2 hours ago, Boogyman said:

Not the people I know or work with. 

Well what do you do?

22 minutes ago, SNOORDA said:

Well what do you do?

I am a lead chemical operator in a chemical plant. 

5 hours ago, Boogyman said:

I am a lead chemical operator in a chemical plant. 

Got me there.  I dont know what that entails or what the pay is like. I just know it’s a hazardous occupation 

Several factors are in play here as part of a transition.  The big two are the explosion in communications capability and globalization.  The rise in communications capability is the key driver enabling the more important one, globalization.  There are LOTS of super positive effects as a result of these two trends, e.g. world hunger/disease/poverty dropping significantly.  However, there are of course groups/regions, etc. that will be affected negatively and there is of course political turmoil.

For the US and the US middle or lower middle class the effect is negative as the overall global leveling has dropped the US middle down a bit while transferring growth (economic power, quality of life) to other parts of the world, primarily Asia but of course other places as well.  The flow of capital toward markets of cheaper labor/resources is a MUCH bigger effect than, for example, the rise in automation.  The extent of this transition is of course largely due to the concentration of wealth in the US and Western European middle classes post WWII which now must be eroded as other parts of the world play catch up.

I'm not seeing the validity of the arguments of saying any particular generation is at fault for the negative effects.  Everyone contributes.  Boomers enjoyed the boom and perhaps didn't use it wisely enough to set a firmer foundation for future generations.  Xers aren't handling the transition optimally as they've taken the operational lead particularly with their offspring.  Millennials can't even see past their own nose with their "not in my backyard" and "I deserve everything for free and now" mentality.

In the end of the day, we are going thru a rapid breakdown of the post WWII structures while in the midst of the fastest and most all encompassing level of globalization we've ever seen and we've just gotten started.  The next 20-40 years are going to be very dramatic.

 

Note: I'll say the same thing many of us said when Trump took power, US manufacturing is gone and it isn't coming back.  Get used to lower paid service jobs and enjoy your iPhone and cafe latte in the meantime.

14 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Several factors are in play here as part of a transition.  The big two are the explosion in communications capability and globalization.  The rise in communications capability is the key driver enabling the more important one, globalization.  There are LOTS of super positive effects as a result of these two trends, e.g. world hunger/disease/poverty dropping significantly.  However, there are of course groups/regions, etc. that will be affected negatively and there is of course political turmoil.

For the US and the US middle or lower middle class the effect is negative as the overall global leveling has dropped the US middle down a bit while transferring growth (economic power, quality of life) to other parts of the world, primarily Asia but of course other places as well.  The flow of capital toward markets of cheaper labor/resources is a MUCH bigger effect than, for example, the rise in automation.  The extent of this transition is of course largely due to the concentration of wealth in the US and Western European middle classes post WWII which now must be eroded as other parts of the world play catch up.

I'm not seeing the validity of the arguments of saying any particular generation is at fault for the negative effects.  Everyone contributes.  Boomers enjoyed the boom and perhaps didn't use it wisely enough to set a firmer foundation for future generations.  Xers aren't handling the transition optimally as they've taken the operational lead particularly with their offspring.  Millennials can't even see past their own nose with their "not in my backyard" and "I deserve everything for free and now" mentality.

In the end of the day, we are going thru a rapid breakdown of the post WWII structures while in the midst of the fastest and most all encompassing level of globalization we've ever seen and we've just gotten started.  The next 20-40 years are going to be very dramatic.

 

Note: I'll say the same thing many of us said when Trump took power, US manufacturing is gone and it isn't coming back.  Get used to lower paid service jobs and enjoy your iPhone and cafe latte in the meantime.

Pretty good post.

However, there are a lot of jobs in the US that are captured by locality and simply can't be outsourced overseas. These people are getting squeezed between monetary policy and immigration policy.

Bottom line is that if you import endless amounts of unskilled or low skilled people and print trillions of dollars, then the bottom half of the country is going to get killed because there is artificial pressure pushing down their wages in nominal terms and pushing down their purchasing power in real terms.

6 hours ago, TEW said:

Pretty good post.

However, there are a lot of jobs in the US that are captured by locality and simply can't be outsourced overseas. These people are getting squeezed between monetary policy and immigration policy.

Bottom line is that if you import endless amounts of unskilled or low skilled people and print trillions of dollars, then the bottom half of the country is going to get killed because there is artificial pressure pushing down their wages in nominal terms and pushing down their purchasing power in real terms.

Yeah the heavy printing stuff is pretty recent and I don’t think the impact has hit yet but it will.

6 hours ago, DrPhilly said:

Yeah the heavy printing stuff is pretty recent and I don’t think the impact has hit yet but it will.

Not just the printing but also the drop in interest rates in the 80’s and 90’s. It priced half the country out of housing which is how we ended up with 2008.

13 hours ago, TEW said:

Not just the printing but also the drop in interest rates in the 80’s and 90’s. It priced half the country out of housing which is how we ended up with 2008.

I would argue it priced many into housing...where they didn’t  belong

5 minutes ago, ToastJenkins said:

I would argue it priced many into housing...where they didn’t  belong

Eh, it really didn't price them in. That was the problem. It wasn't like these people could now afford a home because their monthly payments were lower. Lending standards were just abandoned because of the demand for investment grade yield caused by the Fed making treasuries an insufficient investment.

But remember kids...the Fed says it isn't causing inflation.

Yes, this is cherry picking from pandemic lows. But print $5 trillion...see what happens. 

50 minutes ago, vikas83 said:

But remember kids...the Fed says it isn't causing inflation.

Yes, this is cherry picking from pandemic lows. But print $5 trillion...see what happens. 

Anything oil related is a product of insanely low prices a year ago - do this 3 mos ago and it's probably different. 

Lumber is because they cut supply in 2020 after 2019 was a down year for demand, then were hit with insane demand from people doing home improvement projects being stuck at home while also seeing supply chain issues related to COVID.

Soybeans is probably more from our trade war with China, which probably impacts other ag commodities.

I don't doubt there will be inflationary effects, but I don't know that they'd be showing up just yet. 

Minnesotans furious that they have to pay for Texas’ deep-freeze problems

https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/04/houston-based-utility-wants-minnesotans-to-pay-for-texas-deep-freeze-problems/

Quote

The gas and electric markets in Texas are lightly regulated and highly competitive, which has pushed companies to deliver energy at the lowest possible cost. But it also means that many companies were ill-prepared when the mercury dropped. To save money, they had skimped on winterizing their equipment. As a result, gas lines across the state—which has about 23 percent of the country’s reserves—quite literally froze. The spot price of natural gas soared to 70-times what it would normally be in Minnesota, and gas utilities paid a hefty premium when they used the daily market to match demand.

In a twist, the biggest gas utility in Minnesota is CenterPoint Energy, a Houston-based company that also supplies a large swath of Southeastern Texas. The company said it spent an additional $500 million on gas that week in February, and it has asked Minnesota’s utility commission for permission to add a surcharge to customers’ bills. The surcharge not only seeks to recoup the additional money CenterPoint spent on natural gas, it also includes 8.75 percent interest. The company expects that each customer would shoulder a burden of $300 to $400.

 

On 4/16/2021 at 4:23 PM, EaglesRocker97 said:

 

The problem is automation pushing people into low-wage work. It hasn't been enough yet to drop people out of the labor market en masse, but it has been enough to impoverish them, this and outsourcing combined, at least.

True, but automation development and management is also creating a lot of skilled work on the other end.  I read an article recently about Robotic Process Automation that said for every 3 low level administrators it replaced it created a high paying job for 1 developer.   The point of the article was that today, the net savings to corporations investing in RPA is net zero.  

I suspect this will change as the technology evolves into CPA (Cognitive) and true AI...but still.  I don't think automation has had the job killing effect on our economy that many think it has.  At least not yet. 

2 hours ago, The Norseman said:

True, but automation development and management is also creating a lot of skilled work on the other end.  I read an article recently about Robotic Process Automation that said for every 3 low level administrators it replaced it created a high paying job for 1 developer.   The point of the article was that today, the net savings to corporations investing in RPA is net zero.  

I suspect this will change as the technology evolves into CPA (Cognitive) and true AI...but still.  I don't think automation has had the job killing effect on our economy that many think it has.  At least not yet. 

The poors should do their part and not reproduce. Save the future. 

If the city manger had the balls to stand up to the unions and fire every lousy city worker who snoozed their way to a weekly paycheck there would be plenty of job openings in Philly.