If one machine can cut necessary human labour by half, why make half of the workforce redundant, rather than employing the same number for half the time? Why not take advantage of automation to reduce the average working week from 40 hours to 30, and then to 20, and then to 10, with each diminishing block of labour time counting as a full time job? This would be possible if the gains from automation were not mostly seized by the rich and powerful, but were distributed fairly instead.The Guardian (UK)
Rather than try to repel the advance of the machine, which is all that the Luddites could imagine, we should prepare for a future of more leisure, which automation makes possible. But, to do that, we first need a revolution in social thinking.
Rise of the robots: what will the future of work look like?
Robert Skidelsky
(h/t Kevin Fathi via email)
4 comments:
Because people get bored Robert and most need to be told what to do.
Progressives might not like that, but it is a matter of fact. Most people like to be directed.
Neil, this is a reason that leisure can be monetized.
A great deal of leisure is now already monetized, to the degree that in the US everyone "serious" about being in shape has a personal trainer, affectionately know as one's "nazi."
There were people in my neighbourhood twenty years ago taking advantage of the wealth that automation brings by leading a life of leisure: I’m referring to people who decided to spend their lives living on benefits rather than work. And they didn’t need lectures from economics professors on “revolutions in social thinking” in order to work out how to spend their time.
Ralph,
what's your solution?
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