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Read this interesting essay written by DEREK THOMPSON
For centuries, experts have predicted that machines would make workers obsolete. That moment may finally be arriving. Could that be a good thing ?
The end of work is still just a futuristic concept for most of the United States, but it is something like a moment in history for Youngstown, Ohio, one its residents can cite with precision: September 19, 1977.
For much of the 20th century, Youngstown's steel mills delivered such great prosperity that the city was a model of the American dream, boasting a median income and a home ownership rate that were among the nation's highest. But as manufacturing shifted abroad after World War II, Youngstown steel suffered, and on that gray September afternoon in 1977, Youngstown Sheet and Tube announced the shuttering of its Campbell Works mill. Within five years, the city lost 50,000 jobs and $1.3 billion in manufacturing wages. The effect was so severe that a term was coined to describe the fallout: regional depression.
Youngstown was transformed not only by an economic disruption but also by a psychological and cultural breakdown. Depression, spousal abuse, and suicide all became much more prevalent; the caseload of the area's mental-health center tripled within a decade. The city built four prisons in the mid-1990s—a rare growth industry. One of the few downtown construction projects of that period was a museum dedicated to the defunct steel industry.
The future will tell us whether or not this pans out as he envisions. What does SN think will happen ?
Original Submission
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 25 2015, @12:47PM
Feudal overlords keep forgetting that property is a construct which falls apart when society falls apart. Their complete disregard for keeping society going eventually causes their own demise. Every time.
(Score: 1) by tftp on Thursday June 25 2015, @04:52PM
Feudal overlords keep forgetting that property is a construct which falls apart when society falls apart. Their complete disregard for keeping society going eventually causes their own demise
Feudal overlords are safe because the society does not fall apart. The unwanted population will be "managed." SciFi is full of examples of such management.
If the society doesn't want to be managed... too bad for it. The rulers of the world know what side to take, and that will not be the side of the rabble. The rulers will side with the owners of everything on this Earth. The unwanted people will be destroyed [endoftheamericandream.com] one way or another.
A fully automated world does not require a modern feudal to own 10,000 peasants to grow food for him. It is enough to have 1,000 robots - and those robots repair and build themselves. Why would the feudal want to have the burden of those peasants? They'd be sent away, or left alone to rot in secured cities in the way of Detroit and Baltimore and Chicago. Perhaps fertility will drop there in a strange way. In the end the unwanted people be gone. The rest will be living in luxury - they will have huge tracts of land all for themselves, like on Solaria [wikipedia.org]:
Ultimately, Solaria became totally dependent on robot labor; roughly 10,000 robots existed for every human. The world was extremely sparsely inhabited, with only 20,000 humans (and 200 million robots) inhabiting 30 million miles² (78 million km²) of fertile land, divided into over 10,000 huge estates (the exact number is unknown, since some of the estates were inhabited by couples). The population was kept stable through strict birth and immigration controls.
As new citizens will be born only from those elites, it becomes possible to practice eugenics. But even the good old education, together with complete families and purpose of life and good habits, can go a long way toward fixing many social ills that plague modern ghettos. And, of course, nothing stops that future society of elites from harshly culling their own stock. They do not need too many children, after all - only the replacement.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday June 25 2015, @10:17PM
Their complete disregard for keeping society going eventually causes their own demise. Every time.
Not this time, since that will manufacture consent for militarized police force made up of drone armies wherein an even fewer number of people can suppress the will of an even greater number.
What, you imagine that robots capable of doing all other jobs won't be hunting down dissidents who are blamed for the collapse of society?