Keith,
When did England and Scotland lose their big cats, their stags, their wolves? When did England give up its Holy Art for a cheap version in the church with big organs? REH From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Keith Hudson Sent: Thursday, September 09, 2010 2:33 PM To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, , EDUCATION; Arthur Cordell Subject: Re: [Futurework] Trouble, trouble and more trouble Arthur, In a very strange way I feel that America is repeating some of the features of the British decline. There can be little doubt that we were the first into the industrial revolution. Yet, just as we were getting into our stride (say from 1780-1850) our technologies and industries were already leaving our shores -- mainly for Germany and America. In fact, quite a severe reaction set in against engineering in our leading universities (while Germany was building technical colleges all over). Yet enough science survived and, towards the end of our time (as any sort of viable economy) at around 1950-60 we had developed two of the greatest discoveries of our era as a final gesture -- antibiotics (from molecular biology), and the computer (from Turing's maths ideas). We developed both of these but were unable to hang onto them In a similar way, America has been losing all its consumer goods manufacturing to Japan and China and, like us, has been turning away from engineering. Much more science survived than in our case, however, and, in turn, American science labs have been developing what is the most complex science of them all -- genetics. The possible developments from genetics range from new energy technologies, through to medicine, through to actually making products in new ways. Will America be able to hang onto these future technologies? This, I feel is the big question for America. I think the present recession will turn into a permanently depressed condition until the new DNA-based technologies come along. But it may be a century away before it works its way round to full employment again. Keith At 10:04 09/09/2010 -0400, you wrote: It is the last para in the article that caught my attention. In this election season, the politicians who are really serious about creating jobs and bringing down unemployment <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/03/AR201009030 1979.html> won't be the ones screaming about tax cuts, or stimulus or some imagined government takeover of the economy. They'll be the ones talking about how to make the American economy competitive again. The US economy was moving along and was more or less competitive. The great change happened when competition was opened with countries with dramatically lower wages, labour standards, environmental standards, etc. Against this the US lost ground. Opening the door to China, first with Walmart and then with others following quickly to take advantage of the cost structure abroad has given lower cost products of all kinds to Western consumers at the cost of lost jobs across a broad range of industries. I really cant see how the American economy can become competitive again until a few things happen: living standards and wages decline in the US; wages and living standards rise in China, India, etc. Or as Keith continues to say there is a dramatic new consumer technology which leads to a new industry in the West and which remains in the West long enough to invigorate the entire economy. So the trouble is largely self-inflicted in my view. Short term gains (in price of consumer and a range of industrial products from low cost producers) is now leading to long term pain as jobs disappear, the tax base shrinks, technological skill migrate abroad. And, even worse, as the labour force ages the technology of designing and making things begins to erode simply because there are fewer and fewer entry level positions for new workers who can learn from the older workers. The older workers are gone, many of the industries are in a slump or are gone and so yes there is trouble. (of course you can add to this the financial debacle; Afghanistan, etc.) So we should listen very carefully to those who put forward policies to make the US competitive again. I dont see anything just yet beyond the chestnuts of increased productivity, smartinnovation, more technology, etc. Arthur From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Ed Weick Sent: Thursday, September 09, 2010 9:32 AM To: Keith Hudson; RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME DISTRIBUTION, EDUCATION Subject: Re: [Futurework] Trouble, trouble and more trouble Good morning (over here) Keith, I'm not denying that the availability of new status goods have had a significant effect in determining economic behaviour, but I think a great deal also depends on how people feel about their world and their ability to do things that can effect it positively. Right now, we are living through a period of doom and gloom compared to how we felt, say, a decade ago and we feel there isn't much we can do about it. People, governments and the economy in general are over leveraged and the value of most peoples prime asset, housing, is falling. Unemployment is high and many people of prime working age have dropped out of the labour force. Some commentators tell us that we are into a double-dip recession, while others tell us to forget about double dip, we are into a recession that will not end for a long time. Non-economic factors feed the dark mood: the high hopes of military action in Iraq and Afghanistan are crashing to the ground. At a time like this, one has to try very very hard to remain optimistic. No dark age has lasted forever and I'm hopeful that we'll see this one move on as well. Ed ----- Original Message ----- From: Keith Hudson <mailto:[email protected]> To: RE-DESIGNING WORK, INCOME <mailto:[email protected]> DISTRIBUTION,EDUCATION Sent: Thursday, September 09, 2010 3:34 AM Subject: Re: [Futurework] Trouble, trouble and more trouble Ed, Yes, a good article. My hypothesis, as you know, is that from about the 1980s there were no more uniquely new (mass producible) status goods to motivate the masses. This was the real, underlying reason why credit expanded so enormously at that time. However, whether one believes that my view is correct or not, there still remains the problem that the Western industrial economy seems to have reached structural buffers in employment, as Steven Pearlstein well describes. There are no resource constraints -- so far -- to account for this. Meanwhile, the birth rate of the advanced countries is declining fast. Even if an amazing new technology with a full-employment structure were to be presented to us right now, we (parents or governments) couldn't afford to educate our children to the higher standards that would be required. The only solution I can think of -- and it's one I don't like -- is that the 20% or so of the population who are still thriving in today's (and tomorrow's) recession, and can afford to educate their children in the best schools and universities, will have more children in the coming years and reverse the negative replacement trend. There is anecdotal evidence (enough to convince me) that this trend is already starting. (It's in the category of being fashionable at present.) But there is no hard evidence as yet that this is a real trend. Keith At 15:12 08/09/2010 -0400, you wrote: >From the Washington Post Ed _____ The bleak truth about unemployment By Steven <http://projects.washingtonpost.com/staff/articles/steven+pearlstein/> Pearlstein Tuesday, September 7, 2010; 9:04 PM Somewhere between the rantings of the Republican right, which is peddling the nonsense that excessive government spending is to blame for high unemployment, and the Democratic left, which clings to the false hope that another helping of fiscal stimulus is all that is needed to get millions of Americans permanently back to work, is this stubborn reality: Snip, snip, snip In this election season, the politicians who are really serious about creating jobs and bringing down unemployment <http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/09/03/AR201009030 1979.html> won't be the ones screaming about tax cuts, or stimulus or some imagined government takeover of the economy. They'll be the ones talking about how to make the American economy competitive again. _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework Keith Hudson, Saltford, England _____ _______________________________________________ Futurework mailing list [email protected] https://lists.uwaterloo.ca/mailman/listinfo/futurework Keith Hudson, Saltford, England
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