What are the long term consequences of automatization?

[Peter1469]

You might however, expect to keep your furniture a little longer than a pair of boots.

Most of my furniture is wood, nice, and will outlast me. My suits will outlast me too. At least most of them. I do have a couple of cheap ones.

[Dr. Who]

Most of my furniture is wood, nice, and will outlast me. My suits will outlast me too. At least most of them. I do have a couple of cheap ones.

I tend to buy quality items that will last but many people don't know the difference and probably don't care, which is what encourages the rampant mass production of inferior goods.

[Peter1469]

I tend to buy quality items that will last but many people don't know the difference and probably don't care, which is what encourages the rampant mass production of inferior goods.

Or they think a $200 book shelf is a great deal. But when they put it together and the shelves bow under the weight of their books they are disappointed.

[Dr. Who]

Or they think a $200 book shelf is a great deal. But when they put it together and the shelves bow under the weight of their books they are disappointed.

Exactly. People should go to antique shops and look how furniture used to be constructed and what was used in its construction. Then they should compare it to those supposed great deals. They should also learn just what particle board is and what happens to it if it gets wet. A friend of mine found out the hard way about particle board when her apartment was flooded by a broken pipe in the unit above her. Her bedroom furniture was nice looking but particle board. Everything touching the floor absorbed water, swelled and released urea formaldehyde gas. Ironically, before that happened I had been telling her about the shortcomings of particle board and how toxic it is when wet. She wasted no time getting it removed from her apartment - she was choking on the fumes.

[MisterVeritis]

Actually H&G societies were pretty population staple so where did they get more "employees" and what would they do with more food than they could eat? Even now paper mill employment is down in this country, in part due to automatization.
The main point however is shouldn't automatization produce more free time? And if not why support it?
What's the benefit for the worker? A little less physicality in their job so now they have to find time and money for a gym? The super rich need to throw out a few more crumbs or it will eventually get ugly.

What a goof ball.

[MisterVeritis]

Yep. Automation has always resulted in increased productivity. As an example, we no longer use one-half of our people to farm to feed all of us.

So what do we use them for?

"We" don't use them for anything.

Think hard. Is there anything you know?

[Chris]

No. If you have the ability to create objects, food, water, etc for almost nothing, people are still needed to do all sorts of things.

I think we're saying the same thing.

Scarcity comes in how you allocate resources, well, actually, even in how you allocate time and effort at creating resources, and then how you use them as inputs to production. I cut down a tree and can now cut it up for firewood, saw it up for boards, pulp it up into paper, its uses are limited. My time and effort is limited.

[Chris]

Yep. Automation has always resulted in increased productivity. As an example, we no longer use one-half of our people to farm to feed all of us.


"We" don't use them for anything.

Think hard. Is there anything you know?

They do other things. There aren't all that many small independent farms nowadays anyhow, agriculture is big business now. Those farmers didn't just lay down and die.

[MisterVeritis]

They do other things. There aren't all that many small independent farms nowadays anyhow, agriculture is big business now. Those farmers didn't just lay down and die.

Once they have seen the big city it is hard to keep them down on the farm. One percent of the population can produce more than 50% used to. There is always something more we can be doing with our time.