The Pitchforks Are Coming - a Forward-Thinking Article by Nick Hanauer

[DonRocks]

Jul, 2014 - "The Pitchforks are Coming ... for Us Plutocrats" by Nick Hanauer on politico.com

[Al Dente]

Thanks for finding that!

He hits the nail on the head. We are heading towards feudalism and there's no political will to do anything about it. Special interests write their own legislation making them richer and everyone else poorer. 

I think this is very much tied to the conversations around the 2nd amendment-- we need laws, ideas, and a mindset that truly consider the new realities of our rapidly changing modern world. We're stuck in our ways and have so many leaders who believe (or purport to believe) that somehow our country is immune to decay because... well, America. 

It's gonna start getting real fucked up real fast if we don't have any plans that extend past the next election.

[DonRocks]

On 8/25/2016 at 10:11 AM, Al Dente said:

Thanks for finding that!

He hits the nail on the head. We are heading towards feudalism and there's no political will to do anything about it. Special interests write their own legislation making them richer and everyone else poorer. 

I think this is very much tied to the conversations around the 2nd amendment-- we need laws, ideas, and a mindset that truly consider the new realities of our rapidly changing modern world. We're stuck in our ways and have so many leaders who believe (or purport to believe) that somehow our country is immune to decay because... well, America. 

It's gonna start getting real fucked up real fast if we don't have any plans that extend past the next election.

You know who's going to really suffer when the pitchforks come out?

Certainly, the plutocrats will lose the most.

But the middle class will lose *everything*. Not forever, but for long enough to make their lives absolutely miserable - the mega-rich (unless they have to flee the country, which seems quite unlikely since there are no "official designations" of royalty in this country) will have enough to live on.

The mob mentality hurts the mob most of all, and they're too dumb to even realize it while they're busy having fun burning cars and breaking windows.

Yeah, something needs to be done, and every single time people pull that lever for a politician who even remotely participates in the status quo, they're contributing to the demise of this country.

This is *exactly* why Trump has the appeal that he does - he may be a central part of the problem, but at least he's something *different*, and people are so desperate for something different that they're willing to roll the dice.

Analysts make the mistake of thinking, "Well, if they were dumb enough to vote for GWB, they'll also be dumb enough to vote for Trump," but I see two very different lures being used as bait.

And I also hate to say it, but it isn't "the politicians"; it's the flawed system. This country is set up to move *slowly* at the federal level, and the checks-and-balances hinders things when they need to be done on an urgent basis - *that* could be the downfall of the United States of America: "The Great Experiment" could well turn out to be The Failed Experiment.

People are so deluded by thinking that this 230-year-old country is guaranteed to last forever as the leading world power - they're wrong, and our best days *might* (emphasis: *might*) already be behind us.

I think one of the most insightful, poignant parts of that well-written article is that "The Revolution," if it hits, will be on us so fast that we won't have time to stop it.

We had better start making friends with our enemies because within 100-200 years, *individuals* will have access to cheap technology, capable of killing thousands if not millions of people. And maybe it's already happening.

It's nearly impossible for a billionaire to fathom that, when he climbs aboard his yacht, he might be contributing to the extinction of H. Sapiens, but that may well be the case.

Who knows, maybe in 100,000 years, Rosa Parks and Martin Luther King, Jr., may be nothing more than part of the fossil record, to be discovered in the distant future by the descendants of some primate.

[DaveO]

17 hours ago, DonRocks said:

Jul, 2014 - "The Pitchforks are Coming ... for Us Plutocrats" by Nick Hanauer on politico.com

I like Hanauer.  He has been commenting and writing for a while.  He has put together some very cogent reasonable series of comments that strike a chord with me.  Earlier this year he spoke on his perspectives in relation to the rise of the Trump candidacy within the GOP

(so maybe the "they screwed you" litany is a little overstated (at least from my perspective) but it mostly rings true.)

Hanauer is of course controversial because of his views and has his supporters and detractors. He has been articulating this type of content and themes for a while.  Wealth in the US is incredibly skewed and skewing more and more.  Over the last 30+ years and longer the GOP takes whacks at any kind of help or benefits for virtually all workers in any manner....but endlessly promotes the ever higher incomes of the 0.01% and bosses.  In that vein they have "screwed" part of their constituency  as Hanauer states.  Others have noted this.  I think he says it with more clarity.

[Al Dente]

The pitchforks will come when the robots show up. From an email exchange with my brother...

This is a fascinating, but troubling subject. I’ve read a good bit about what we’re looking at down the road in terms of unemployment. I don’t think any candidate wants to get on the stump and warn us about the coming of the robots. But we need to have a serious discussion about what to do with a million unemployed truckers, not to mention the millions of other jobs that’ll be on the chopping block in the next decade. What exactly do we train these people to be—assuming the gov’t or anyone else is willing to fund the training? I suspect there isn’t going to be a whole hell of a lot of replacement jobs.

"Presidential Campaigns are Talking around the Robot in the Room" by Marilyn Geewax on npr.org

 I think we’re going to see even more inequality in income and more and more (in my opinion, misdirected) anger from voters. Given the whole Trump shitshow, what kind of leaders are going to appeal to these voters? I fear we’re headed toward something a lot worse than Trump. Unless, dare I say it, we find a more socialistic solution that the public can get their heads wrapped around. Wealth will have to be redistributed greatly.

Feb 15, 2016 - "Robots will Steal your Job: How AI Could Increase Unemployment and Inequality" by Oscar Williams-Grut on businessinsider.com

 It’s happening already.

Jul, 2015 - "A World without Work" by Derek Thompson on theatlantic.com

“In 1964, the nation’s most valuable company, AT&T, was worth $267 billion in today’s dollars and employed 758,611 people. Today’s telecommunications giant, Google, is worth $370 billion but has only about 55,000 employees—less than a tenth the size of AT&T’s workforce in its heyday.”

 “Nine out of 10 workers today are in occupations that existed 100 years ago, and just 5 percent of the jobs generated between 1993 and 2013 came from “high tech” sectors like computing, software, and telecommunications. Our newest industries tend to be the most labor-efficient: they just don’t require many people.”

[DaveO]

1 hour ago, Al Dente said:

The pitchforks will come when the robots show up. From an email exchange with my brother...

Robotics is here and has been here for a while.  Its expanding.  If you look at total steel production in the US and elsewhere and look at total employment in that industry....there are lots and lots less workers per unit of production than in the past...in the US and worldwide.  People have been replaced by robotics.  On the "political talk" front  if you blocked every ounce of steel import into this nation and completely turned to domestic production they wouldn't hire the volume of workers from the past...and the skills would be different.  (some of the people would run the robots and others would maintain them).

Same thing with auto production.  Go into a full fledged auto plant.  It looks like something out of future time with robotic wings and arms everywhere.  Far fewer people.

Its here and it is expanding.  Driverless cars and DRIVERLESS TRUCKS.  Holy shit.  Imagine when those big trucks make a big mistake and screw up.  That will be some serious damage.   But evidently its coming. 

And in various restaurants you don't need servers.  Sit down, make your complete order off an IPad type device on your table.  Then pay with your card at the table.  Maybe a human will deliver the food.  maybe a robot. 

 

[DonRocks]

1 hour ago, Al Dente said:

The pitchforks will come when the robots show up. From an email exchange with my brother...

Impose a 90% corporate tax rate, and massive redistribution of wealth to the unemployed. Why wouldn't that solve it? If enough people are poor, they'll vote for it.

You've seen how there's almost a mob mentality against "the 1%" (a term that didn't even exist until a few years ago) - if it gets worse, why wouldn't the pushback get stronger?

[ktmoomau]

This sounds very depressing, and I am a very positive person normally, but I am glad I was born in 1983 and am not any younger.  We have made so much progress, and yet so little.  The world has transformed into something so impersonal- we don't call people on the phone, it's uncomfortable so we text, email and facebook (I feel like Facebook needs Jeb!'s exclamation point at the end to try to remind us all that it is fun).  I understand the irony of typing this online in a forum.  Now we add that robots drive us, they do our work.  Even more homogenous nations are facing crippling depression and internal divisiveness caused by economic turmoil.  We don't have any forward vision anymore, our outrage is short-lived and we are not willing to come together on any large important issues because of smaller differences that divide us.  Our government moves from one emergency they put off for five years to the next.   Our infrastructure is crumbling, we can't get off our fossil fuel dependency, and we let companies who are willing to pay, essentially do whatever they want.  We do not value personal industry- we pay teachers, military personnel, servers, etc meager wages.  If we don't monetarily value freedom and education as a society, how do we value other personal service.  And if we don't value personal service, what do we value and how does anyone survive in this new economy?  I understand the frustration that so many people feel.  I certainly don't have all the answers, but shouldn't we be working on that as a nation?  I abhorrently disagree with the, "Make America Great Again," sentiment because we have never been that great at everything, there has always been a large sector in which we have been pretty bad, but I would like to make America great.  I think part of that requires a deep commitment to retraining ourselves on core values.

[DonRocks]

1 hour ago, ktmoomau said:

Our infrastructure is crumbling

That's another thing. People will continue to use the restroom, and to properly restore and rebuild *just* our wastewater treatment facilities and inflows is estimated in the *trillions* of dollars (I worked in this area with the EPA for several years, so I know) - robots will not be doing this work, or at least not much of it.

No pun intended, but our wastewater treatment has gone to shit. Bridges, highways, drinking water ... it's all being ignored.

Fighting global warming? A brand new industry. I say "bring on the robots" - there's plenty of work to do.

Plus, I want this done, all over the country and preferably the world.