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Distribution of Wealth in a Robot-Driven World
An anonymous reader sent another piece by Marshall Brain. He continues his examination of a society where most manual labor is performed by machines, idling a large fraction of the current workforce. See his previous piece for background.
There is only one certainty, and that is that we will run out of money. Corporations gather money faster than any force on the planet, and eventually, they will have it all sewn up. The consumer will have less money to throw around, because McDonalds, Microsoft, and Major Movie labels will have gobbled up the entire economy in their attempts to keep stocks rising, even as the balloon's dimensions stretch into dangerous proportions.
This is exactly why Europe has such a lavish welfare system -- Hitler capitalized upon uncared-for Germans who were jealous of the wealthy overclass (with a significant amount of Jews). This was only 60 years ago and Europe is not going to make the same mistake again, though the economics of welfaring a section of the population which have a significant percentage of people who just want to drink beer and sleep around has got serious problems too. Paying people to be slackers isn't good for the country, though bloody revolution (you better be careful, corporate America) is a poor solution, offered up by the people who want to be the next aristocrats.
IMO, the solution involves the "haves" having compassion for the "have-nots" which means welfare only for the purpose of getting them a niche where they can be productive (and relatively happy doing it) for themselves, their families and the aggregate society. Ted Turner, you fuck, are you listening?
Peace & blessings,
bmac
True peace and happiness are only a wish away -- www.mihr.com