From here: The Industrial Revolution could shed light on modern productivity Excerpt: The subject of productivity (in this article) is too important for me to encapsulate. So, if interested under the glaring summer-sun then read it! And don't say you were never told ... ! *I, for one, do not believe that mankind is "running out of ideas", even if most of the world has been running not-at-all thanks to Uncle Sam's gift to it of the Great Recession. In fact, with the advent of the Information Age, I suggest we are at the cusp of another great jump forward as happened at the onset of the Industrial Age. My only question is, "Will we land on our feet?"
seems unlikely given that the self driving car for example in supposedly only a couple of years away.
We have been out for a long time. Just no one noticing. Certain things brought out those ideas, electricity, the combustion engine, to name 2. The Computer and Cell phone are really the last 2 things to come out. Or do you want to include the Plastic engagement ring ? We were told in 1980 that everyone would have a robot in their house by 2000. Not only can we not afford one due to the personal austerity via the FED. They can't get past certain features. Yes, one can lay a brick, weld on an assembly line. But one will never cook your dinner or clean your house outside of a mobile vacuum... that's it ! This is also why Google, Apple have so much CASH, they don't have anywhere to spend it other than grabbing up other businesses, taking even more money from 10 people and giving it too ONE... i.e. Retail to Amazon When FAANG stocks make up 85% of Profits in the SP500 you know we are doomed. It is just a matter of when, like others ask. We can all guess, but once it starts, and all business go to BOOK VALUE.. DOW @ 12K Nasdaq @ 3. It will be too late to prepare, No one will think the DOW is going to 12K if it drops to 21K over the next 2 months, nor will they if it goes to 18K a month later. If it is 16K at New Years, would you predict 12K by March or would you listen to Kudlow and Kramer and think 25K is coming by June. No one, and I mean no one wants to call the dive, your a pessimist, you don't know what your talking about, etc. Peter Schiff called it in 2006 until it happened. A lot of video out there of people laughing at him on TV as if he were a quack. This is a CREDIT BUBBLE and yet, no one on TV will admit it and they wont let Guys like peter on to tell the truth. WHY ? Because the bankers are getting filthy rich off of it.
so the self driving car is not a new idea? Crisper gene editing in not a new idea that could transform life on the planet?
Well, Great Britain did have a growing middle and upper class during the Industrial Revolution, even though the other 60% of the population suffered and exploitation of factory workers was rife (people who had been pushed off the land, in part due to falling agricultural commodity prices). Could the middle class have fueled more consumption? (a sort of feed-back effect) Quite possibly, though it may have gone both ways. Yes, I agree, there are probably going to be a lot of parallels. The question is, how well do we truly understand the Industrial Revolution and what actually happened? In the long-term, it improved living standards. (Or did it? There were a lot of poor people fleeing to the colonies. Developed countries wouldn't have that same safety release valve today.) A lot of times our understanding of past events is not actually the correct one, especially when it comes to understanding the economics of it. So what if there's some importantly significant flaw in our understanding of the economics of the Industrial Revolution? Let's not forget all the bad things that stemmed out of that during that era. Perhaps another parallel we can look at is the recent industrialization of China. China is still at "second world" living standards, in many respects. A lot of people have been displaced. (A little more about that in the second video in this thread: China has an intractable demographic problem ) In Japan, in the very late 1800's, "cottage industries" were very important to the economy leading up to industrial development of Japan. In some ways, Japan experienced a similar issue, as falling rice prices pushed peasants off their land (which they did not own).
Republican capitalist industrialization in China instantly eliminated 40% of all the poverty on earth. To suggest that was not the greatest economic miracle in human history should forever more remind you that you should always be a student and never a teacher.
I continue to laugh at your support for a dictatorship and how you ignore the tiger economies (and their reliance on interventionism)
lib trying to change the subject rather than telling us what he knows about property rights economics?? I wonder why??
Given your celebration of China, let's start with the basics! I doubt you're ready for the analysis into transaction costs.
