----- Original Message -----
Sent: Thursday, October 30, 2003 1:50
PM
Subject: RE: [Futurework] Walmart and the
American dream
Arthur,
You said:
"Design capability is a
complicated discussion. Let's just say that when it is lost it is
almost impossible for the country with that loss to buy intelligently in
the global marketplace."
Perhaps instead of
countries "buying intelligently", people should do the buying. Do they need
"design capability"? I'm sure I don't know what you mean by design capability.
When Britain was completely free trade, did she have design capability? If she
didn't, how did she carry on her enormous trade with the whole
world?
Questions, questions,
questions.
We have been losing jobs for two centuries as we learn to
do things with fewer people and less cost. Perhaps most obviously with regard
to agriculture. A couple of hundred years ago practically everyone was in
agriculture.now, there are perhaps 3%. So we lost more than 90% of our jobs.
What happened? All kinds of new production Why should the loss of a few
hundred, or even a few thousand specific jobs bother us very much? If you are
a member of the "lump of labor" club, the loss may seem troublesome.
Otherwise, it can be viewed as market progress toward cheaper goods and an
enhanced standard of living.
If you recall the second assumption of classical political
economy, you'll know that we are not over keen on work. We want the fruits of
our labor, but we aren't eager to exert ourselves getting
them.
So what is our "economic policy"?
It seems to be to
remove people from the production process. Then the rest
will have jobs (which are assumed to be scarce, perhaps because
most people already have everything and need
little).
Thus, we
keep young people in school until they are 18,
then we fill our colleges with high school graduates who probably
shouldn't be there. We impose retirement ages and make early-retirement very
attractive. A clever trick is to put people at their most productive age into
the military, which is hardly productive. We suck the brightest and the best
into swollen bureaucracies whose major task seems to be to restrict
production rather increase it.
And
when we have finished
this culling, what
do we have?
We have an unemployment problem.
Could it possibly be that we have adopted the
wrong approach?
We have a country this is practically oozing
resources. We have enough space to take the whole population of the world and
they wouldn't be crowded. Yet, we cannot answer Henry George' s question: "Why
are people looking for jobs. Why aren't jobs looking for people."
Is the problem "design incapability"?
Harry