Wednesday 3 December 2003

Pic of the day: Exactly the skills needed in the future society... (Picture from inspirational anime Read or Dream.)

More or less work?

I read a really eye-opening fact in a newspaper article a couple days ago. It was about the supposed productivity growth in the USA. As most of you know, the American economy is recovering nicely these days. But the current growth spurt is fueled by cheap credit and government overspending. It is not sustainable unless somehow, miraculously, the USA will earn a lot more money in the not too far future. One reason for optimism has been the strong productivity growth. Admittedly this has the downside that new jobs are not created as fast, since you can get more done with fewer people. But as everyone gets richer, the jobs should sooner or later show up, in service if nowhere else.

The article pointed out that official statistics on productivity were based on the axiom that employees worked equally much today as they did some years ago. This is probably not true.

With portable computers, intranet and cheap long distance calls, more and more people take their work home. Also during the recession, companies have put pressure on their employees to work longer hours with no overtime pay (sometimes with no pay at all) in exchange for not being fired. This shows up as productivity growth, but it is not, really. You cannot continue this way. There are natural limits to how much people can work, and the closer we come to those limits, the harder it gets to push on. And the moment the job market recovers, this "productivity growth" will not just stop, it will actually be reversed. Well, the part that stems from people working for free out of fear, at least.

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I also read something else interesting in the newspaper. This was about the upcoming pensions reform here in Norway. There has been some talk about how to finance the pensions. After all, despite being one of the richest nations on Earth, we haven't put aside money on such a vast scale. So there will be attempts to make people stay longer in their jobs; otherwise they will get less money. And taxes will have to be raised to pay for the public pensions. But that's where a couple respectable researchers say no. Lower the taxes instead, they say.

More exactly, they want the income tax lowered for people in low-paid jobs. This, they say, will cause these people to work more. Those in high-paid jobs already work a lot.

It is that easy, huh? The low-paid workers work so little because they can't be bothered? Don't find it worth it? Evidently in the world where these researchers live, getting more work is as simple as wanting it. Must be a nice place. None of that pesky unemployment. And no vicious circle of not affording education and not getting work, or only work that breaks your body and soul. Admittedly we don't have American conditions here, thank the Light for that, but it's still a bit from "if you want work, just say so". Well, unless you work for free!

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There seems to be broad political agreement that everyone should work for most of their lives. I think this is a bad goal. Instead, we should find ways to redistribute wealth and give people respect even if they cannot work. Because as technology progresses, more and more people will be unable to do anything a machine cannot. The only areas in which humans have a natural advantage are creativity and being sexy.

My first job consisted largely of sorting paper forms. Today, many of these are replaced by electronic forms that are sorted automatically. The job position still exists, and there is still some paper sorting, but for each year there is less of it, and less people to do it too. Should we have laws that require the use of paper forms in order to preserve jobs that don't require higher education? Should we have laws that demand that all roads be built with spades and sledgehammers in order to accommodate people who used to live by their muscles?

There are many approaches to the problem of unemployable people. There is the American way: Concentrate them in city slums, then when they get out of line kill them. There is the European way: Make imaginary jobs paid by tax money, and have people do things that don't need doing. And of course there's always the option of using them as canon fodder in wars. None of these sound really good.

In my humble opinion, people who don't have marketable skills should be paid a moderate amount to have fun, on the express condition that they don't breed. (Actually I'd probably sign up for that even though I have exactly the skills our society needs, but that's beside the point.) The point is, in the long run most of today's jobs are no longer necessary. The children who are born today, won't be adults in today's society. We should begin to think of the future. Even though it won't be what we expect, it is still a good bet that it won't be like the past either, and we have to make room for that.