The Lights in the Tunnel: Automation, Accelerating Technology and the Economy of the Future
The Lights in the Tunnel: Automation, Accelerating Technological innovation and the Economic climate of the Long term
- ISBN13: 9781448659814
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What will the economy of the long term appear like? Exactly where will advancing technology, job automation, outsourcing and globalization lead? This groundbreaking book by a Silicon Valley computer engineer explores these questions and exhibits how accelerating technological innovation is probably to have a hugely disruptive influence on our economic climate in the near future--and might nicely already be a considerable issue in the current international crisis. THE LIGHTS IN THE TUNNEL employs a strong believed experime
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Good book,
Pretty smart and accurate overview of our technology-driven near future. The solutions for our future technological world proposed here are a little naive, but definitely worth considering. The book may be taken as a joke by many, but the many would fool themselves.
The author is correct in stating that our current mass market system will become overwhelmed by the drastic decline in the number of consumers - people without jobs because of technology displacement. This story has been around many times in the past, as the author mentions, but the core aspect we are already encountering is the accelerated technological advancements of this century. The author does a great job making this point.
But it's hard to believe that dealing with the need of a dramatic change in our politico-economic system we'd be able to remain a relatively peaceful society as the book invariably portrays. Most people in the West are civil nowadays because they can upgrade their gadgets or kitchens periodically. Should this numbness diminish when a lot of folks can't find work anymore, it's hard to believe we wouldn't have to live through some sort of anarchy. One hopes to be able to experience it, thought, however it may happen.
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|Clear, concise, and compelling,
Other reviewers have summarized the book in detail, so I won't. I'll just emphasize the bottom line:
Machines are fast approaching humans in terms of *mental* labor capacity, not just *physical* labor capacity. In the past as machines took over much of our physical labor, we were then free to turn to more valuable mental labor. But once machines take over much of our mental labor, then what do we turn to for employment?
The author makes a very compelling case that this situation will arise, and likely within the next few decades. And he also lays out some rather bold suggestions to delay the shock of the resulting high unemployment and allow us to transition to an inevitably new type of economy as smoothly as possible. Though, even with these suggestions, I expect this transition is not likely to be smooth.
This book is a very important, frank discussion of a pending time-bomb for our precious mass market economy. Read it and recommend it to others. And think about how you and your family and friends will manage the forthcoming transition.
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|AUTOMATION CHANGES EVERYTHING,
When manufacturing automation produced the Great Depression there were forecasts that the Price System was doomed because the income from jobs was what provided purchasing power for the mass market. But instead of collapse, a transition was begun whereby the labour market was shifted from manufacturing employment to service employment.
But in The Industrialization of Intelligence, Noah Kennedy warned us that the same processes that had eliminated jobs in manufacturing would eventually be applied to intellectual work. Martin Ford is now announcing that we are very close to massive layoffs amongst Knowledge Workers because everything from inventory re-stocking, to legal research, to medical diagnostics, will be progressively automated as well.
No jobs means no pay cheques, so a decline of 30% in the size of the workforce will bring ruin to both ordinary consumers and mass marketing. Declining sales means declining profits, and that leads to declining investments and declining innovation. The market will not be able to shift sufficient employment to any other sector to recreate jobs. Market-financed automation will undermine the incomes of virtually everyone.
It's time to rethink the way income is distributed as well as the lifestyles that consumers lead. If economic productivity is taxed at the same rate as previous labour costs, transfer payments can then be established to provide income to otherwise unemployed consumers. These transfers should be enough to cover the basics: food, clothing, shelter, medical treatment, transportation, education, and entertainment. There is literally no other way to get purchasing power into the hands of consumers.
To keep people motivated to continue "behaving themselves," the transfer rates could be tied to incentives for responsible and creative lifestyles. More education would result in a somewhat higher transfer payment, as would volunteer work, and other helpful and creative endeavours. These are some of Mr. Ford's suggestions, and they are all very carefully thought out and presented. Since we will all be impacted by the continuing process of automation, we all need to read this book, and engage in conversation regarding how and when such steps need to be taken.
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