[EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote:
>
> Agree.
>
> Re: future of work, note the shut down in auto assembly plants (and other
> mfg. centres as well) as we see the other side of "just in time"
> manufacturing. Inventory provides some robustness in when interruptions
> occur.
I have been saying for a while:
"Just in case" beats "just in time".
How curious that our factories and offices where
downsizing, eliminating raw material inventories,
outsourcing, etc. is de rigeur, are designed by
postmodernist bricolage-ornamentation celebrating architects,
who never tire of mocking the modernists' slogan: "less is more".
Our postmodernists have replaced
esthetic minimalism with ethical, cultural and political
minimalism: lower wages, less job security, less
"room for error", etc.
These postmodernist architects -- the products of our
elite universities -- pride themselves on
*not* trying to improve persons' lives.
http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/postmodernismx.html
If we follow John Adams's notion of the relative
desirability of various occupations, with being an
artist or architect way above being a businessman, there
is no wonder that our businessmen fall into such
churlish ways of thinking when those above them
celebrate churlishness (they especially
like Las Vegas). Yet again, another "treason of the clerks".
>
> The larger issue seems to be about the unmeasured costs of efficiency. Not
> externalities, rather apparent efficiency which turns out not to be
> sustainable because it was short term efficiency. We have seen this in
> infrastructure (highways) and we see it elsewhere.
[snip]
I have little doubt that Soviet centralized economic planning was
inefficient. But I wonder *how much* more productive capitalism is
when all the goods that have to be sold at markdown, the cost of social
planning thru advertising (not to mention planned obsolescence...),
the cost of business failures, etc. are factored in. I find it
hard to imagine that a Soviet steelworker who did produce at least some
steel could have been *much* less productive than an unemployed
American steelworker, etc.
--
I have posted on my website, at least until the copyright holder
fins out, an unauthorized reproduction of what I consider
to be one of the defining images of the 20th century -- a century
of so many disappointed hopes, so much wasted promise....
http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/trotsky.html
"And history continues...." (Elsa Morante, _History: A Novel)
"Yours in discourse...."
+\brad mccormick
--
Let your light so shine before men,
that they may see your good works.... (Matt 5:16)
Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. (1 Thes 5:21)
<![%THINK;[SGML+APL]]> Brad McCormick, Ed.D. / [EMAIL PROTECTED]
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Visit my website ==> http://www.users.cloud9.net/~bradmcc/
