Do we really need jobs?

[Luckymoose]

Eventually human beings will no longer be required to work as our inventions will continue to produce for us at a rate we cannot fathom. At that point we are nothing more than toddlers in a world with extremely high standards of living. It will be paradise.

 

[Narz]

For much of history, jobs have been important, as jobs allow us to get away from the subsistence, lackluster economy of hunter gathering.

Pre-agriculture societies worked about 2-4 hours a day & the rest of their time is devoted to festivals & leisure. Working 8-hours a day at Walmart & then coming home to watch TV now that's lackluster!

 

[Integral]

Cutlass, I could write a longer post (and probably will on request), but Nick Rowe has addressed the whole "technology and jobs" question here in a somewhat better way than I probably could.

--

More directly, the article makes a lot of good points. He sort of discounts the "creative" half of creative-destruction, in the sense that while some industries fade in the face of technological change, other industries grow. We don't have a thriving buggy-whip industry anymore, but at the same time employment in the IT sector was 0 back in 1850. Technology cuts both ways.

"Do we really need jobs"? Yes, to generate income. But we don't necessarily need 40-hour-per-week jobs. The workweek adjusts so that unemployment stays low; wages also do some lifting in the adjustment process. We don't have a 60-hour workweek and there's no reason to think we'll stick at a 40-hour workweek. "Mass unemployment in the face of technical change" ignores the fact that hours and wages adjust to keep a high-employment equilibrium. Proof: the past 80-some years, in which there's been a lot of progress but no corresponding rise in trend unemployment.

--

The high unemployment we see right now is recession-related, not technology-related.

If it were tech-related, and automation were pushing people out of jobs, then why wasn't unemployment at 9% back in 2005? Were there such massive changes in technology between then and now? Of course not.

...more to come if any of this is remotely interesting. Lots of it is a rehash of stuff one would learn in intermediate macro. See Nick's post linked above.

 

[Colonel]

This unemployment crap is insane. People need to stop being lazy and get a job. If I were fired tomorrow I would have a job within a month regardless of the job skills I currently hold. My X had a problem finding a job and I thought "hey the economy is bad so its just she can't find work" but then I realized that there were tons of places hiring around town and she simply wouldn't settle for something she thought was below her. This is the problem with the American public, no job is too low for you if you can't put food on the table.

 

[innonimatu]

http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/09/07/rushkoff.jobs.obsolete/index.html?hpt=op_mid
But there might still be another possibility -- something we couldn't really imagine for ourselves until the digital era. As a pioneer of virtual reality, Jaron Lanier, recently pointed out, we no longer need to make stuff in order to make money. We can instead exchange information-based products.

Ah, yes, the desperate strategy to save the economy by commercializing virtual goods. I've been expecting that since the last millenium. And I've been expecting it to fail. For two reasons:

1) Someone has to produce the actual physical goods. What will the be exchange rate of real vs. virtual goods?

2) What will be those virtual goods? Because it looks to me that most virtual goods are entertainment crap, and there is no sign of that trend breaking. Worse, the trend is also that people be consumers of virtual crap, not producers. Case in point: the "ipad mania" - those are devices which by their very design are meant for viewers of icrap, not as tools for creating it.

I thought the article was actually a decent analysis, but I'd say it gave into political ideology in the end.

Well, that's the whole point of making any analysis, isn't it? To obtain information in order to make better policy decisions? Those are always political.

This is a good point, but I think it is flawed to take this as a declaration of a "techno-socialism", the way the author reasons. I think that trend exists and may continue to grow some, but realistically the economy can continue to grow into new areas that didn't previously exist. The economy needs to grow by continuing to take risks on new discoveries, new technology, etc.. If the market stagnates, then intervention is needed, but that's not grounds for a new socialism.

What does it mean to state "the economy grows"? What has been and is now supposed to be this "growth"? Is it technical improvement? Qualitative increases in production? Quantitative increases?
If you look carefully, the measures of "growth" do not really care about that. It's all abstracted as "net output" which corresponds to the claimed "value added" of the diverse sectors of an economy. The problem is: how much of that is a measure or real economic output of useful goods and services, and how much is the result of trading just of the sake of "growing the GDP" or making money?

Consider, for example, that comment by Paul Volcker about the so-called "innovation" of financial services, which was supposed to have made them so much more valuable to the economy: "Is that a reflection of your financial innovation, or just a reflection of what you’re paid?"

Any economy in the world has always been, in part, about gaming the system, whatever it was, instead of producing useful goods. But the real risk, now, of this escape towards imaginary property/virtual goods is that it will become the vast majority of the economy! Then "the economy" becomes only a mechanism of social control - for keeping people busy and obedient to some estabelished hierarchy.

I'd also disagree with the author's optimism about food production, etc... I'm skeptical that food production and population growth will continue. All we need is an energy (fossil fuels mainly) crash to cause a crash of everything else dependent (food, population, civilization,...).

Yeah, and on the long run we're all dead. So what?

 

[Cutlass]

This unemployment crap is insane. People need to stop being lazy and get a job. If I were fired tomorrow I would have a job within a month regardless of the job skills I currently hold. My X had a problem finding a job and I thought "hey the economy is bad so its just she can't find work" but then I realized that there were tons of places hiring around town and she simply wouldn't settle for something she thought was below her. This is the problem with the American public, no job is too low for you if you can't put food on the table.

And that is exactly the attitude that causes failed understanding of the problems and politicians who constantly do the wrong thing. High unemployment is because there aren't enough jobs to go around. Not because people aren't trying to take them.

Cutlass, I could write a longer post (and probably will on request), but Nick Rowe has addressed the whole "technology and jobs" question here in a somewhat better way than I probably could.

--

More directly, the article makes a lot of good points. He sort of discounts the "creative" half of creative-destruction, in the sense that while some industries fade in the face of technological change, other industries grow. We don't have a thriving buggy-whip industry anymore, but at the same time employment in the IT sector was 0 back in 1850. Technology cuts both ways.

"Do we really need jobs"? Yes, to generate income. But we don't necessarily need 40-hour-per-week jobs. The workweek adjusts so that unemployment stays low; wages also do some lifting in the adjustment process. We don't have a 60-hour workweek and there's no reason to think we'll stick at a 40-hour workweek. "Mass unemployment in the face of technical change" ignores the fact that hours and wages adjust to keep a high-employment equilibrium. Proof: the past 80-some years, in which there's been a lot of progress but no corresponding rise in trend unemployment.

--

The high unemployment we see right now is recession-related, not technology-related.

If it were tech-related, and automation were pushing people out of jobs, then why wasn't unemployment at 9% back in 2005? Were there such massive changes in technology between then and now? Of course not.

...more to come if any of this is remotely interesting. Lots of it is a rehash of stuff one would learn in intermediate macro. See Nick's post linked above.

On the creative destruction part, I tend to see this in terms of the wages problem that I've been harping on all this time. When wages don't rise with productivity, then there's no increase in purchasing power to make being creative profitable. There needs to be a lot of available money before you get the startups and new investment that creates the new jobs.

On the hours worked part, I'm not sure what you are saying here. The hours worked for full time employees does not seem to be trending down. Now I don't know how to break out the stats, but it looks like the average full time employee is working more hours, not less. So lesser hours are not looking to provide more jobs. Not so long as it is better for the employer to insist on longer hours instead of hiring more employees.

Now maybe that stat is disguised behind the fact that so many people are involuntarily part time when they would choose to be full. But for those with full time jobs, you need to answer how many are getting 40 and under and how many are getting over 40, whether they like it or not.

If a lot of people are forced to be over 40, then the trend for the employment rate doesn't apply.

 

[Ahovking]

jobs gets us out of the house, they helps us interact with others keeping the community alive it, jobs help us play the Giant game of economics. We really do need jobs

 

[Colonel]

And that is exactly the attitude that causes failed understanding of the problems and politicians who constantly do the wrong thing. High unemployment is because there aren't enough jobs to go around. Not because people aren't trying to take them.

See you can say that all you want but I know there are plenty of places hiring for various type of work. The problem is some people can't find a job they are suited for and the larger group of unemployed refuse to accept lower paying jobs because they think it is below them to work in certain types of jobs. This country needs to get its work ethic back and force these lazy people into jobs whether or not they like the job they end up with.

 

[Cutlass]

See you can say that all you want but I know there are plenty of places hiring for various type of work. The problem is some people can't find a job they are suited for and the larger group of unemployed refuse to accept lower paying jobs because they think it is below them to work in certain types of jobs. This country needs to get its work ethic back and force these lazy people into jobs whether or not they like the job they end up with.

That's really not true at all. Americans are working harder now than they have in decades. You really think all those people loosing their houses are not looking for work? The jobs do not exist. Maybe some better motivated people can do better at it than others. But the fact that the jobs do not exist does not change. You take a job below what you can do, fine. That does not mean that a larger share of the population is employed. All that means is that some people get jobs and others do not. It does not change the unemployment rate. Just which people are unemployed.

 

[Colonel]

Considering without even trying in the past two years I have been offered a variety of jobs, some well below my skills to some that even exceeded the things I am qualified for\capable of I find fault in your statement that jobs simply don't exist. They exist for those who are willing and able to take them, you just have to look hard enough. For instance I have a Simulator company that I am considering working for after my military career and they have had job openings for nearly three years straight now. Yes that specific example requires that you have various skill sets that I hold that a majority of the public does not but you can find similar jobs in nearly every field.

 

[Disgustipated]

See you can say that all you want but I know there are plenty of places hiring for various type of work. The problem is some people can't find a job they are suited for and the larger group of unemployed refuse to accept lower paying jobs because they think it is below them to work in certain types of jobs. This country needs to get its work ethic back and force these lazy people into jobs whether or not they like the job they end up with.

Yes there are jobs, but let's be realistic. Most of them are in fast food or low-end retail (convenience stores etc.). Is that really the kinds of jobs people want?

 

[Cutlass]

Considering without even trying in the past two years I have been offered a variety of jobs, some well below my skills to some that even exceeded the things I am qualified for\capable of I find fault in your statement that jobs simply don't exist. They exist for those who are willing and able to take them, you just have to look hard enough. For instance I have a Simulator company that I am considering working for after my military career and they have had job openings for nearly three years straight now. Yes that specific example requires that you have various skill sets that I hold that a majority of the public does not but you can find similar jobs in nearly every field.

That's you. Not the economy as a whole. People are not losing their houses and life savings because they aren't trying to get jobs. They are losing them because they can't find jobs.

 

[Colonel]

Yes there are jobs, but let's be realistic. Most of them are in fast food or low-end retail (convenience stores etc.). Is that really the kinds of jobs people want?

I could care less if they are the ones people want, if they can't find work because they lack valued skills then they should be working those sorts of jobs. Its not my fault they are a drain on society because they couldn't seem to find a valued skill (like the ones I hold) in order for them to be in a better paying job.

Cutlass- As the post above you stated there are jobs people just don't want to take them because they are not well paying jobs. Its redistribution of wealth time, we need to remove people from the middle class that don't deserve based on their skills to remain there. In that same token we can raise up some of the lower class to the middle because they hold skills that are necessary.

 

[Cutlass]

I could care less if they are the ones people want, if they can't find work because they lack valued skills then they should be working those sorts of jobs. Its not my fault they are a drain on society because they couldn't seem to find a valued skill (like the ones I hold) in order for them to be in a better paying job.

Cutlass- As the post above you stated there are jobs people just don't want to take them because they are not well paying jobs. Its redistribution of wealth time, we need to remove people from the middle class that don't deserve based on their skills to remain there. In that same token we can raise up some of the lower class to the middle because they hold skills that are necessary.

There are not enough jobs! No matter how you want to slice it, there are not as many jobs as their are people able and willing to take them.

The question of taking jobs at lower income is an utter and complete strawman. There are not as many jobs as their are people able and willing to take them.

All of your post is nothing but far rightwing strawman.

 

[Colonel]

There are not enough jobs!No matter how you want to slice it, there are not as many jobs as their are people able and willing to take them.

The question of taking jobs at lower income is an utter and complete strawman. There are not as many jobs as their are people able and willing to take them.

All of your post is nothing but far rightwing strawman.

I re-bolded the parts that I thought need to be in your quote. You acknowledge that people are unwilling to take a variety of jobs. This is because they believe it to be below them and this is the very problem I am speaking of. If they want food on the table then they need to take these jobs regardless if they can not maintain the lifestyle and the type of residence they had to begin with.

 

[Cutlass]

I re-bolded the parts that I thought need to be in your quote. You acknowledge that people are unwilling to take a variety of jobs. This is because they believe it to be below them and this is the very problem I am speaking of. If they want food on the table then they need to take these jobs regardless if they can not maintain the lifestyle and the type of residence they had to begin with.

None of that has anything to do with the fact that if every person took the very first job offered, the unemployment rate would still be 9%.

There

are

not

enough

jobs

for

everyone

able

and

willing

to

work.

And nothing you say changes that.

Willingness is utterly and completely of no consequence whatsoever. That's pure propaganda.

 

[Colonel]

Once again I find fault in your statement but there is no way to continue this argument as we will both continue to say the same thing. We simply will have to agree to disagree.

 

[Disgustipated]

I should mention that it looks like bank of America will eliminate 30,000 jobs. It just gets worse and worse. And those are decent jobs.

 

[kramerfan86]

Even if 100% of the unemployed decided to settle for whatever job they could, there still wouldnt be enough jobs and its foolish to suggest otherwise.

 

[Colonel]

Even if 100% of the unemployed decided to settle for whatever job they could, there still wouldnt be enough jobs and its foolish to suggest otherwise.

As I said this is not true but as there is no way to prove this absolute certainty in either case we shall simply have to continue the discussion without falling back on this particular part of the argument.