In reply to OrionWorks - Steven Vincent Johnson's message of Tue, 31 Aug 2010 19:55:30 -0500: Hi, [snip] >IMO, at some point as automation continues taking over most of the dredge >work we may eventually have to transform our entire economic infrastructure >into a highly sophisticated computerized welfare state. IOW, everyone gets >(is entitled to...) a minimum "allowance" that guarantees that everyone can >purchase all the basic necessities of life, like food, clothing, shelter, >transportation, and perhaps even a little pocket change for an occasional >show.
This is more or less the definition of socialism. For those who are fond of the capitalistic approach, the solution is to make everyone a shareholder, so that income is distributed as dividends as well as wages. That way no one complains when fewer people need be employed (&/or fewer hours worked), because dividends go up commensurately. In fact the "ideal" solution might be a single giant corporation that owns and operates everything, and in turn is owned by all people (with shares that can't be sold). Then profits (and dividends) increase as the business is run more efficiently, resulting in everyone having a vested interest in seeing that it runs efficiently and requires as little labor as possible. That in turn means that production is maximized while effort is minimized. Therefore this model is flexible enough to allow a transition to a completely automated manufacturing process. Note: When a person's share income starts to drop they have to work more to compensate, and that extra work in turn pushes the dividends back up again, so this mechanism ensures that the minimum amount of work required to meet peoples expectations is carried out. Of course there will be those who do no work, and are content to subsist on the share income alone which may not be considered fair by those who do work. This is more or less the economic equivalent of a minimum wage, which we already have. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://rvanspaa.freehostia.com/Project.html
