4 ms·

Due to said industrial revolution, people's quality of life went up a thousandfold, same as in China and other countries now adopting capitalist principles.

andy_ppp 3mo ago
Not true, that was WW2 and high taxation on the rich that created the middle class. The Industrial Revolution was 1750 onwards so maybe you’re okay with it taking nearly 200 years to get a good settlement for working people but I am not! If you look at most of the world, Nigeria or India say you’ll see disgraceful levels of poverty and a small number of people who are ultra wealthy. This is where we are heading in the west if we can’t prevent the rich from inflating and buying all the assets you will own nothing and rent everything from them.
- satvikpendem 3mo ago
  India and Nigeria made many economic mistakes. My comparison is China and Vietnam who reduced poverty manifold in a single generation.
  - dofm 3mo ago
    So as long as nobody makes major economic mistakes it's fine?
    - satvikpendem 3mo ago
      Yes? Of course making mistakes in any system leads to ruin.
dofm 3mo ago
Not at all quickly. People's lives got immediately worse — well within a working lifetime. Life expectancy fell and infant mortality worsened for well over a hundred years. In particular the quality of life for people displaced by the second agricultural revolution degraded radically. It took until the early 1900s for people in cities in the west to be as healthy as a pre-industrial revolution farm worker.
- satvikpendem 3mo ago
  China did it in a generation. It is not like it was before, we have the economic tools and knowledge to accelerate it.
  - dofm 3mo ago
    1978 is two generations ago, really, and things are not better for everyone now. Working days are long, six days a week, pay is poor enough that people are living in dormitories or company housing, effectively indentured still. And the question with the AI thing is: when you take some chunk of labour out of the employment market entirely (such is the promise of AI across all sectors — hire fewer people), where will the "economic tools" come from. Because you'll trigger demand collapse. It is a fantasy. And even then, you're talking about a technological change that will ruin a very large number of people's livelihoods and economic security for decades as if it is just something someone will have to fix.
    - satvikpendem 3mo ago
      That's true, but any system has issues, there is no silver bullet. And yes, with the rate AI is going, among others, it is something someone will have to fix, I don't see what the alternative of not fixing it would look like.

andy_ppp 3mo ago

Not true, that was WW2 and high taxation on the rich that created the middle class. The Industrial Revolution was 1750 onwards so maybe you’re okay with it taking nearly 200 years to get a good settlement for working people but I am not! If you look at most of the world, Nigeria or India say you’ll see disgraceful levels of poverty and a small number of people who are ultra wealthy. This is where we are heading in the west if we can’t prevent the rich from inflating and buying all the assets you will own nothing and rent everything from them.

satvikpendem 3mo ago
India and Nigeria made many economic mistakes. My comparison is China and Vietnam who reduced poverty manifold in a single generation.
- dofm 3mo ago
  So as long as nobody makes major economic mistakes it's fine?
  - satvikpendem 3mo ago
    Yes? Of course making mistakes in any system leads to ruin.

dofm 3mo ago

Not at all quickly. People's lives got immediately worse — well within a working lifetime. Life expectancy fell and infant mortality worsened for well over a hundred years. In particular the quality of life for people displaced by the second agricultural revolution degraded radically. It took until the early 1900s for people in cities in the west to be as healthy as a pre-industrial revolution farm worker.

satvikpendem 3mo ago
China did it in a generation. It is not like it was before, we have the economic tools and knowledge to accelerate it.
- dofm 3mo ago
  1978 is two generations ago, really, and things are not better for everyone now. Working days are long, six days a week, pay is poor enough that people are living in dormitories or company housing, effectively indentured still. And the question with the AI thing is: when you take some chunk of labour out of the employment market entirely (such is the promise of AI across all sectors — hire fewer people), where will the "economic tools" come from. Because you'll trigger demand collapse. It is a fantasy. And even then, you're talking about a technological change that will ruin a very large number of people's livelihoods and economic security for decades as if it is just something someone will have to fix.
  - satvikpendem 3mo ago
    That's true, but any system has issues, there is no silver bullet. And yes, with the rate AI is going, among others, it is something someone will have to fix, I don't see what the alternative of not fixing it would look like.