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Really interesting perspective here, wanted to add. I am an engineer now, but studied developmental economics very briefly and there are lot of really interest
by 3a2d29 4y ago
Really interesting perspective here, wanted to add. I am an engineer now, but studied developmental economics very briefly and there are lot of really interesting theories out there.
This “land distribution” point reminds me of a paper they claimed Spain fell behind other colonial powers like England and France because the resource they exploited was precious metals that allowed a few to get rich, but didn’t allow a middle class to grow.
Make me think of whether big tech does the same thing (if they can find a way to automate enough they can hire few people and few engineers)
- dasil003 4y agoI’ve thought a lot about this as big tech has grown over the past twenty years. I don’t think it’s quite as bad as precious metals because tech does have utility. But the low marginal costs and rapid global distribution trend towards winner-take-all results.
- edgyquant 4y agoBut it's also creating a large population of upper middle class/upper class individuals who will then invest their capital. So I still don't see it being as bad as a gold rush.
- chrischen 4y agoBut the inverse of that is a bit ridiculous: don’t automate the things so you can create busy work for more people. It sounds even more ridiculous if you phrase it as make and keep people alive just to do busy (fake) work.
- tnzk 4y agoThe point was, at such a developmental stage, large portion of population wouldn't be capable of automating stuff, so keeping people busy and alive would be better than starve them with nothing to do.
- chrischen 4y agoThat's exactly how and why progress is halted. People yell "think of the jobs" and prevent new advances in automation or technology that would actually save lives or better lives, just for the sake of protecting the incumbent industries.
- epistasis 4y agoRight, p -> q does not imply q -> p, and does not imply !p -> !q,yet too often when it comes to economics, that sort of fallacy underlies key arguments on selling policy to the populace.