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> 70 years ago one man could sustain an entire household on one paycheck There are just as many "one salary sustains an entire household" jobs today as there e

> 70 years ago one man could sustain an entire household on one paycheck There are just as many "one salary sustains an entire household" jobs today as there ever were in the past. More in fact. The factory job that provides enough for the whole family was only ever a reality for a tiny, tiny portion of humanity. The vast majority of people, even the vast majority of americans did not have access to those jobs. Even the "glory days" of american manufacturing were filled with abject poverty. > Horses and oxen were very useful throughout history, until the car and tractor was invited. Today the number of horses and oxen is at an all-time low. No amount of unionizing by horses would change that This ignores that horses have zero political power. No one is working to make their lives better.

EGreg 3y ago
Average family income in 1950 was $3,300, according to estimates issued today by Roy V. Peel, Director, Bureau of the Census, Department of Commerce. The average income across all occupations in the USA today is $61,900. The average household incomes averaged to $87,864 According to recent data, the average price for a home in 1950 was just $12,000, while the average price for a home today is upwards of $540,000. It turns out that a typical “household” back then had one breadwinner make the vast majority of the money. Today the households are often single-parent, or both parents working So I don’t think that only a factory job could provide for a whole family back then. But my point is that whatever the corporation was (law firm, or whateve) they weren’t going to lay people off because the automation and AI wasn’t there. Now there increasingly is. The number of people who hold a job for 20-30 years at the same company is much smaller than back then. I guess the main factor is the diminishing returns of a glut of products (crops in the farm example, or AI-generate content now) which devalues that specific industry’s products and makes everyone in a race to the bottom, so humans are priced out of a job. If you do this across enough industries (and many today are electronic or manufacturing) that means humans are no longer cost-effective to employ for any except a diminishing number of positions. What will we do with the growing unemployed class?

EGreg 3y ago

Average family income in 1950 was $3,300, according to estimates issued today by Roy V. Peel, Director, Bureau of the Census, Department of Commerce. The average income across all occupations in the USA today is $61,900. The average household incomes averaged to $87,864 According to recent data, the average price for a home in 1950 was just $12,000, while the average price for a home today is upwards of $540,000. It turns out that a typical “household” back then had one breadwinner make the vast majority of the money. Today the households are often single-parent, or both parents working So I don’t think that only a factory job could provide for a whole family back then. But my point is that whatever the corporation was (law firm, or whateve) they weren’t going to lay people off because the automation and AI wasn’t there. Now there increasingly is. The number of people who hold a job for 20-30 years at the same company is much smaller than back then. I guess the main factor is the diminishing returns of a glut of products (crops in the farm example, or AI-generate content now) which devalues that specific industry’s products and makes everyone in a race to the bottom, so humans are priced out of a job. If you do this across enough industries (and many today are electronic or manufacturing) that means humans are no longer cost-effective to employ for any except a diminishing number of positions. What will we do with the growing unemployed class?