What will we do when there are no more jobs? [View all]

[ProfessorPlum]

I exaggerate (a little). There will always be jobs. But maybe not a lot of them, and certainly not with the same ratio of people to jobs as there has been.

Technology is a rachet, moving towards fewer and fewer jobs. Everything that can be done by a machine instead of a human is (usually) a cost savings, so there is enormous pressure that way.

How will we deal with this? With the "protestant work ethic" that the workers of this country take to heart (thanks to it being enforced by their capital bearing masters), we deal with this situation now by mocking people who don't have jobs, or don't have adequate jobs, and our government seems to be run by people who want to make the situation of the un- or under-employed even worse.

"there but for the grace of god go I" we say under our breath, as we continue to labor away at one of the ever shrinking pool of jobs.

At some point, the only answers are 1) minimum income - a living income no matter what you are doing, which maintains your life and health and makes your healthcare completely untethered to employment OR 2) a feudalistic/fundamentalist/fascist hellscape, with the 1% living better than royalty, and the rest of the population slaving for their comforts while being worked to death and given nothing (or very little) in return

1) is completely politically unthinkable in our current state
2) is completely shitty and horrible, but seems to be what we are hurtling fastest towards.


Could the country take the implications of 1) without having a complete mental breakdown? Cause, it's got to happen. It's the only alternative (in a world with few jobs) to complete dystopia.