MINDLESS MUSINGS

Let us assume that neither utopia nor dystopia are on the cards for us working slobs. We are not going to work 1 or 2 hours a week and live lives of convenience and leisure. We hopefully are not going to live in a future with unprecedented poverty and unemployment; where there are only three classes: the appalling poverty of the 90% and the ludicrously rich 1%. The other 9% will be needed to serve and protect the 1%. Not a great life, but you get room and board. I mean surely the billionaire class wouldn’t just abandon us in pursuit of their own interests. Right? Right?

Anyway, for most of us, we are only focused on next week’s pay, so we can afford to live and maybe have a little fun. This is where the big question mark is. How do the ‘workers’ make themselves useful (in a profit driven world sense) when their job is made redundant?

This is not the first time in human history that a massive innovation decimated an industry or even an economy. One thing we humans are good at is adapting. Creating innovations that could improve livelihoods? I would again say yes. It’s just that something usually happens after this point where things fuck up. The advantages of the innovation are offset by a whole new problem stemming, directly or indirectly from the very invention/s that were going to liberate us all. A bunch of other threads sprouting from that idea.

Back to this point, machines are replacing human labour at an unprecedented velocity. It’s not just the menial tasks anymore. These gizmos are popping up in almost every sector and level of the workforce. Those jobs we all hate are disappearing.

“But A.I. is a wonder! It can do things you never thought possible. Yeah, like make me admit I wanna keep my job.”

 Scott Seiss

The next Industrial Revolution is upon us people. While we are not farmers flocking to the cities, we are heading for a huge shake-up. People aren’t just losing their jobs; those jobs are vanishing. Once upon a time, not long ago, there was a ‘printing industry’. A huge chunk of that information, entertainment and gossip consumed on the internet once had to printed into paper, magazine or book format. Then shipped, sorted, delivered and sold in stores.

That’s a shit load of jobs (many very specialized) and businesses where the demand has all-but dried up. Many of the less specific job skills were easily transferable and a lot of the ‘talent’ made the switch to digital media, but still, a huge swathe, was gouged out of a once booming industry.

A person loading paper into a machine can sell their labour for some other humdrum job. Forklift and truck driving are applicable to numerous industries, but what about the people who dedicated years to learning the trade of printing? Colour mixing, machine maintenance, adjustment and repair. See ya.

A similar reshuffle is happening in numerous industries right now. You work as a cashier at a supermarket or fast-food chain. See ya. You can apply somewhere else, but the supply of applicants is now way outstripping demand, and we already have enough people working in the kitchen. Although we are always looking for ways to get rid of those deadshits (I mean to increase efficiency in the kitchen) by using machines too.

Of course, these automatic cashiers and any other machines need to be maintained and repaired, so there are new jobs there. Obviously not as many and requiring a higher skill level, so jobseekers are still behind.

Supermarkets are an interesting petri dish. The checkout staff are gone; or now 1 or 2 are monitoring the line of automated cahiers rather than having one per counter. However, a surge in home delivery services has opened a new demand for workers to perform different tasks. Now they need staff to do the shopping for the online customers and people to deliver it. Certainly not glamourous, but neither was being a cashier, I guess.

This whole ‘gig economy’ seems very shifty to me. U%$r drivers instead of taxis, food delivery services. This trick of fobbing all the overheads off onto the, I don’t even know that they’re called! They certainly aren’t sub-contractors. Ticking the ‘agree to terms’ box on an App is very different from a legally binding contract signed by a company and a subby. Isn’t it? Isn’t it?

Your vehicle $$$ Your petrol, gas, electricity $$$ Your insurance $$$

No holiday or sick pay.

Welcome to the hidden expense of owning a business.

Those insipid fucken commercials telling you how easy it is to do this work.

“I can choose my own hours”

“I am my own boss”

Well, you better be a hard ass slave driver of a boss if you want to earn a living wage! People lazing about, playing guitars at home on the commercials; that better be your parents’ home because you aren’t gunna make the rent fart arsing around like that! Futuristic utopia this is not. Working 1 or 2 hours a week in this trade will lead to destitution.

“I get paid to listen to my favourite music”

“What are you a DJ?”

“No. I deliver packages for A*&^n”

Apparently delivering packages around the city with a strict quota and deadline is the same as taking a leisurely cruise down the coast. You get paid per delivery by the way, not by the hour, and not much either. Remember all your expenses come out of that money. If you fail to meet any quotas or other standards you can be cut off immediately. Fuck you and fuck your bills!

There’s no boss’s office to enter and plead your case. You are now in digital purgatory looking for where to even attempt an appeal. Things are moving backwards if this is the direction we are going.

Well, I’m bummed out, how about you?