On the Second Order Effects of Technology.

[danieldwilliam]

Three thoughts make a post.

I’ve been thinking a little this morning about second order effects from technology.

Electric cars and the Meadows.

Prompted by an article on the ever popular Andrew Ducker’s Interesting Links I’ve been thinking about the geography of the Meadows.

There is a strip of park that runs along Melville Drive, the big road that runs along the south side of the Meadows and the north east side of the Bruntsfield Links. It’s on the south side of Melville Drive, so not part of the Meadows proper This bit of park land is about 20-40 feet wide and runs from outside my flat to the far west end of the Meadows.  It’s tree lined and has a foot and cycle path running along it.  It’s pleasant to walk through but it’s not much used for anything other than being walked through. Nobody sits there, even when the Meadows is utter full.  I think this is because it’s right next to a main road.  It’s noisy and a bit fumey from the traffic.

When we start using electric cars which are quiet and non-polluting* I think this area becomes much more likely to be a place to sit.  On hot days when the Meadows and Links are full it’s an extra three quarters of a hectare of shaded outdoor space.  As I walked to work I noticed quite a few spaces where one might sit were it not for the noise and gases from passing cars dotted about Edinburgh

So, I’m wondering what parts of our cities become much more pleasant to use when we have mainly electric cars.

Language barriers and Cultural barriers.

My second Wold question** was about language translation. What happens when we have access to fast to the point of instant, very accurate translation.  I type an email in English, you read it in German, or Latin or Lithuanian.  Going a bit further, I chat away in English and your earphones translate my chat into your language of choice.  Thinking about these abilities being so good that they eliminate the language barrier.***  I wonder if it removes the most significant barrier to labour mobility in the EU.  Does it remove it and is it the most significant barrier to labour mobility?

Labour mobility, or the relative lack of it compared to China and the US, I think is one of the reasons why the EU is just slightly under performing its own economic potential. The US has a population of several hundred million who speak one of two languages and can move anywhere. The EU, with a  slightly larger population has a couple of dozen.

I think more practically porous borders might help with some of the acute difficulties facing some EU populations. It’s currently not hugely helpful to an unemployed Greek or Spaniard that the German economy is booming as they find it difficult to migrate to Germany to find work because they don’t speak German. 

Does the economy of the EU get a boost from increased labour mobility or do we end up with even larger migrant populations crowding into cities where the economy is growing?

What happens to culture when we all, in practise speak German and Greek and Spanish?  Does it persist geographically? By interest group?  By outlook?

So I am wondering at the secondary effects on the EU of reducing the language barriers through technology.

A Huge Economy, A Large Public Sector.

By 2046 the UK public sector will be the same size of our entire economy is today.

Or rather, assuming average growth in the UK returns to slightly below its long term average i.e. 2% and the proportion of GDP spent through the public sector in 2046 rises to 50% in 2046 the size of the public sector will be about £2.48 billion from a total GDP of £4.96 billion.

At 2%***** growth, compounded, our economy doubles every 35 years.**** I think a lot of this growth is going to come from technology.

At current wage trends we should see income parity with China sometime around 2030.  Productivity adjusted unit cost of labour parity is likely to arrive sooner than that.

So we’ll be richer in 35 years. With less competition on price for jobs.******  Obviously, there are questions about how that wealth is distributed which matter a lot to our individual and collective experience of that increased wealth. I’m thinking about the second order effects of additional wealth. Do we become more generous?  Do we choose to take that growth as leisure, as stuff, as transfer payments or investments to promote equality?

Will we notice, or will life still feel like hard work when lived from the inside?  If life feels easier I’m wondering how that changes us.  Would we see a reduction in the number of two income households?  More amateurs in all fields?  A great culture explosion as freed from the tyranny of paid work we invest our time in our hobbies and our children?

*At the point of use.

** A Wold Question is a family term for a pondering, not very acute but makes you think a little bit question. The term originates with my mother who on a trip to the Cotswolds with her friends asked “But what is a Wold?”
***Douglas Adams fans know the answer to this but after we’ve rebuilt Europe what then?

****At 4% it doubles about every 18 years or so.

***** 2% and a bit has been the trend of growth in the UK for some time and there is some evidence to suggest that 2% is the long term growth trend for the world over the last several thousand years when you strip out the effect of population growth and accumulation of capital. That is to say that the effect of technology on growth is 2% per annum.

******From humans.

Comments

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

That's three posts. At least. And I haven't gotten around to yesterday's, yet.

One of the things I like about Watchmen (the book, not the film) is that electric cars are ubiquitous. In Moore's view, this makes places quieter and cleaner, but not necessarily any different to use. I think it's the volume of traffic rather than the volume of engines that makes the difference, and people will not want to sit near multiple tons of rapidly moving metal. We're wired to see these things as a threat, and it's not conducive to relaxation to have them nearby (plus, the safety lobby will insist on them making some noise, hopefully of the "woomwoomwoom" science-fictional type.

The Language Barrier: is it possible, pace DNA, that we get a tower of babble situation? Everyone thinks they're being understood, but no one actually is? Much of our communication is non-verbal, and much of that does not translate well. Without equality of education between populations, equality of labour won't necessarily follow. The US model, with an underclass of black and spanish speaking workers will spread more easily to Europe (substitute your own value of guest-worker: Polish, Turkish or North African) but the professions and senior management jobs will still go to the privileged, to "people like us".

The growing economy: do we feel richer than we were 35 years ago? In 1977 my working class family had a car, a phone, and a television. My mum worked part-time. Now the same unit would probably have two cars, 5 or 6 phones and two or three televisions. We'd also all have computers. Would I be right in thinking that the price of all of these has gone up about 2% per year? And we're paying for things that we wouldn't have in the past - pensions, broadband, cable TV. In 35 years I guess we'll feel much the same as we do now, grumbling about the cost of pilot licenses for our rocket packs, and trying to find the best value health provider for downloading our consciousness to the best retirement virtual reality.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

That’s a good point on the lack of relaxation to be had when sitting near moving lumps of metal. I wonder at what speed they are perceived as too much of a threat to relax. Perhaps 20 mph.

I hope by the time we have wide spread take up electric cars we’ll be in automatic cars driving themselves which might make them less threatening.


I think you’re right on equality of education being important here. Whilst writing the original post I was thinking what else would a Greek person need to do or be to get a job at Volkswagon or Seimens. Easy enough a Greek waiter could get a job in the café in my building but until he’s done 4 years of accountancy training she’s not getting a job working in my department.

I think more chance of equality of education in the EU than the US.

There is some research that suggests that the long term inflation rate is also 2% and so the logic goes that the TV you would buy now costs in cash twice what it would have cost 35 years ago but is twice as good.

It’s a tricky question to answer; do we feel richer? Because whilst I was alive in 1977 I wasn’t living the life I live now and in 35 years time I won’t be living the same life either. This is true of my folks who were doing my roles at work and at home 35 years ago and are now in different roles.

I know that I am richer than an equivalent person 35 years ago would have been but whether I feel different I don’t know.

I know people who have access to things now that their parents did (better cancer treatments or foreign holidays) and that feels good but do they feel more prosperous?

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

I like the Mediocrity Principle (except for the name, where, frankly, they could have tried harder). Things here are, more or less, the way things are elsewhere. We always have an impulse to consider ourselves unique, but, by and by, people are the same. (Do not ask me to square this with my frequently expressed contention that we live in a Golden Age).

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I see the impulse to see ourselves as unique. As I’ve said in other posts I could quite imagine myself living an equivalent life in Rome and perhaps not notice the difference much (until there was a famine, or a plague or one of my children died of a disease I’ve not heard of in 50 years, not to mention that fact there would be no Capt).

However, at some point a quantative difference becomes a qualitative difference.

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

Or as my friend Bill is wont to say, "Beyond a certain point quantity has a quality all of its own".

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I like that.

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

I read far too much Judge Dredd when I was growing up to ever trust a robot car. Or any robot, for that matter.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

But the robot is your friend.

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

Uh huh.

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

Does every accountancy degree come with gender re-alignment?

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Not all of them - just the ones including a converstion from Greek to UK GAAP

[andrewducker]

Having spent time out in India training people, and worked with offshore developers a bit, I can definitely say that even when we all speak the same language we don't speak it the same way.

Heck, working with Americans causes problems due to cultural differences on a regular basis.

Oh, and technology prices drop, they don't rise. A quick google found me these prices for televisions (adjusted into modern dollars):
1939: $9,773
1948: $9,524
1953: $8,480
1968: $2,270
1977: $1,840
1986: $1,115
1996: $490
2011: $319

http://www.theawl.com/2011/11/how-much-more-do-televisions-cost-today

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

I worked with Motorola on some transcultural courses in the mid-90's. A lot of that was to do with cultural difference, and language was the least of it. I'm still fascinated by a lot of the work we did back then, and how relevant it still is (at my last job my manager, the one with a keen belief in the healing power of crystals, had "The Seven Cultures of Capitalism" on her desk, 17 years after we'd been running courses with the authors at Motorola).

No surprise on the drop of price for technology, given Moore's Law, though I'd love to see the original selling prices too. I remember a Powerbook 100 (or was it a Macbook? *googles* no, Powerbook it was) selling for $2500 in 1990 or so - I wonder what that is in today's money?

[andrewducker]

The Bank of England has an inflation calculator, and it reckons $4,662.

http://www.bankofengland.co.uk/education/inflation/calculator/flash/index.htm

In the US, inflation has been a little lower, so it would be $4,300 according to http://www.usinflationcalculator.com/

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

and the current equivalant would be a Mac Air? At about $1,000 in GBP?

[andrewducker]

Or possibly a 13" Macbook Pro ($1200) as the Powerbook 100 had a 9" screen.

In either case, 1/4 of the price for a mindbogglingly better computer.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I wonder what the cost comparisons for cargo ships are.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Interesting set of numbers.

I guess I’m seeing a *significant* drop in the proportion of an average wage required to buy a TV. Wow. A TV has fallen in labour costs from double digits of a working year to buy one to double digits of a working month to buy one and I still get more holiday. Whomever it was who suggested we live in a Golden Age, we are ready for your close up now.

What’s not clear from the numbers is where the TV’s he’s picked out sit in the market space. Is the 1948 TV at about $948 the absolute top of the range TV (in which case I reckon if I walked into John Lewis with a thousand bucks I could walk out with their best TV today too*) or if it’s a mid-range TV in which case I’d expect two or three from Mssrs Lewis for the same cash.

In terms of the overall suggestion that technology improvement = long term growth (adjusted for capital and population) = cash inflation I think you would need to consider a range of technologies. Some will be fast moving, like computers, some medium moving, like TV’s, and some slow moving like** antibiotics*** or book printing or clothes making (which doesn’t appear to have changed much in fundamentals since the 1960’s it’s just that the machine have been moved from the Borders to China).

This stuff is tricky, which is why it’s tricky.

I recall reading (in the same mental spasm as reading about the impact of technology on growth) that the only goods that had increased in cost when calculated as a proportion of wages were beer and cigarettes and this was the result of taxation.

*Actually not, because they’d ask for pounds and when I told them that me and some of my internet buddies were chatting about technology and inflation and I wanted to test some of the chat emperically they’d politely ask me to leave.

**Actually dificult to think of a technology that is still used the same way it was in the past but is slow moving.

*** I’m picking antibiotics here because I think we’re still using mainly pencillin derivatives and we’re still able to make a dent in most bacteria type diseases but we still can’t shake the difficulties with resistance.

[andrewducker]

Here's a handy pair of graphs:




Via here and here.

We _are_ living in a golden age. It's just not as evenly distributed as many would like.

John Lewis will, by the way, happily charge you £3000 for their top of the line TV. That's 65" diagonal though, so unless your living room is larger than I remember, I wouldn't go for it.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Cheers for that - as the article on clothing suggested on the quality and quantity you get for your reduced share of your wage packet - I'd be willing to bet that the food you get for a reduced share of your wage packet is more and better.

I wonder what caused the blip upwards between 1945 and 1950. Something to do with the war but I wonder what.

The more I think about it the more a more even distribution of our current golden age sounds like the plan.

[andrewducker]

Yeah, we actually produce enough food worldwide to feed everyone - it's how to get it to people.

I believe that UK food costs are higher than some countries, largely because we buy so much pre-packed stuff rather than making it ourselves.

Part of the problem is that capitalism does a _great_ job of the kinds of increases in wealth you see there, it's just awful at then spreading the wealth around. Moving to an entirely regulated economy is awful for productivity while being fairer (until corruption of the people in charge of the economy makes it appallingly bad).

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I know I'm as guilty of this as anyone because I have plenty of food and a nice house and I'm still covetous of electrical items and foreign holidays but I do wonder at a world where we produce enough food to feed everyone, and we don't *and* people don't think that our system might be somewhat flawed.

Mind you, my willingness to go and physically fight (or worse, see the Captain go off and physically fight) some tinpot dictator for access to "his" country so I can then spend my own money on famine relief is limited.

We are very time poor in the UK. Sort of.

I think any concentration of decision making is likely to end in some corruption of the decision making process, be that capitalism morphing into oligarchy or socialism morphing into archoarchy.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Three grand for a five and a half foot TV!

I wouldn’t be able to fit that into my living room without taking most of the furntiture out.

I’d have to sit in my neighbours flat to watch the damn thing. Damnit I’d be able to watch TV from the Occupy the Meadows camp.

Which reminds me of the person who owned a flat round the corner from MLW’s flat in Comely Bank who used to watch films using a projector and the whole living room wall. For films, read “films, nudge, nudge”

[andrewducker]

I'd love to have a projector. My parents have one, and a friend picked up an awesome one cheap. The main problems are having a wall free of books/pictures/shelves and needing to close the curtains.

I thought the Occupy The Meadows people had packed up? The ones in St Andrews Square seem to have done so.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Me two. A friend of MLW has one and we've been round a few times to watch movies.

The last time he'd invited us round to watch a film The Rise and Rise of Michael Rimmer (well worth a watch) and to meet a prospective new girlfriend. Awkwardly, the film has a pretty gratuitous nude scene. Which was awkward.

I'm put off by the cost of the projector bulbs and also the abiltiy to find a white wall. I know that if I had one it would rarely come out because I'd have to assemble the whiteboard effort everytime I used it.

(Actually, I think I've just had an idea).

The Occupy folks have moved on. MLW noticed they had gone a few days ago. I was not so observant.

I'm not surprised to be honest. I think they were about to be moved. Perhaps by the Friends of the Meadows. It was also pretty damned cold and the bit of the Meadows they were in was a swamp.

I think the Meadows lot a continuation group from the St Andrews Square team.

Not sure how I feel about Occupy.

[andrewducker]

While feeling that they aren't as educated about matters of economics as I'd like, I'm ecstatically happy that we have vocal left-wing people to counter-balance the vocal right-wing people and move the Overton Window back towards a central position I feel comfortable with.

Also, some of them will get more educated, more politically motivated, organise themselves better, and try and push politically for things. And I'm all in favour of more political engagement.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I'm very glad they exist but I wonder if their economic naiveity and televisual appeal is crowding out some more thoughtful leftwing critics of the current system, it's current crisis and what one might like to replace it with.

I should have gone and spoken to them but you know, I didn't.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I recall a conversation I had with an American which really surprised me.

I liked him. I thought he was a decent guy. Very intelligent, very well educated.

We drifted onto the subject of the NHS and he said “…but if you’re telling me that I have to be taxed extra just so some other guy can not die at 48, well sorry but no.”

My face must have done strange things because he changed the subject before I was able to say anything.

Massive difference in cultural assumptions.