Maybe I was not completely clear yesterday, and the real Pandora box may skip your eyes. Let me take you one step further.
Do you know what's the minimal wage in a free society ? In the days of Adam Smith and before the two industrial revolutions, it was the amount of money that could sustain the living of a small family - a couple and two or three children. If the wage goes below this limit, the size of the working population shrinks, and the unmet demand of labor would drive the salary back up. (Unfortunate for the followers of Karl Marx, the reverse also holds true.)
The problem is, this equilibrium could sustain only if there is no competition in the employment market of labor force. Traditionally, competition could only be a problem in small economic systems - new immigrants provide cheap manpower because they only ask for the minimum that could sustain their own life.
By the law of biology, this species won't last.
But, when the laboring force is facing competition with machines and artificial intelligence, things are different because the wage (alas, the wear-and-tear and maintenance cost) of the latter is way lower.
And, machine does not (have to) follow the law of biology - they do not need a family or reproduction.
That's why we see such an unacceptably low salary amongst workers with minimal technical skill - a sum that is difficult even to sustain their own life.
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1 comment:
Puahaha.. yes... I'm so glad you made this post- because after yesterday's post, I sure didn't comprehend it with my average intelligence.
But from an employer's point of view, all this is for their good. So will improving people's skill really work?
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