Sunday, September 12, 2010

Future issues

White collar work in the West is threatened by lightspeed worldwide communication with countries where wage rates are dramatically lower; and by increasingly powerful computers and programs.

When all but manual and menial work simply and permanently isn't there anymore for very large numbers of people, the moral connexion between work and income is weakened. The issue then will be distribution of wealth: who gets given what, and with what justification?

The embers of socialism are still hot.

4 comments:

Paddington said...

The only hope for many is very technical education. Unfortunately, too many lack the natural talent that is required.

James Higham said...

The move is away from currency as we know it to, as you say, a reallocation of resources. The City is the primary target over here and it's far more than greed - it is control, in order to implement the new paradigm.

hatfield girl said...

Why would socialism be thought of as a guide to the distribution of wealth? Realised socialism was one of the most spiteful, authoritarian and degrading socio-economic systems ever installed and suffered. (Sorry, I'm reading Frederick Taylor's The Berlin Wall 13 August 1961 - 9 November 1989, and it raises the political blood pressure). Anyone who wants to understand the depths to which socialism can carry human beings needs to study the experience of Germany. They lost the war but they didn't deserve such a retribution.

Sackerson said...

Thank you for visiting again, HG. The faults of socialism in practice are now well recognised, but the difficulties that have arisen out of the lunatic gambler-capitalism of recent years will serve to revive the theme of "from each according to his ability, to each according to his needs". Especially when the present Coalition is perceived as planning to hit the poor to pay for the excesses of the rich.