Human beings have been in constant competition with machines in order to win their place in the process of production since the rise of the modern (McCarthy and McGaughey 1989, p. 3). It is certain that all types of production involve some type of human labor performance. Labor is the method by which the human mind transforms its designs and aims to matter. It is man’s application of his bodily and mental faculties for the purpose of altering matter and thereby making it serve a further end (Reisman, 1990, p. 131).
The technological advances effects on income and employment have been debated and argued about since the time when the despaired workers of the textile industry in Nottingham, England, destroyed the recently invented machines for knitting that did not require the human presence and threatened their income and way of life in general. The high rate of economic growth of the western capitalist economy resulted in a fast rise of labor and capital incomes and also caused a progressive shortening of the workday. At the beginning of the 20th century, the number of workers that were busy in various kinds of active production as well as their wages was rapidly increasing, however, the annual labor hours amount was pretty stable. At the end of the forties, the number of workers that were involved in the production industry still continued to grow, although their rates of real wages increased quite slowly.
During the recent 15 years, the rates of unemployment tended to grow in the United States, as well as in multiple less-advanced countries. It appears that the salary gap between the upper and lower class groups is widening. This effect seems to have consumed the whole nation, and it was suggested that it is the result of technological change acceleration.
The replacement of humans by machines, or in other words, the automation of the manufacturing process, tends to speed up the production aspects that were slowed down by the human presence. The fewer human beings are required for performing the production, the more rapid this production industry becomes. The present rate of growth of the United States economy depends rather on energy sources than on human labor. Human labor cannot be completely abandoned however it is possible to minimize it, and where there is no such possibility, human labor is forced to keep at the same pace with the production rate that outruns all known predecessors.
The age of automation began to arrive in the United States during World War 1. For example, before the war, the US textile industry was completely dependant on the German imports of chemicals and dyes. When the war with the Germans had caused a deprivation of those imports, there were not many skilled workers in the US in order to establish their own production of those chemicals. Therefore the United States was instantly forced to establish its own chemical industry. They had to suddenly replace human labor with machinery. The German chemical workers received their training through observing their parents. They studied the art of dye manufacturing by observation of the liquid color. The newly opened plants in America implemented a continuous-flow process, managed by sensitive measuring instruments that were automatic and specifically designed for that purpose. Many other industries have later gained the sophisticated machinery that eliminated their need for employing highly skilled workers. This is considered to be the arrival of the automation age (Leontiff 1995). But only when half a century later the electronic computing devices were invented and adopted in order to permit machines to carry out not just accurate observations but also what is now called automatic thinking and reasoning. Currently, in the United States, the change of technology has become closely connected to fast scientific knowledge advancement. If we were to look into the future, we could expect further replacement of the most skilled manufacturing workers by a vast number of production means.
One may wonder what will be the consequences of these changes from a social and economic point of view within the next decade. It is certain that with the implementation of automated production, the production output of goods will rise. However, this rate will not be as rapid, as within the last fifteen years, because of today’s awareness of a need to protect the environment and save the necessity to preserve the natural resources. Right now, the national income distribution between human labor and automated production is determined; however, the demand for human labor already tends to have ceased increasing, and later on, its wages will start to fall, even for workers that are highly trained and receive good salaries. Consequently, the income of the companies that own the natural resources and means of production will rise. What is now called “technological unemployment” shall weaken the trade unions in their ability to raise real wages over a certain competitive level.
The acceleration of the technological changes in manufacturing, and particularly the production automation, will not lower the equal national income distribution by the government. In fact, in the long run, this function of this institution shall increase.
Throughout many centuries, the need for labor was perceived as an unavoidable burden, except for the minority that was privileged to command servants. Only this minority possessed the luxury of real leisure, meaning that they had no necessity of being deprived of their energy through exhaustion. The tendency of the last fifteen years is offering us a future where the requirement of human labor will gradually vanish up to a certain point, where the majority will not be able to be occupied, abandoning their talents and available energy. Leisure will be more prevalent among the majority of the population up to the point of total boredom and idleness. Furthermore, those individuals that will be able to accomplish meaningful work shall make up a privileged minority. At the same time, the idle majority will be burdened with their free time to kill.
The Industrial Revolution, for the first time in history, caused the replacement of heavy animal and human labor with machines, providing highly increase mobility to humanity. The rate of the Industrial Revolution was constantly accelerating, and with the arrival of electronic technology, this rate became explosive. Smart machines that were equipped with highly sophisticated intelligence, especially during the last fifteen years, have performed the tasks required by human society production and service more and more. In the technologically advanced nation, like the United States, the new developments of manufacturing have become very familiar to the population and do not require any further elaboration. However, a large part of humanity is still in the experiencing early stages of technological, industrial integration. Up to the present time, the work was able to sufficiently keep more or less acceptable employment levels. However, in the nearest future, society shall experience an inevitable unemployment level rise. This is especially true for advanced societies, like the United States (Muller 1997). Because of the automation of manufacturing and lower levels of jobs in the factories, much can and is being done to keep the people employed. Some manufacturers permit job sharing between two or more people in order to shorten the working hours. Others increase vacation and holidays or implement other ways of spreading more widely the opportunities of employment. But despite all the measures taken by companies that are using machines in the workplace, the unemployment rates have been increasing for the last fifteen years and will increase dramatically within the next decades, as there is a reduced need for work.
Currently, the above scenario has an explicit standard economic objection. One might argue that the absolute scarcity problem was solved in much of the West thirty years ago. But currently, people are progressively transforming their “wants” into “needs,” and this causes the creation of “artificial” consumer society demands, which appear to be almost infinite. It is pretty much evident that this process will last for a long period of time, and if people are ready to spend money on another one of their “needs,” whether it is some item or service, the jobs required making whatever thing they need or fulfill that service will exist. This will create a higher level of manufacturing automation. However, there will also be more demands and consequently more jobs that these demands will create.
Nevertheless, this argument has a weak side. Its problem is that it underestimates the information technology revolutionary impact on manufacturing. This impact consists of a future where machines will be made by other machines and where there will be an exponential progression of machines substituting human labor. In fact, over the last fifteen years, such a tendency was already clearly observed. During this timeframe, in the most advanced countries, including the United States, smart machines have overtaken the labor market. From one side, we are dealing with an increasing number of machine builders, caregivers, and symbol manipulators, and from the other side, an enormously high number of fast food and hospital laundry workers. This fact is a dramatic national social issue in the US at the current time, and in the future, this issue will become more acute with the dynamic advancement of manufacturing technology. This will result in a much more rapid disappearance of the jobs at the lower position on the sophistication scale, compared to those that are on its upper end.
A good example of the aforementioned tendency is the United Auto Workers, which is an essential player in the United States automotive manufacturing industry. Disregarding the management-union relation that commonly experiences high levels of distrust, resistance, and suspicion from both sides, there is a history of reasonable cooperation and shared interests recognition. However, it is clear that management attempts to make the production system “idiot-proof” accompanied by the union’s attempts of protecting their members brought to elaborate and bulky work rules and job classifications. Most manufacturing employers see this as a huge barrier to effective workforce deployment and, therefore, a block of productivity. In the conditions of a protected market, the industry governing rules of production for manufacturers as well as for suppliers are suitable for large volume production. Manufacturing equipment should never stay idle, and there must be constant maintenance of inventory in order to ensure the product’s continuous flow. Various questions, such as the quality, effectiveness, and cost, are all giving way to production obligation. Human labor is not allowed to interfere with production, and thus the jobs should be designed as basic as they can be, also making easier the substitution of one worker for another. When a certain job requires a specific human skill, it is a clear responsibility to a designated worker. The automotive manufacturing industry now followed the principle of “if it ain’t broke, do not fix it,” and as long as vehicles roll out of the factory’s doors, it was difficult to claim that anything is “broke” (Flynn and Cole, 1988, . 93).
In order to prevent the rise of unemployment rates in the United States, employers should cardinally change their policy towards human labor during the wide-scale integration of machines into the manufacturing industry. The accomplishments and strategies of the Japanese automotive industry might be a good example to follow for Americans. The governing themes of Japanese manufacturing are improvement of quality and reduction of waste. The use of automated manufacturing equipment is frequently in the second place. Japanese manufacturers observe human labor as a highly valuable and important resource that requires constant development and nurturing. The manufacturing job positions are designed in a way that enables flexible assignments, requiring the development of multiple skills, unlike the US manufacturing industry that induces the skill reduction caused by the substitution of human labor by machines. Furthermore, this strategy of the Japanese manufacturers drives the companies towards excellence and causes the spread of their manufacturing. Such perfection pursuit should be acknowledged and adopted by the US manufacturers of not just automotive, but any other industry, as this strategy will bring enormous potential dividends.
References
- George Reisman, Capitalism: A Treatise on Economics [book on-line] (Ottawa, IL: Jameson Books, 1990), p. 131.
- Eugene McCarthy, and William McGaughey, Nonfinancial Economics: The Case for James W. Cortada, The Digital Hand : How Computers Changed the Work of American Manufacturing, Transportation, and Retail Industries / [book on-line] (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004).
- Michael S. Flynn, and David E. Cole, “3 The U.S. Automotive Industry: Technology and Competitiveness,” in Is New Technology Enough? Making and Remaking U.S. Basic Industries, ed. Donald A. Hicks [book on-line] (Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute, 1988), p. 93.
- Shorter Hours of Work [book on-line] (New York: Praeger Publishers, 1989).
- Steven Muller, “Time to Kill,” The National Interest, 1997.
- Wassily Leontiff, “The Long-Term Effects of Technological Change,” Challenge 38, no. 4 (1995).