Decision 2016

[Nukatha]

The ideal answer goes like this:
Production replaces people with robots
Company pays a smaller number of employees slightly better than before in order to maintain the robots
Lower cost to manufacture results in savings to the consumer
Lower price to consumer means that those still working (teacher, police, service worker, academic, engineer, anyone else) have more disposable income, due to prices dropping.
Those individuals now have their income freed up purchase nonessential life-enhancing products as they see fit, be they board games, massages, vacations, whatever.
More business spring up to fill this need for more service/life enhancing products, hiring the workers displaced by the reduction to production jobs.

This continues on to the point where few humans do manual labor, instead contributing to society either with a life-enhancing service, maintenance/operation of the robots, or research into future technologies.

Unfortunately, this all gets nipped in the bud when a company does not pass on its savings to the consumer, opting instead to sell their widgets at their original price, even after production costs drop to a half, quarter, or even less than what they were originally.

[Rich10]

Originally Posted by Nukatha

Unfortunately, this all gets nipped in the bud when a company does not pass on its savings to the consumer, opting instead to sell their widgets at their original price, even after production costs drop to a half, quarter, or even less than what they were originally.

If the cost of production decreases, competitive forces should drive down the price. Do you agree?

What happens to the worker who doesn't have the skill set to maintain the robots, or do research into new technologies. These are the people who have been left behind in this economy. What type of life-enhancing service are you suggesting?

[Dysole]

As long as barrier to entry (how difficult to enter the business) remains low and there is not active collusion to keep prices high then yes prices would decrease. Are you confident that these hold?

Your hypothetical worker is one of the reasons why focusing more on improving our service industry is going to be more helpful in the long term. But automation is nothing new. Similar concerns were expressed at the start of the Industrial Revolution.

~Dysole, always making sure she checks assumptions

[Nukatha]

Originally Posted by Rich10

If the cost of production decreases, competitive forces should drive down the price. Do you agree?

What happens to the worker who doesn't have the skill set to maintain the robots, or do research into new technologies. These are the people who have been left behind in this economy. What type of life-enhancing service are you suggesting?

#1: I absolutely agree, but the word 'should' is the key operator. Consider all the pushback Google is getting from Comcast/ATT/the dominant Internet provider in every city that they want to set up the infrastructure to run Google Fiber. Google's a company with all the resources and know-how to build their own network, but its would-be competitors keep the barrier of entry much higher than it needs to be.
Those companies know that if a new player comes to town, they will have to lower their prices or improve their services (both of which Comcast could easily do), but they love the current system of being only one or two players, and can rake in profits far in excess of cost. ( http://www.cutcabletoday.com/comcast...ernet-service/ )

They lobby (and pay off) the local/state/national governments wherever possible to keep that barrier of entry high, which hurts everyone except for the big company.

Which is why I'm voting Libertarian. Bust up the cronyism and those barriers of entry come slamming down.

And for life-enhancing services:
Restaurants, board games development, tourism, television programs, personal trainers, house cleaner, musicians/stage performers, stand-up comedians, grass-roots political efforts, R+D to improve each of these things. Basically, everything besides food, shelter, and transportation to one's place of work I would consider 'life-enhancing'.
If average citizens have more cash in hand, they can spend more on all these things.
I suppose I've got two grand goals for humanity:
#1: Get enough people off of this rock and two a number of different ones so that the species will be able to thrive long after the imminent meteor strike that wipes out 90% or more of life on Earth.

#2: Automation reaches the point where every individual can live comfortably by contributing to society in a profession that does not negatively impact one's health.

[Rich10]

Originally Posted by Nukatha

#1: I absolutely agree, but the word 'should' is the key operator. Consider all the pushback Google is getting from Comcast/ATT/the dominant Internet provider in every city that they want to set up the infrastructure to run Google Fiber. Google's a company with all the resources and know-how to build their own network, but its would-be competitors keep the barrier of entry much higher than it needs to be.

Those companies know that if a new player comes to town, they will have to lower their prices or improve their services (both of which Comcast could easily do), but they love the current system of being only one or two players, and can rake in profits far in excess of cost. ( http://www.cutcabletoday.com/comcast...ernet-service/ )



They lobby (and pay off) the local/state/national governments wherever possible to keep that barrier of entry high, which hurts everyone except for the big company.

Google is one of the largest companies in the world. I'm sure that they lobby as well as anyone else.

Originally Posted by Nukatha

Get enough people off of this rock and two a number of different ones so that the species will be able to thrive long after the imminent meteor strike that wipes out 90% or more of life on Earth.

Is there something you know about that the rest of us don't?

[Nukatha]

Originally Posted by Rich10

Google is one of the largest companies in the world. I'm sure that they lobby as well as anyone else.

Exactly, here's a titan that is just barely able to gain new footing in the realm of being an ISP. The barrier of entry is such that a startup without Google's background has no chance of success.

Originally Posted by Nukatha

Get enough people off of this rock and two a number of different ones so that the species will be able to thrive long after the imminent meteor strike that wipes out 90% or more of life on Earth.

Is there something you know about that the rest of us don't?

Death by meteor seems to be an inevitability/eventuality, especially considering the votes its getting this year for President.

[dok]

Originally Posted by Nukatha

Pretty sure we'd need a Constitutional Amendment to change that

Incorrect. All elections, including those for federal office, are administered by the states, not by the federal government. Any individual state could decide to institute approval voting, or instant runoff voting, or Condorcet voting, to elect their senators, or to apportion their presidential electors, and neither the federal government or any other state could tell them otherwise. This is the idea behind things like the national popular vote project - you can do an end around on the electoral college by getting a group of states to agree to cast their electors for the popular vote winner.

Ditto for the House of Representatives: if New York wanted to elect its representatives to the house using a half-dozen multi-winner districts, or just one massive district using some sort of proportional representation, no other state could tell them not to. The Constitution just says how many representatives they have to send, and when they have to hold elections for them.

[flameslayer93]

Late in on this, will try to read more of everyone's posts later.

Anyways, some first thoughts. Just know I don't do research and pretty much go by what I hear/see on the news. I am complacency at its finest.

Trump - I thought the Democrats were the donkies? I was never big on the guy in the first place and I've heard about a damn wall for so long I might decide to go into demolition just so I could blow the things up.

Clinton - Pretty much a political name my entire life, as I'm only in my early 20's. I could live with her as President. The male in me says that her use of female issues dont matter to me whatsoever. The human in me says otherwise. The only real issue is that the human in me doesn't care enough to see if anything is major issues outside of the ivory walls.

I would have been ok with the other options had they not dropped out/lost. Sanders was really good, even if I could've cared less about college reform whatever. Plus, he is old. He really wouldn't have anything more to gain from being President other than being President, which goes miles when there are concerns about corruption across all of politics. Kasich was from Ohio, and I didn't see any horrific crap going on here because of him these last few years. Cruz was pretty much a walking internet meme.

I wonder, if at the end of these next 4 years, will I still be able to live the American dream? White picket fence, home, spoiled rotten kids and eating at mom and pop restaurants after a long week of work? If I can't, then what was the point in voting at all?

Fear is real, everyone.

[Nukatha]

@dok , I stand corrected. Here's to hoping a few state legislatures change elector decision methods.
@flameslayer93
#FeelTheJohnson my man.

[ParaGoomba Slayer]

Hillary has to win because women should have the right to their own bodies. A blastocyst or a fetus is not a person, therefore it should not override the rights of a an actual person.

[Tornado]

Woah, you really jump in with both feet PGS.

I like your 'old' angle flameslayer.

Bernie is above corruption because he will die before reaping benefits. I have never seen it proposed in such a way. Nice perspective though I am not sure exactly how valid it is.

I am not sure if you know this but the current candidates would be the oldest(Trump) and second oldest(Clinton). Reagan was the oldest.
I hope I got those right.

[ParaGoomba Slayer]

Originally Posted by Tornado

Woah, you really jump in with both feet PGS.

I like your 'old' angle flameslayer.

Bernie is above corruption because he will die before reaping benefits. I have never seen it proposed in such a way. Nice perspective though I am not sure exactly how valid it is.

I am not sure if you know this but the current candidates would be the oldest(Trump) and second oldest(Clinton). Reagan was the oldest.
I hope I got those right.

What do you mean, my old angle?

I was inspired to check back in here by a post from TheVenocWarlord on the X-Wing reddit about how I terrorized Heroscapers in addition to the X-Wing community. Seems like /someone's/ angry that I'm correct about circumcision, religion, abortion, and how spawning more children instead of adopting currently existing ones is selfish and xenophobic.

So I'm chiming in with a post stating my beliefs. Better to be right than polite.