Eventually, one would assume, machines and technology will come about that will eliminate the demand for low paying jobs. Why pay a human to do a job that a machine can, right?
I was thinking about this and it initially lead me to the conclusion “Oh no! What will the low-skilled workers do!”
But wait? Is this necessarily a bad thing? It may sound cruel or Malthusian in a sense, but won’t humanity be better off without the lowest-rung? If there were no longer opportunities for poor/uneducated/low-skilled people to work, wouldn’t the majority of them die off? Why should the government interfere with this natural phenomenon (ie, welfare and “free” medical services)?
My knowledge of Austrian economic literature is, I’m sure, much less than many of the members here. Have any Austrians published thought about this topic? How would Malthus compare to a typical Austrian?
There will always be a “lowest rung”. However the lowest rung will change and be better than the previous ones, but still be at the bottom of the pile relative to the present situation.
The technological advances I am thinking of are far greater than say a shovel (which enables low skilled people to work), but more like a robot that can replace an assembly line and build cars (which would put low skilled people out of work).
To use that example, the robot would not be run by “low-rung” people, but by scientists and engineers.
My argument is that technology like this, which completely replaces low-skilled workers - not enables them, is not necessarily a bad thing because it could serve as a population control mechanism.
This doesn’t entirely fit with what’s put foreward in the OP, but actually I tend to think of technology as a way to raise the bar of population sustainability so that deliberate population control is unecessary (not that I don’t find it to be immoral as well in the first place). What allegedly “overpopulated” areas need is not population control but population sustainability. They need access to resources and technological innovation.
As for the prospect of technology replacing workers to such an extent that basically “robot labor” replaces “human labor”, I’m not much of a luddite. I don’t see much reason for fear.
I dont ever see a day when this would be the case. There will always have to be low skilled labor to clean and supervise the robots, there would just be less of it. An example is if you go to walmart and you use a self-checkout machine, there is always somebody standing at the end of them making sure they are working properly, and they fix them when they are not. Therefore, the amount of unskilled labor in this situation would be decreased, but would never be eliminated.
I wouldn’t be so sure. Could a self-cleaning or self-supervising robot never be created?
But yes, you are right in that the amount of unskilled labor would not be totally eliminated but decreased. I believe this could be a good thing since our population is always expanding while resources and land are finite.
No matter the level of technology, there will always be a “low-end” on the human-jobs spectrum. Ever-increasing technology simply shifts the entire spectrum.
I suppose we could get to the point where humans no longer have to do anything at all in order to survive. In that case, we humans can simply spend our time doing better things than worrying about starving! There would still be a demand for goods and services produced by humans, but they will be 100% leisure. It wouldn’t result in any deaths of low-skilled workers, but it would probably result in fewer people willing to pay them for their services.
It will certainly make the case for capitalism easier!