Re: Productivity vs. Uncle Ralph

["Doug, Data Librarian at Ext 4225" <engstromdd -at- PHIBRED -dot- COM>]

Some of Uncle Ralph's points are well taken, but before we get too down on
productivity, let's remember that's the reason that we're all here on the 'Net
instead of out hand-milking the goats.

I recently spent an afternoon hand-spading a 10'by10' plot for raspberries. As
my wife gave me a backrub that evening, we discussed my new-found appreciation
for why, during medieval and prior times, 95+ percent of the population had to
be involved in agriculture and they wore their bodies out by age 35.  I even had
the unimaginable luxury of a metal spade, rather than a wooden model, and
improvements in plant genetics will make my raspberry patch more productive than
those poor schmucks in Merri Olde England ever would have dreamed.

I think probably our gravest error, which is pointed out by Uncle Ralph's story,
is that we've started using our productivity gains almost exclusively to make
more stuff, rather than to make the same stuff in less time.  Rather than using
higher productivity to bargain for a balance of higher wages and lower hours
(the pattern for almost a hundred years) we've largely opted to raise wages (or
in the last 20 years or so, reduce the rate of decline) and leave the work week
fixed at 40 hours.  Actually, the work week has been slowly creeping upward on
an individual basis (as a result of overtime, both paid and unpaid) and has
skyrocketed on a per-household basis (as a result of two-income couples) which
is probably why most of us feel harrassed and stretched too thin.  I'd much
rather have more time off and proportionately less money, but that's not an
offer anyone is making these days.

(The whole issue of fair division of productivity gains between labor and
capital is separate and far more acrimonious.)

Anyway, the point is that productivity isn't the problem; dumb use of
productivity is.

Doug
ENGSTROMDD -at- phibred -dot- com