious war, you have a mix between true believers and cynical manipulators with varying motivations, even at the top.
  - slothtrop 8y ago
    It was meant to be a strong claim. It's certainly not for skills that aren't homegrown.
tptacek 8y ago
Because younger generations subsidize the retirement and care of older generations, who interned subsidized the retirement and care of their predecessors, obviously.
- simonsarris 8y ago
  So then isn't this the time bomb, not the demographics? Why do we call it a demographic time bomb and not a "we keep mortgaging the future generation" time bomb?
porpoisely 8y ago
A shrinking population places enormous strains on social benefits ( social security, medicare, etc ) and would devastate the two largest retirement assets of people - homes and stock market ( 401k ). The dominant 20th century economic and social model is based on constant population and consumption growth. Ultimately, as a society, we've borrowed too much from the future. If these assumptions fail, the stock market would collapse and housing prices would decline. We could head towards an equilibrium, but that would require an economic and social paradigm shift and lots of near to intermediate pain for a lot of people. Paradigm shifts rarely happen and when they do, it's because of extreme circumstances causing a lot of societal pain. It's like we are on a runaway train that's about to crash but we are too afraid to jump because jumping could mean death.
- dnautics 8y ago
  > The dominant 20th century economic and social model is based on constant population and consumption growth. This. It's probably worth reiterating just how fundamental this is: the necessity of growth is built in, fundamentally to the way that the dollar (and the euro, then yen, etc) itself works. I'm not convinced that punting on decisions has to be as bad as a crash. Japan has failed to meet growth for a few decades, and the way they handled it, there is just social malaise, an alienated generation, and excellent melancholy anime.
  - growlist 8y ago
    Watching NHK World, parts of Japan look idyllic and make me want to retire there, or even move there now. I watched a charming piece the other day about an island whose inhabitants have amongst the highest life expectancy in the world. A genuine community, shared activities and culture, lack of stress, plenty of fruit and vegetables as well as little traffic seemed to be the recipe. Perhaps the rest of the world could do with some of this so-called stagnation!
    - dnautics 8y ago
      NHK World (my mother watches this) is definitely government propaganda. This is not to say that Japan is a horrible place, it's generally nicer than the US, but there's lots of societal malaise going over there. Also Japan sweeps a lot of poverty and soft corruption problems under the rug.

cimmanom 8y ago

In the long run, yes, a smaller population may be better. It's getting there that would be painful. Part of the issue is that our economic safety nets for the elderly work only if there's a sufficient (working) younger population to fund them. At best, this is a recipe for intense intergenerational political conflict. At worst, it's a choice between bankrupting the younger generation and leaving the older generation out on the streets.

snarf21 8y ago

Like you said, it is a major concern for companies that must show X% growth year over year. Part of that is built into the fact that population keeps growing. It isn't possible for all companies with a negative growth rate. The other issue is that the issues Japan is facing is there are no people to take care of all the elderly. It will be a challenge to make sure they just don't starve to death. There will be a lot of people that may just die at home and no one knows. I do think that as automation increases, more and more jobs will be around elder care.

petre 8y ago

> what's the matter with a shrinking population There's no problem apart from the fact that the gov't doesn't tax robots and the tax burden falls on the shrinking population causing hardship, while the debt keeps rising. I've just read somewhere that this years' interest rates exceed US military expenditure.

blancheneige 8y ago
well, that seems to be a bit of an asymmetrical argument. sure, less taxpayers means less tax revenue. but that's only because the work force has been partly replaced by automation, with all the implied savings. you have think about where that lost tax revenue would have gone: infrastructure, military, health care, etc. now if it gets that bad that automation has taken over (yes, even doctors and surgeons...), surely that means these sectors are a lot more cost efficient, thus not as tax dependent as they used to be. if it's done progressively (and it's unlikely it will happen overnight) there is no reason why a good balance cannot be maintained.
- petre 8y ago
  Health care? Since when is health care in the US paid for by the federal government? Robot doctors and surgeons, not during my lifetime, but robot infantry support is more like it. You still need taxes to pay for those aircraft carriers and the robots and the personnel that maintains and fixes the robots. Then what are they going to do about the interest rates? Devalue the dollar? Start a war like Germany did? Or maybe just get a haircut.

slothtrop 8y ago

The powers that be want to suppress wages. That's the only motivation for unfettered immigration.

chrchang523 8y ago
"That's the only motivation" is a strong claim. This is essentially a religious war. In any religious war, you have a mix between true believers and cynical manipulators with varying motivations, even at the top.
- slothtrop 8y ago
  It was meant to be a strong claim. It's certainly not for skills that aren't homegrown.

tptacek 8y ago

Because younger generations subsidize the retirement and care of older generations, who interned subsidized the retirement and care of their predecessors, obviously.

simonsarris 8y ago
So then isn't this the time bomb, not the demographics? Why do we call it a demographic time bomb and not a "we keep mortgaging the future generation" time bomb?

porpoisely 8y ago

A shrinking population places enormous strains on social benefits ( social security, medicare, etc ) and would devastate the two largest retirement assets of people - homes and stock market ( 401k ). The dominant 20th century economic and social model is based on constant population and consumption growth. Ultimately, as a society, we've borrowed too much from the future. If these assumptions fail, the stock market would collapse and housing prices would decline. We could head towards an equilibrium, but that would require an economic and social paradigm shift and lots of near to intermediate pain for a lot of people. Paradigm shifts rarely happen and when they do, it's because of extreme circumstances causing a lot of societal pain. It's like we are on a runaway train that's about to crash but we are too afraid to jump because jumping could mean death.

dnautics 8y ago
> The dominant 20th century economic and social model is based on constant population and consumption growth. This. It's probably worth reiterating just how fundamental this is: the necessity of growth is built in, fundamentally to the way that the dollar (and the euro, then yen, etc) itself works. I'm not convinced that punting on decisions has to be as bad as a crash. Japan has failed to meet growth for a few decades, and the way they handled it, there is just social malaise, an alienated generation, and excellent melancholy anime.
- growlist 8y ago
  Watching NHK World, parts of Japan look idyllic and make me want to retire there, or even move there now. I watched a charming piece the other day about an island whose inhabitants have amongst the highest life expectancy in the world. A genuine community, shared activities and culture, lack of stress, plenty of fruit and vegetables as well as little traffic seemed to be the recipe. Perhaps the rest of the world could do with some of this so-called stagnation!
  - dnautics 8y ago
    NHK World (my mother watches this) is definitely government propaganda. This is not to say that Japan is a horrible place, it's generally nicer than the US, but there's lots of societal malaise going over there. Also Japan sweeps a lot of poverty and soft corruption problems under the rug.