JOB SUSTAINABILITY

Although the U.S. has had decent job growth in the last 3 years, along with moderate or perhaps too much government frugality, I worry about the sustainability of jobs for our people. And for people throughout the world. With increased use of automation and other efficiencies, we can now produce many goods with fewer workers. Recent high school and college graduates have extreme difficulty in finding suitable employment.

The outlook for the rest of the world is als worrisome. Advanced countries will see fewer manufacturing jobs per product. While there are more low skill jobs available in the developing world, one of the major work environments, farming, will gradually give way to larger, more mechanized operations. And populations will continue to increase.

So where will the jobs be? The world can make all the goods it needs without increasing the workforce. We can't all be providing services to each other. We'll have all the automobiles, TVs, phones, etc. that we can use, but there are other needs. There is practically no end to the possible improvements to the planet and benefits for its peoples. Water resources, roads, bridges, medical deliverables, education, environmental action, etc. But these require complete or substantial government action. And where will governments get the money and will power to conduct these operations and provide the jobs required?

Maybe we need to produce goods that we can sell to the Martians.