John Fischer, Paul Krugman, "The Stupidity Problem" and "Sympathy for the Luddites". (June 16, 2013)

John Fischer, editor of Harper's magazine, from 1953-1968, for its September 1962 issue wrote an article he titled "The Stupidity Problem" the thrust of which can be summarised as "he who earns his living through manual labour may not have the competence to drive the bulldozer". Mr Fischer suggested that the solution might be for such individuals to become service providers, which seemed to be a suggestion borne out of frustration.

Now over half a century later the Princeton University economist, Nobel Laureate and New Your Times columnist, Paul Krugman proposes that the concerns of the Luddites in late 18^th century northern England now have a counterpart in the 21^st century of first world economies.

“How are those men, thus thrown out of employ to provide for their families?” asked the petitioners of 1786. “And what are they to put their children apprentice to?”

And Professor Krugman points out: "Those weren’t foolish questions... So are we living in another such era? And, if we are, what are we going to do about it?... [T]he story went... modern technology was raising the demand for highly educated workers while reducing the demand for less educated workers... the solution was more education."

And here Professor Krugman reiterates his stark warning:

"Today, [a dark] picture of the effects of technology on labor is emerging. In this picture, highly educated workers are as likely as less educated workers to find themselves displaced and devalued, and pushing for more education may create as many problems as it solves... The McKinsey Global Institute recently released a report on a dozen major new technologies that it considers likely to be “disruptive,” upsetting existing market and social arrangements... [T]he report suggests that we’re going to be seeing a lot of “automation of knowledge work,” with software doing things that used to require college graduates. Advanced robotics could further diminish employment in manufacturing, but it could also replace some medical professionals."

And then the kicker:

"[T]he modern counterparts of those [1786] woolworkers might well ask... what will happen to us if, like so many students, we go deep into debt to acquire the skills we’re told we need, only to learn that the economy no longer wants those skills?

"Education, then, is no longer the answer to rising inequality, if it ever was (which I doubt)."

Finally, does the Princeton professor have a solution?

"[A] strong social safety net, one that guarantees not just health care but a minimum income, too. And with an ever-rising share of income going to capital rather than labor, that safety net would have to be paid for to an important extent via taxes on profits and/or investment income... I can already hear conservatives shouting about the evils of “redistribution."

There is an alternative -- There are some problems that don't have equitable solutions that our civilisation are prepared to accept -- like the anthropogenic contribution to climate change.

After all, our Universe doesn't owe us a living.