Saw an interesting review by Guillermo Santamaria of Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee's new book Race Against The Machine at H+ (see below). The book deals with the current unemployment problem and the changes in the economy that are causing it -- particularly the automation of so much labor.
In my comment I wrote that it must be difficult to write about the current employment crisis (or, indeed, any crisis). Naturally, we tend to interpret events from our own perspective. If developments seem to benefit our own sort of person, then the future appears dark in the short run and bright in the long. if they do not, however, then the future is uniformly horrible.
The question, of course, is whether we know who the developments in question will really benefit. Automation, for instance, is putting much of the industrial workforce out of business. But, I've heard it argued that increasingly sophisticated software is having the same effect on white collar workers. The managerial, service, and "human skills" workers may not, in the long run, be the winners they think they are.
http://hplusmagazine.com/2012/01/29/book-review-race-against-the-machines/
I wrote my own critical review of Race Against the Machine here: http://declineofscarcity.com/?p=1037
ReplyDeleteEssentially I try to take the authors' premise seriously and show that their optimism doesn't follow logically, nor do their policy suggestions.