It's dubious that anyone except the most wealthy benefits from this. Even though productivity has exploded, wages hasn't followed and the rewards of productivity has gone to a small few. I don't know how anyone can look at wealth inequality today and think most people should be "grateful". It's more likely to me that rest of America will start to look like San Francisco.
You don’t have a smartphone, don’t use wireless networking and telecom, have no flat screen TV, don’t use the internet, and so on?
None of those things would exist if productivity was at the same level as the 1800’s.
If we woke tomorrow and started making all goods to be long-lived, nothing single-use, fixed up the designed-in obsolescence, open-sourced everything, then we'd release people and resources for a great focus on innovation whilst simultaneously cutting production levels.
Yes, people would work less (and produce less waste). No, I don't have all the answers on how that would work out. Greed would probably cause it to fail.
"Hey, at least I'm not dead." as the answer to "Why haven't we seen meaningful increases in free time for first world workers over the past three decades?" is a real head-scratcher.
AI will similarly increase out productivity but the work will still continue, because humans are an inexhaustible species, we always want to do more and more.
It's not an exclusive choice either. At least in Europe, the amount of free time grows with each generation. 37.5 hours per week, 5 weeks vacation and many bank holidays is a significant change from how much people worked in the fifties.
Yes, we can do better. But both our wealth and our free time are visibly improving.
Many of these advances in consumer goods absolutely create more time for relaxation and enjoyment.
Where did the parent say anything like this at all? I believe you're attacking a strawman.
Imagine how different the world would look if the richest person's net worth was a few million, and wealth was distributed much more evenly. You don't even need to look at productivity for this.
Why would I increase inflation if I redistributed existing wealth, by the way?
Inflation occurs when the supply of money flowing in the economy grows. Bezos' wealth for example is tied up into Amazon, it's not liquid. But suddenly if you gave everyone and extra 10k a year from that money? They'll spend it, causing prices to increase. That's inflation. Not to mention converting Amazon stock to cash would cause the price to crater. The way to get around that would be to directly issue the stock to the government or to the people, as some countries do. However, again, people could simply sell the stock to use the money as cash, again causing inflation. Norway and Alaska have a decent model, a sovereign wealth fund that issues dividends to its populace, but again, it can cause inflation.
Now one might say that worker comfort matters over companies being made, but at some point, there have to actually be companies to work at in the first place.
Bread and circuses? I mean sure, some things are cheaper, but other things are also much, much more expensive. And maybe it's because I'm older now, but I don't think "flat screen TVs" are a good benchmark for overall wealth (I don't even own a TV).
Yet, things like healthcare, housing, childcare and education have exploded in price despite the gains of "productivity". The former are necessities to live and it's dubious that to argue that I've "gained" from productivity if you have traded the ability for me to own a home with an iPhone. The balance isn't there - and I think you have a political undercurrent of people waking up to this. What good is a flat screen TV, if I can't own a home? Have I really benefitted from productivity gains if the equation is so out of whack? Simple math tells me that while a 50in has gone from $9,000 to $1,000, a "starter home" has gone from $200,000 to $800,000. Telling me I've benefitted in this situation is to take me for a fool.
Housing: NIMBYism and lack of ability to build, mainly by strict government zoning and people who petition their local governments to not build more lest it devalue their house.
Healthcare: insurance companies trying to get away with as much as they can, while hospitals try to charge as much as they can, effectively creating a price bidding war with the consumer in the middle.
Childcare: More people working, lower supply of childcare services but demand goes up, thus price goes up.
Education: Government effectively making student debt undischargeable in a bid to get more people to get college degrees but this backfired. Administrator costs for colleges ballooning.
So, even if wages had kept up with productivity, if you don't solve the underlying reasons as to why these costs exploded, you'll have the same issues as before.
I’m not saying socialized or free market approaches are better than one another. But the approach we have taken is the worst of both.
You can’t just insure the sickest demographics - you need a distribution. Either make it universal or let the free market compete for it.
You can’t just give anyone a ton of cash to learn what they want. Either make it free for all or let the free market lend to students based on expected return.
You can’t just guarantee every mortgage which keeps interest rates artificially low. Either build social housing or let the free market set interest rates.
In the 50s there were 3 cars/10 Americans. Now it's 9. Homeownership went for 55% to 66%. College degrees 6% -> 38%. We used to spent 20% of income on food. Now it's around 8%. Poverty among 65+ went from 35% to 10%.
Yes, more jobs today require more knowledge. My grandpa worked in a factory full of boring, repetitive work where he also got to inhale bad fumes every day. I went to college for 6 or 7 years and my employers combined have probably spent less than 10k on training for me. I get to work at a sit/stand desk, get snacks provided, ergonomic equipment and do work that has much more variety than anything my grandpa did. Even if I ignore the astronomical income difference between me and my grandpa, I'd still not trade this for his job.
Was the food actually healthier in the US in the 50s? Did food not come from factory farms? Wonder Bread has been around since the 20s and in the 40s had to have vitamins added. Seems like we already were far away from the serene pastures we all like to imagine food came from. Looking outside the US, famines were incredibly common until quite recently.
Edit: some photos of how great life looked outside of movies and advertisements as recently as the 80s: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35119136
We've got big problems in our economy and income inequality is certainly one of them, but it's asinine to pretend that most individuals in society have not benefitted from technological progress.
Even your list is out of touch; many of my friends in San Francisco don't have in-unit washer or dryers. Look I don't even think I'm even making a crazy observation; I'm just continuing the trend - as AI gets better and more pervasive it's only natural that wealth will concentrate without some force to redistribute it (either through wages or taxes).
A better example is, we go fishing, I catch fish, you chop wood, we build a fire with my wood and eat with your fish. We are both better off than we were before.
If you want to talk about shutting up in the face of inequality, pick a better example, or better yet, mention that you're not talking about the economy at all, even though that's the point of discussion here.
Are you implying there is no income equality today? I don't understand your contention with my point. It's more just asking me to ignore actual data and be happy with the fact that I can buy a flat screen TV for $200.
It's seems natural that capital accumulates - and with AI this process is only going to get more concentrated; and looking backwards its clear we its only going to get worse.
Income inequality in the economy is present, yes, but economists are not in agreement whether it's a good or bad thing, and whether redistribution of wealth would even solve it [0]:
> Despite the extensive existing literature on income inequality and economic growth, there remains considerable disagreement on the effect of inequality on economic growth. Existing literatures find either a positive or a negative relationship. In this paper, we attempt to theoretically examine that relationship with a stochastic optimal growth model. We make the disagreement clear within a single model. We conclude (i) that both are possible – that is, higher inequality can retard growth in the early stage of economic development, and can encourage growth in a near steady state, (ii) that income redistribution by high income tax does not always reduce income inequality. Income inequality can be reduced by higher income tax in a near steady state, but it cannot be reduced in the early stage of economic development, and (iii) that two government polices – rapid economic growth and low income inequality – can be achieved by low income tax in the early stage of economic development, but both cannot be achieved simultaneously in a near steady state.
[0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S02649...
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Now if you would like to submit literature on this topic, please do, as simply talking about what seems "natural" or "clear" does not really mean anything.
My kids have a vastly more fragile lifestyle then I did right out of college.
Machines made blue collar work near worthless, except for some crafts.
And things like ChatGPT can lower the worth of white collar jobs.
To whom would companies sell their stuff if nobody worked enough to earn money to buy their stuff?
You are working the same number of hours as before (40 ish) because companies are producing 10x as much goods in the same amount of time. If they produced only the same amount, ie 1x, you'd have your 2 hour work day (or more likely be out of a job). It is because companies are producing more stuff that you have a job at all currently. You are complaining about the very thing you benefit from now.