4 ms·

The fundamental misunderstanding here is that a nearly steady-state economy is not a situation like the 1970's. It's a situation where 90% of the population is

by waps 13y ago

The fundamental misunderstanding here is that a nearly steady-state economy is not a situation like the 1970's. It's a situation where 90% of the population is unemployed and unnecessary. Our expectations for a steady-state economy should be adjusted to mean the situation that existed from the fall of the Western Roman Empire to 1850 or so. Vast majority of people on unemployment, barely subsisting. People who have viable businesses dig in and isolate themselves (if necessary declaring independence). Ever-growing consolidation of power and every institution falling to the influence of ever fewer power centers. Fortunately, a mere 10 years of steady state economy won't get us to that point. Today we're already at the point that something like 60-70% of the world's population is useless (if you killed all of them tonight, tomorrow there would be no visible difference at all). That number is increasing fast. The cure ? Remove the scarcity of electricity might do it. Find something to do (the way some medieval economies solved it was to employ 70% or so of the population for building cathedrals - manually. Every last thing manually cut from stone. That could work). War is another option, used in the middle east did (well, one particular group, really). As long as they keep winning, their borders expand, their economy grows, and it can last quite a while in that state.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]
invalidOrTaken 13y ago
Best comment in the thread, if one of the more depressing.
Daniel_Newby 13y ago
Ultimately you have to choose between a scarcity economy and systematic birth control. No possible technological advance can keep up with an exponential growth curve. And the birth control system has to have active eugenic measures, otherwise a genetic collapse can sweep through the population. (The AI servants do not care whether they look after 10 billion genius athletes or 10 billion brainstems in automated nursing homes.)
- gizzlon 13y ago
  The growth rate is declining: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth#Human_population_growth_rate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth#Human_populat...
  - andygates 13y ago
    Came to say this. There's every indication that as humans get healthier, more educated, wealthier and live longer (more post-scarcity, in other words) they switch from "breed more backups" to "nurture one or two offspring", and steady-state popultion comes out of that. The sectors of wealthy economies which are still breeding fast are generally the poor (scarcity again) or people from social groups that were used to breeding lots, who are slowly getting the memo.
    - Daniel_Newby 13y ago
      Prosperity does cause humans to move towards relatively fewer offspring, but only relatively. If the birth rate exceeds the replacement rate by even a tiny fraction in any demographic, the result is exponential growth. And there are prosperous, well-educated demographics with ultra-high birth rates, such as Mormons.
      - notahacker 13y ago
        That assumes the birth rates of other demographics don't fall sufficiently behind the replacement rate to compensate in the short term, and that demographics' birth rates are immutable in the long term. Will the offspring of Mormons maintain their parents' birth rates? Well they're already falling...
- rwmj 13y ago
  Those aren't the only choices though. One is that you just accept that there will be a large number of unemployed, and account for that by having a basic income guarantee. Another would be creating make-work for many people. And there are others, it's not just "go back to 1970 or birth control".
ovi256 13y ago
Stone is a brittle material that chips and shatters if looked at the wrong way. Stonecutters and masons were highly skilled professionals. What you're looking for are the masses of porters and carriers, unskilled workers moving construction materials.
gjm11 13y ago
> 60-70% of the world's population is useless (if you killed all of them tonight, tomorrow there would be no visible difference at all). No difference visible to you, perhaps. I'm thinking it might be visible to their friends and families. It would certainly be visible to them, were it not for the accident that you're contemplating killing them rather than, say, just permanently disabling them. If you view people solely as units in the economy -- devices for providing goods and services that other people will pay money for -- then it may be true that 70% of the world's population is "useless". But if you take a look you may notice that most people do other things besides providing goods and services for money. No one is paying me when I read my daughter a bedtime story, listen to a friend who's having relationship difficulties, or bake chocolate chip cookies to take to a party. Those activities may (or may not) be less valuable per hour than my highly paid day job, but if you think they are useless then I think you are looking at the world through a filter that blocks out some important things.
- Sarien 13y ago
  I think you make a very important point that I haven't seen in any of the other comments: There are lots of goods that are not traded within the economy. The original comment is valid, many people are not relevant to the economy and indeed there are lots of articles on how we are all just wasting our time in meaningless jobs. Some studies have even found that certain jobs (like investment banking) have a net negative creation value. Isn't the kind of activity like reading your child a story, working for free in a social group and the entire maker movement targeted at the kinds of goods that are both great and beautiful and desirable but also non-essential? Exactly the kinds of goods that people will stop paying for when they have less money to spend. So maybe we just need to find a way to distribute the essentials and some money differently so that we can all work on beautiful but useless things instead of trying to get us all the kind of job that everybody will immediately admit they don't even want. Just some random thoughts. ;)
- waps 13y ago
  I think it varies. I have been walking along the 90% unemployment regions of Brussels a few years ago, and just knocking on a few random doors just "oh sorry you're not Tom" excuse for a look around, sometimes a conversation (I worked - and was bored to death - in the area, so for a month, that was my lunch hobby) (you wouldn't believe just how fertile ground conspiracy theories find here. Especially for a European country). I hate to say it but unless I got entirely the wrong impression, you're wrong. For most of these unemployed their friends and families would take weeks or months to notice. Hell, the staff at the local supermarket will probably notice before friends will. You see the same in the paper. They're isolated, unemployed, and there's large numbers of them. So it happens quite regularly that one of them dies - and if it's for a dumb or catchy reason, the papers go after it. Carbon monoxide poisoning is always reported. Someone who was ill - and this is a country with nearly-free healthcare before you say money - and didn't go to the hospital at all, then died, or someone who was seriously ill, but with little symptoms at first, got sent home, then died in their sleep. There's usually at least some mention of how they arrived at this conclusion and it tends to include how they were found. Depressingly often it's the smell or a loan collector, or- less often, thankfully - panicked kids who found this happened to their sole parent, then did something like running screaming outside, attack a police officer (not seriously, but enough to get them to "tell their mam"). Even if they have friends and family, that someone disappears from these neighborhoods without telling anyone is not exactly a rare event, usually related to crime they committed, so it does not raise any alarms. So no, in most cases I don't think it would be visible at all. Some areas in large cities that nobody really goes voluntarily to would go quiet. And yes, the supermarket would notice.

by waps 13y ago

deleted 13y ago

[deleted]

invalidOrTaken 13y ago

Best comment in the thread, if one of the more depressing.

Daniel_Newby 13y ago

Ultimately you have to choose between a scarcity economy and systematic birth control. No possible technological advance can keep up with an exponential growth curve. And the birth control system has to have active eugenic measures, otherwise a genetic collapse can sweep through the population. (The AI servants do not care whether they look after 10 billion genius athletes or 10 billion brainstems in automated nursing homes.)

gizzlon 13y ago
The growth rate is declining: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth#Human_population_growth_rate http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Population_growth#Human_populat...
- andygates 13y ago
  Came to say this. There's every indication that as humans get healthier, more educated, wealthier and live longer (more post-scarcity, in other words) they switch from "breed more backups" to "nurture one or two offspring", and steady-state popultion comes out of that. The sectors of wealthy economies which are still breeding fast are generally the poor (scarcity again) or people from social groups that were used to breeding lots, who are slowly getting the memo.
  - Daniel_Newby 13y ago
    Prosperity does cause humans to move towards relatively fewer offspring, but only relatively. If the birth rate exceeds the replacement rate by even a tiny fraction in any demographic, the result is exponential growth. And there are prosperous, well-educated demographics with ultra-high birth rates, such as Mormons.
    - notahacker 13y ago
      That assumes the birth rates of other demographics don't fall sufficiently behind the replacement rate to compensate in the short term, and that demographics' birth rates are immutable in the long term. Will the offspring of Mormons maintain their parents' birth rates? Well they're already falling...
rwmj 13y ago
Those aren't the only choices though. One is that you just accept that there will be a large number of unemployed, and account for that by having a basic income guarantee. Another would be creating make-work for many people. And there are others, it's not just "go back to 1970 or birth control".

ovi256 13y ago

Stone is a brittle material that chips and shatters if looked at the wrong way. Stonecutters and masons were highly skilled professionals. What you're looking for are the masses of porters and carriers, unskilled workers moving construction materials.

gjm11 13y ago

> 60-70% of the world's population is useless (if you killed all of them tonight, tomorrow there would be no visible difference at all). No difference visible to you, perhaps. I'm thinking it might be visible to their friends and families. It would certainly be visible to them, were it not for the accident that you're contemplating killing them rather than, say, just permanently disabling them. If you view people solely as units in the economy -- devices for providing goods and services that other people will pay money for -- then it may be true that 70% of the world's population is "useless". But if you take a look you may notice that most people do other things besides providing goods and services for money. No one is paying me when I read my daughter a bedtime story, listen to a friend who's having relationship difficulties, or bake chocolate chip cookies to take to a party. Those activities may (or may not) be less valuable per hour than my highly paid day job, but if you think they are useless then I think you are looking at the world through a filter that blocks out some important things.

Sarien 13y ago
I think you make a very important point that I haven't seen in any of the other comments: There are lots of goods that are not traded within the economy. The original comment is valid, many people are not relevant to the economy and indeed there are lots of articles on how we are all just wasting our time in meaningless jobs. Some studies have even found that certain jobs (like investment banking) have a net negative creation value. Isn't the kind of activity like reading your child a story, working for free in a social group and the entire maker movement targeted at the kinds of goods that are both great and beautiful and desirable but also non-essential? Exactly the kinds of goods that people will stop paying for when they have less money to spend. So maybe we just need to find a way to distribute the essentials and some money differently so that we can all work on beautiful but useless things instead of trying to get us all the kind of job that everybody will immediately admit they don't even want. Just some random thoughts. ;)
waps 13y ago
I think it varies. I have been walking along the 90% unemployment regions of Brussels a few years ago, and just knocking on a few random doors just "oh sorry you're not Tom" excuse for a look around, sometimes a conversation (I worked - and was bored to death - in the area, so for a month, that was my lunch hobby) (you wouldn't believe just how fertile ground conspiracy theories find here. Especially for a European country). I hate to say it but unless I got entirely the wrong impression, you're wrong. For most of these unemployed their friends and families would take weeks or months to notice. Hell, the staff at the local supermarket will probably notice before friends will. You see the same in the paper. They're isolated, unemployed, and there's large numbers of them. So it happens quite regularly that one of them dies - and if it's for a dumb or catchy reason, the papers go after it. Carbon monoxide poisoning is always reported. Someone who was ill - and this is a country with nearly-free healthcare before you say money - and didn't go to the hospital at all, then died, or someone who was seriously ill, but with little symptoms at first, got sent home, then died in their sleep. There's usually at least some mention of how they arrived at this conclusion and it tends to include how they were found. Depressingly often it's the smell or a loan collector, or- less often, thankfully - panicked kids who found this happened to their sole parent, then did something like running screaming outside, attack a police officer (not seriously, but enough to get them to "tell their mam"). Even if they have friends and family, that someone disappears from these neighborhoods without telling anyone is not exactly a rare event, usually related to crime they committed, so it does not raise any alarms. So no, in most cases I don't think it would be visible at all. Some areas in large cities that nobody really goes voluntarily to would go quiet. And yes, the supermarket would notice.