
The History of Technological Anxiety and the Future of Economic Growth [pdf] - YeGoblynQueenne
http://pubs.aeaweb.org/doi/pdfplus/10.1257/jep.29.3.31
======
ideonexus
My summary of the paper is this: technology has always eliminated the lowest-
skilled jobs, freeing people up to work more rewarding jobs. Today's
information technology tools are opening up tremendous opportunities for
rewarding work. So don't pay attention to the people worrying about technology
putting people out of work, because they have always worried and things have
always turned out fine.

I hate to be the one to make the argument that "this time it's different," but
this paper has a huge blind spot in its analysis. What makes technological
progress in the Information Age different is the fact that the people loosing
their jobs today are the _highly-educated_. Paralegals are being replaced with
search algorithms, doctors will soon be replaced with IBM Watsons, and my
entire career as a software developer has been to automate and eliminate
office jobs for people with college degrees.

You know who isn't being replaced? Fast food and retail workers. Low skill and
super-high skill jobs are fine, but the middle-skill jobs are being automated
out of existence. Perhaps these IT tools we all develop will eventually open
up new mid-skilled employment opportunities, but when I see the anger and
populism fueling Trump and Sander's campaigns, I see people who are genuinely
hurting because they are being left behind. We can't just shrug and tell
ourselves, "Well, it's always gotten better in the past."

------
dang
Url changed from [http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/jobs-
aut...](http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/jobs-automation-
technological-unemployment-history/403576/?single_page=true), which points to
this.

