Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030

Re:Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030 by JoeAltmaier on Saturday April 07, 2018 @03:55PM (#16782525)

Further, even if we give 'capital' a pass (the use of imaginary points to grease the wheels of trade) and move on to the Free Market. A market works if everybody has something to trade there. For those that bring only their labor (whether ditch digging, medicine or engineering) they have a finite value over their lifetime - they will never be wealthy as the top 1% are.

Now automate. We no longer need the labor of millions to run the machine (country's industry). We need only a million. Then only a hundred thousand. Then none. What happens to the 'laborers'? They are dropped out of the bottom of the machine as scrap.

Its this 'means of production' that gets us into trouble - when a few folks squat on it and call it 'theirs', the rest of us are reduce to marginal participants in the machine, expendable.

Automation is happening in the US at an explosive rate. Heard about a factory coming back from China? Only because now even Chinese labor is too expensive, if you can automate. There are insignificant jobs 'coming back'. And there never will be any more, again.

No, the age of labor is nearly over. And what will the millions of us do then?

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Richest 1% on target to own two-thirds of all wealth by 2030 by coliveira on Saturday April 07, 2018 @05:51PM (#16783210)

This just points out that capitalism as it is practiced nowadays is unsustainable. Not news, of course, the general functioning of the system is known since the 19th century, but the shoes are starting to drop. Since technological revolutions happen so fast, I wonder if we're already seeing the beginnings of the downfall of all this.

[ Parent | on HN ]