What you are saying is true only in a world of perfect competition. The reality is the market concentration in most industries in the USA has been steadily increasing for decades and with this the profit margin and return on equity (even including non-software companies) of major corporations has risen over time. There is less competition now and companies have more pricing power than than they did 30 years ago so a lot of the cost savings will just be absorbed by the companies as higher profit margins rather than passed onto consumers. Not just that but concentration of cross ownership has risen. If for example Blackrock, Vanguard, State Street and Fidelity combined control 25% of the voting rights of shares in a company in the S&P 500 and control a similar percentage of voting rights in its competitor behind the scenes they will be pushing to make sure competition is gentlemanly and no price wars etc break out between competitors.Not necessarily. Imagine for example that it costs $1,000 to produce a computer. And automation reduces that cost to $800. Those $200 of savings can be passed on to the consumer. The consumer will then take those $200 he would have spent on the computer, and buy something else, for example some nice handmade shoes.
The government greenlighting things is only one step in the process.There are absolutely states in the union who will green light these factories faster than 5-10 years.
The problem is not everybody can do highly skilled highly specialized jobs. Not everybody is capable of that. I am fairly certain in 30 years time unemployment will be much higher than today.I don't think we have to redistribute money in the form of a dole or a guaranteed minimum income, paying people to sit around while we tax the people who work.
Even if current jobs become obsolete, there are still things people can do that generate value. There probably needs to be protection and subsidies for some industries, but the goal should be to provide private sector jobs for people, not to create generational welfare recipients or armies of government bureaucrats.
Yep. That is why you need to make enough money to retire in the next few years before everything goes to shit.Being reliant on the government to survive sounds like a potential nightmare.
Oh, you didn't take the latest jab or posted something "racist" on social media?!? No more UBI for you! And now we must take your children since you can no longer provide for them.
It reminds me of something from the end times prophecies.
I've been doing this for a while with my clothes and shoes etc. Less stuff but higher quality and timeless cuts.I have a pair of US-made New Balance gym shoes. They weren't ridiculously expensive, something like $120 about ten years ago. I've had them that long and they're still in like new condition. Granted, I don't use them outdoors and only wear them when I lift weights, but the quality is excellent, much better than any shoes I've had that were made in SE Asia.
My hiking shoes and hiking boots were made in Italy. The shoes are made of microfiber and I bout them about a year ago. The boots are leather and I've had them around 12 years. They cost something like $350. Both are amazing quality, seems like they'll last for decades. If they can make footwear like that in Italy for a reasonable price, seems like we should be able to make something similar for a similar price in the US.
Granted, the boots I bought over a decade ago, so they were kind of expensive, but not really for leather boots made in Italy that are likely to last my whole life, if you think about it. I get that a 10% or 20% price increase in the cheaper, lower quality SE Asian shoes most people wear will hurt lower income people to some extent, but making shoes in the US doesn't seem like a totally crazy idea to me. In the end, maybe Americans buy shoes less often, pay more, and get better shoes that last longer.