DiogenesTheWiser
Well-Known Member
We are in the so-called "digital age," which has replaced the so-called Nuclear Age of my youth (the 1970s & 1980s). During times of great shifts in the Age or the Era, there's usually economic upheaval. Take, for instance, the prevalence of the automobile, radio, durable goods like refrigerators, and amusement parks of the 1920s. This "modernity" altered social relationships and social value systems as well as render many old economic practices obsolete. Telegram companies were starting to go belly up because people could call one another. Ice houses went belly up because people had refrigeration. Wheelwrights went belly up because people with automobiles no longer needed wagon wheels. Similar with stockyards in the cities that kept folks' horses while in town.
By the Depression of the 1930s, some Americans believed in a Universal Basic Income (UBI). One of whom was Huey P. Long, who advocated the ideas that in the land of plenty (America), every man should live like a king. He promised voters to deliver on a UBI to the tune of $5K annually, and an automobile for every family, along with a radio.
Of course, Long was shot dead before he could run for el presidente, and spent much of his time in the Senate disparaging FDR and drinking way too much. Yet the UBI ideal lived on until WWII set aside the Great Depression that gripped every facet of American life for 12 to 14 years. Why?
Americans adapted, gradually, to the economic changes. Wheelwrights might have had hard times, but their kids knew not to follow in their dad's footsteps. Similarly, the youth today realize that a lot of jobs are obsolete. Even our ways of educating people are no longer valid in a digital age when information is free flowing. There's not one iota of need to teach the basic skills in school any more. Other than literacy, there's no need for math, algebra, civics, geometry, economics, history, or literature. Yet schools go on teaching the stuff that's available to anyone interested via the world wide web, which folks can access on their phones.
What the future generation will concentrate on is expanding the digital in the digital age. The new high income jobs will be centered around servicing the internet. So coding is what schools should be teaching. That along with basic medical-related skills are the core skill sets that future employees will need. Coding to keep the digital going and evolving, and medical skills to keep 100 year olds alive and comfortable (because we're living longer).
Society will adapt to the digital age, and economically speaking, whole new professions will eventually be created. Some of the same ol, same ol will persist, however. The vast majority of jobs will be low-paying, and only available to folks who don't know how to code and don't want to learn. Only a handful of folks will control the digital flow of information, and they'll be the like the robber barons of 140 years, or the Trumps of today. In short, in the new economy, the poor will get poorer and the wealthy will figure out ways to sustain that.
