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Technology has been putting people out of work for millennia. In the process, sometimes it makes new industries (new, but different, jobs), other times it just

Technology has been putting people out of work for millennia. In the process, sometimes it makes new industries (new, but different, jobs), other times it just makes existing industries leaner and more efficient (fewer jobs, but all involved have to optimize to compete, and the resources are freed up to create something new elsewhere). Market forces are never purely to "create jobs", they are to create new or better products more efficiently. The task of "creating jobs", regardless of efficiency, falls to politicians.

kruhft 13y ago
That's the first time I've seen the top comment on a story starting to 'gray out' from downvotes.
- kruhft 13y ago
  Looks like I caught it just before the fall :)
cmnzs 13y ago
That made a lot of sense up until your last sentence...!
gamechangr 13y ago
Totally with you, until that last sentence. "The task of "creating jobs", regardless of efficiency, falls to politicians." Really????
- jedbrown 13y ago
  It was partly snark, but I think there is some truth to it. A company says "we automated process X, improving quality, reducing production time, and cutting costs by consolidating the Y division" (where Y may be the "grunt work" that was automated, or perhaps less direct---an industry that depended on having warm bodies doing task X). This is considered an unambiguous win in the commercial sector because it makes the company more competitive/profitable. Politicians, on the other hand, see all the people from division Y that are now unemployed and don't have marketable skills. Depending on the industry and locality, increased competitiveness can increase revenue and local spending, keeping a neutral or positive effect on employment rate. But in general, automation is bad for politicians in places that lose jobs. Those politicians are tasked with providing incentives or otherwise stimulating the market to bring jobs back to the region. Efficiency is a second-order effect for politicians: it only matters insofar as it affects the solvency of the company or the ability to keep the local facility running. But many industries have de-facto local monopolies (e.g., due to high cost to enter a local market) or other circumstances such that maximum efficiency for the corporation is not optimal for local politics. If you want to sell a new technology to a politician, you have to show the new jobs that will grow up around the technology rather than showing the efficiency gains from replacing workers.

kruhft 13y ago

That's the first time I've seen the top comment on a story starting to 'gray out' from downvotes.

kruhft 13y ago
Looks like I caught it just before the fall :)

cmnzs 13y ago

That made a lot of sense up until your last sentence...!

gamechangr 13y ago

Totally with you, until that last sentence. "The task of "creating jobs", regardless of efficiency, falls to politicians." Really????

jedbrown 13y ago
It was partly snark, but I think there is some truth to it. A company says "we automated process X, improving quality, reducing production time, and cutting costs by consolidating the Y division" (where Y may be the "grunt work" that was automated, or perhaps less direct---an industry that depended on having warm bodies doing task X). This is considered an unambiguous win in the commercial sector because it makes the company more competitive/profitable. Politicians, on the other hand, see all the people from division Y that are now unemployed and don't have marketable skills. Depending on the industry and locality, increased competitiveness can increase revenue and local spending, keeping a neutral or positive effect on employment rate. But in general, automation is bad for politicians in places that lose jobs. Those politicians are tasked with providing incentives or otherwise stimulating the market to bring jobs back to the region. Efficiency is a second-order effect for politicians: it only matters insofar as it affects the solvency of the company or the ability to keep the local facility running. But many industries have de-facto local monopolies (e.g., due to high cost to enter a local market) or other circumstances such that maximum efficiency for the corporation is not optimal for local politics. If you want to sell a new technology to a politician, you have to show the new jobs that will grow up around the technology rather than showing the efficiency gains from replacing workers.