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Why not? Because capitalism. New technology will continue to automate away more and more jobs, from manufacturing to the service industry. This could be one of

Why not? Because capitalism. New technology will continue to automate away more and more jobs, from manufacturing to the service industry. This could be one of the greatest achievements in human history, leading to that so-called "leisure society" futurists talked about, but that would require a massive overhaul of most countries' economic systems. All those gains in productivity mostly enrich the owner class while the rest of us have to fight even harder for the jobs that haven't (yet) been eliminated by technology. In the U.S., it's hard to imagine getting a single conservative lawmaker to sit down at a table and have a frank discussion about wealth redistribution or a minimum income or public ownership schemes, possible solutions to this problem. That makes me worry that the inevitable transition away from our obsession with the free-market and pursuit of capital will be painful rather than celebratory. And that things will have to get worse before enough of us can consider implementing solutions that make things better.

rgrieselhuber 12y ago
One of the biggest practical hurdles to that sort of wealth distribution is simply that there is a whole world of people outside the US ready and willing to accept investment and residence from the owner class.
- mjburgess 12y ago
  That's not a problem. profits made within a country can be taxed within a country. Stopping the export of capital is a legal/legislative issue, not a logistical one. The rich have already left. The mythical class we're "punishing" arent tied to nations/peoples any more. Their assets are however. Their companies operate within nations. They wealth is spent in deals/properties/etc. within countries. If a Koch brother lands on US soil he can be arrested and all of his assets seized. If he does a deal with a US company, all of the transactions can be subject to US law. It's a matter of political will.
wyager 12y ago
If automation continues and demand stays the same, things like 3-day work weeks will come about naturally. A capitalist system would not prevent that from happening. Would you care to share why you think capitalism would prevent an increase in leisure time (even though it has been increasing since the industrial revolution)?
- mjburgess 12y ago
  "Reduced labour" isnt produced by automation, increased profit is. To "give back" labour you have to reduce profits. "Leisure time" was won by unions, collective bargaining and legislation. "The Weekend" only exists at all because of the collective actions of the workforce, not of capital owners.
  - wyager 12y ago
    Reduced labor (per output value) and increased profit are the same thing. There is always a trade off between time spent working and wealth. Only through automation can we keep our current quality of life while working less, increase our quality of life without working any more, or do anything between those two possibilities.
    - mjburgess 12y ago
      No, automation just reduces the amount of repetitive labour. The remaining labour isn't distributed evenly across the workforce: some people take up more work to increase or maintain their level of wealth and some people become unemployed. Envy and ambition create worst-case nash equilibria for all.
- TeMPOraL 12y ago
  > Would you care to share why you think capitalism would prevent an increase in leisure time It's actually a quite simple mechanism - people who would want to work 3 days will get replaced by people willing to work 4 days, which will get replaced to work one day more, etc. As long as people actually need jobs to survive, the end result is they work as much as possible within bounds of law. We sometimes forget about it, because IT industry is in it's golden age, with more jobs than suitable candidates. But look at non-specialized jobs like retail, and you'll find everyone working Monday-Saturday in shitty conditions for low pay. They'd be working Monday-Sunday, were it not the long fight against capitalism for leisure time. Capitalism optimizes for profit, not for human values. Those are becoming increasingly separated nowdays.
  - 12y ago
grimtrigger 12y ago
Whats the difference between a leisure state and a welfare state?
- rmrfrmrf 12y ago
  racism.
- WalterSear 12y ago
  Ayn Rand's crack pipe.
  - dang 12y ago
    Please don't.
- psychometry 12y ago
  Your preconceptions toward the latter, if I had to guess.
tptacek 12y ago
I perceive this as one of a species of comments that is well-intentioned and valuable in isolation, but that when introduced to the thread has the effect of making it harder to discuss the article on its own terms. It's easy to see the subtext of the article that indicts unrestrained economic competition. So it's hard to ding a comment for surfacing that subtext and engaging with it. But at the same time, having been on HN for a long time, it's also easy to see how the result thread will simply litigate capitalism, and how unlikely it is that anyone will learn anything from the ensuing debate.
- dang 12y ago
  I agree. Comments like this are stronger when they stay with the specific content of the article. They're weaker when treating it merely as a platform for some generic position ("obsession with the free market"). It isn't that the rhetoric is false, it's that it's impossible for it to be substantive here. Grand claims need grand substance, which there isn't room for in a mere comment post. People compensate for this with ersatz things like getting louder or angrier. Tangents don't have to be bad. Ira Glass-style "I had an uncle who wore that kind of hat" tangents can be great. But generic tangents go somewhere uninteresting. The gravitational pull of the large, familiar topics has to be resisted because once the discussion gets stuck on one of those planets it is never getting off.
  - calibraxis 12y ago
    I don't care to post this, but meta begets meta... Your (and tptacek's) meta comments seem unhelpful and clearly favor HN's status quo. I've successfully demanded a shorter workweek from capitalist bosses, and helped coworkers fight theirs. And that comment you both meta-criticize is pretty sensible, in my view. If you're going to hack a system, it's worth getting familiar with the subversive lit. (Though their last paragraph may indicate a lack of familiarity with that subversive lit. Because politicians will naturally fight/coopt revolutionary changes to the system they administrate. Post-capitalism is a revolutionary change, and a capitalist state would attempt to respond violently. But whatever.)
    - 12y ago
yummyfajitas 12y ago
We already have the leisure society - the bottom rung of the income distribution (in the US) lives in that society. People below the poverty line in the US work very little and have consumption and disposable income (after taxes/transfers) of about $20k/year. http://johnhcochrane.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/taxes-and-cliffs.html http://johnhcochrane.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/taxes-and-cliffs... http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpswp2012.pdf http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpswp2012.pdf I don't know why people refuse to acknowledge that we are already there.
- mkr-hn 12y ago
  I don't see a claim in those links that people at the bottom rung have $20k in disposable income. I can't imagine they even have $20k a year to begin with. Your claims are very different from my experience living close enough to that bottom rung to know people in it.
  - dllthomas 12y ago
    In the second link there is a graph entitled "Disposable Income for a Hypothetical Single Parent with One Child, by Earnings", which doesn't fall below $20k. Of course, it may not be correct to generalize it, and it is incorrect to present it as "per person" since it represents two people - parent and child.
    - yummyfajitas 12y ago
      You can get consumption data from the BLS, which gives similar numbers: http://www.bls.gov/cex/22013/midyear/income.pdf http://www.bls.gov/cex/22013/midyear/income.pdf You'll need to dig in to figure out what a "referent person" is.
      - dllthomas 12y ago
        Please explain how this supports your figure. I don't see it. Dividing the consumer unit "average annual expenditure" by the "average number of persons per consumer unit" per column there, only the top two exceed $20k, and only the top 3 approach $20k. It does all exceed $10k, but there's still 27 million households spending less than $15k/yr/person - where it would be more correct to say "about $10k" than "about $20k".
fab13n 12y ago
> Why not? Because capitalism. I believe you're mostly true. I can only see one slim chance for things to turn out better than expected: most capitalists get rich by making not-so-useful crap that can only be bought by plebes enjoying some disposable income. Ford vitally needs most American to be able to afford an SUV.

rgrieselhuber 12y ago

One of the biggest practical hurdles to that sort of wealth distribution is simply that there is a whole world of people outside the US ready and willing to accept investment and residence from the owner class.

mjburgess 12y ago
That's not a problem. profits made within a country can be taxed within a country. Stopping the export of capital is a legal/legislative issue, not a logistical one. The rich have already left. The mythical class we're "punishing" arent tied to nations/peoples any more. Their assets are however. Their companies operate within nations. They wealth is spent in deals/properties/etc. within countries. If a Koch brother lands on US soil he can be arrested and all of his assets seized. If he does a deal with a US company, all of the transactions can be subject to US law. It's a matter of political will.

wyager 12y ago

If automation continues and demand stays the same, things like 3-day work weeks will come about naturally. A capitalist system would not prevent that from happening. Would you care to share why you think capitalism would prevent an increase in leisure time (even though it has been increasing since the industrial revolution)?

mjburgess 12y ago
"Reduced labour" isnt produced by automation, increased profit is. To "give back" labour you have to reduce profits. "Leisure time" was won by unions, collective bargaining and legislation. "The Weekend" only exists at all because of the collective actions of the workforce, not of capital owners.
- wyager 12y ago
  Reduced labor (per output value) and increased profit are the same thing. There is always a trade off between time spent working and wealth. Only through automation can we keep our current quality of life while working less, increase our quality of life without working any more, or do anything between those two possibilities.
  - mjburgess 12y ago
    No, automation just reduces the amount of repetitive labour. The remaining labour isn't distributed evenly across the workforce: some people take up more work to increase or maintain their level of wealth and some people become unemployed. Envy and ambition create worst-case nash equilibria for all.
TeMPOraL 12y ago
> Would you care to share why you think capitalism would prevent an increase in leisure time It's actually a quite simple mechanism - people who would want to work 3 days will get replaced by people willing to work 4 days, which will get replaced to work one day more, etc. As long as people actually need jobs to survive, the end result is they work as much as possible within bounds of law. We sometimes forget about it, because IT industry is in it's golden age, with more jobs than suitable candidates. But look at non-specialized jobs like retail, and you'll find everyone working Monday-Saturday in shitty conditions for low pay. They'd be working Monday-Sunday, were it not the long fight against capitalism for leisure time. Capitalism optimizes for profit, not for human values. Those are becoming increasingly separated nowdays.
- 12y ago

grimtrigger 12y ago

Whats the difference between a leisure state and a welfare state?

rmrfrmrf 12y ago
racism.
WalterSear 12y ago
Ayn Rand's crack pipe.
- dang 12y ago
  Please don't.
psychometry 12y ago
Your preconceptions toward the latter, if I had to guess.

tptacek 12y ago

I perceive this as one of a species of comments that is well-intentioned and valuable in isolation, but that when introduced to the thread has the effect of making it harder to discuss the article on its own terms. It's easy to see the subtext of the article that indicts unrestrained economic competition. So it's hard to ding a comment for surfacing that subtext and engaging with it. But at the same time, having been on HN for a long time, it's also easy to see how the result thread will simply litigate capitalism, and how unlikely it is that anyone will learn anything from the ensuing debate.

dang 12y ago
I agree. Comments like this are stronger when they stay with the specific content of the article. They're weaker when treating it merely as a platform for some generic position ("obsession with the free market"). It isn't that the rhetoric is false, it's that it's impossible for it to be substantive here. Grand claims need grand substance, which there isn't room for in a mere comment post. People compensate for this with ersatz things like getting louder or angrier. Tangents don't have to be bad. Ira Glass-style "I had an uncle who wore that kind of hat" tangents can be great. But generic tangents go somewhere uninteresting. The gravitational pull of the large, familiar topics has to be resisted because once the discussion gets stuck on one of those planets it is never getting off.
- calibraxis 12y ago
  I don't care to post this, but meta begets meta... Your (and tptacek's) meta comments seem unhelpful and clearly favor HN's status quo. I've successfully demanded a shorter workweek from capitalist bosses, and helped coworkers fight theirs. And that comment you both meta-criticize is pretty sensible, in my view. If you're going to hack a system, it's worth getting familiar with the subversive lit. (Though their last paragraph may indicate a lack of familiarity with that subversive lit. Because politicians will naturally fight/coopt revolutionary changes to the system they administrate. Post-capitalism is a revolutionary change, and a capitalist state would attempt to respond violently. But whatever.)
  - 12y ago

yummyfajitas 12y ago

We already have the leisure society - the bottom rung of the income distribution (in the US) lives in that society. People below the poverty line in the US work very little and have consumption and disposable income (after taxes/transfers) of about $20k/year. http://johnhcochrane.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/taxes-and-cliffs.html http://johnhcochrane.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/taxes-and-cliffs... http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpswp2012.pdf http://www.bls.gov/cps/cpswp2012.pdf I don't know why people refuse to acknowledge that we are already there.

mkr-hn 12y ago
I don't see a claim in those links that people at the bottom rung have $20k in disposable income. I can't imagine they even have $20k a year to begin with. Your claims are very different from my experience living close enough to that bottom rung to know people in it.
- dllthomas 12y ago
  In the second link there is a graph entitled "Disposable Income for a Hypothetical Single Parent with One Child, by Earnings", which doesn't fall below $20k. Of course, it may not be correct to generalize it, and it is incorrect to present it as "per person" since it represents two people - parent and child.
  - yummyfajitas 12y ago
    You can get consumption data from the BLS, which gives similar numbers: http://www.bls.gov/cex/22013/midyear/income.pdf http://www.bls.gov/cex/22013/midyear/income.pdf You'll need to dig in to figure out what a "referent person" is.
    - dllthomas 12y ago
      Please explain how this supports your figure. I don't see it. Dividing the consumer unit "average annual expenditure" by the "average number of persons per consumer unit" per column there, only the top two exceed $20k, and only the top 3 approach $20k. It does all exceed $10k, but there's still 27 million households spending less than $15k/yr/person - where it would be more correct to say "about $10k" than "about $20k".

fab13n 12y ago

> Why not? Because capitalism. I believe you're mostly true. I can only see one slim chance for things to turn out better than expected: most capitalists get rich by making not-so-useful crap that can only be bought by plebes enjoying some disposable income. Ford vitally needs most American to be able to afford an SUV.