About jobs - it has to be a part of the discussion that machines have replaced so many jobs. I don't even see with protectionism how there are really enough jobs to go around if you cut back to things that aren't entirely fluff in the economy. Maybe part of the answer needs to be spreading around the work a little better - cutting hours instead of cutting workers. The government has a *lot* to do to pick up the benefits in that case, since only "full-time" workers get these in most cases. Kellogg's did this during the Great Depression - cut hours - and the workers were happier than they had been even though their pay was cut, most who had the option decided to keep the 30-hour lower pay plan even when offered more hours and higher pay. They still had benefits, though, even at 30-hours. It just seems so stupid that we have all the goods to keep everyone fed, clothed, and sheltered, but our distribution system which is work and pay, is just breaking down. I definitely agree about it all coming down to jobs, but the problem is so complex, with outsourcing to other countries, automation, a workforce dependent on their employers for healthcare, etc. Many, many problems all tangled together.
Anyone read Player Piano by Kurt Vonnegut? He presents in an amusing way a lot of my thoughts about jobs.
What if we STRUCTURALLY have more people than there are jobs? Industry has always tried to get more "productive"... more product per man-hour of labor... Machines to make things in great quantities at low cost. Machines to take the place of many workers. What is left for displaced workers to do? And when our economy settles out after this "adjustment", we may find economic activity some 20-40% BELOW the 2007 "borrow and spend" peak. We may find that there are not enough jobs available, regardless. What is to be done about the permanently unemployed?
Workers all over the globe are all losing out to these guys, who are themselves having a hard time hanging on to their jobs, even though they're working hard and efficiently for 49 cents an hour: And in the very near future, this guy will basically work for free: Interviewing for IT/White Collar job:
The same people complaining in this thread how machines make workers obsolete would have complained 100 years ago how tractors and fertilizers were destroying farming jobs. Or how computers were destroying office jobs in the late 70s.