El fin del trabajo

[lectorhinfluyente1984]

http://charleshughsmith.blogspot.com.es/2015/04/the-changing-world-of-work-i-americas.html

Eight of the nine classes are hidebound by backward-looking conventions, neofeudal and neocolonial arrangements and a spectrum of perverse incentives and false choices.

My theme this week is the changing world of work. The goal of this week's five-part look at the changing world of work is to look forward, rather than dwell with misty-eyed longing for what is now firmly in the past.

Let's start by establishing a socio-economic context for the discussion: the class and income structure of the U.S.

The conventional class structure is divided along the lines of income, i.e. the wealthy, upper middle class, middle class, lower middle class and the poor.

A few years ago I suggested that a more useful scheme is to view America through the lens not just of income but of political power and state dependency, as a Three-and-a-Half Class Society (October 22, 2012).

But this 3.5-class structure did not capture the changing nature of employment, income and wealth/political power, so last year I subdivided America's socio-economic spectrum into nine classes.

This nine-class structure is not feudal, in the sense of extremely limited social and economic mobility; only the Oligarchy Class is nearly impervious to upward social mobility, and even this class can be cracked open by anyone amassing billions of dollars in productive assets.

It is however neofeudal, a term I use to describe a society and economy dominated by financialization and the apex of wealth and political power that wealth buys. The classes below this apex are either tax donkeys, Upper Caste technocrats serving the apex, or the lower classes that are bought off with social welfare and various modern iterations of bread and circuses.

I described the tax donkeys in Neofeudalism 101: Strip-Mining the Upper Middle Class.

The bread and circuses class is aptly described in this first-hand report: I live better on Welfare then I ever did working.

The working poor now toil to serve the well-paid technocrats: The Shut-In Economy: In the new world of on-demand everything, you’re either pampered, isolated royalty, or you’re a 21st century servant.

Let's review the nine classes:

1. The Deep State. Mike Lofgren offered this description of the Deep State in Anatomy of the Deep State:

The Deep State is a hybrid association of elements of government and parts of top-level finance and industry that is effectively able to govern the nation without reference to the consent of the governed as expressed through the formal political process.

I describe the U.S. Deep State as the National Security State which enables a vast Imperial structure that incorporates hard and soft power--military, diplomatic, intelligence, finance, commercial, energy, media, higher education--in a system of global dominance.

The key feature of the Deep State is that it makes decisions behind closed doors that the surface elected government ratifies and implements.

The number of people in the Deep State class is small: senior Federal officials (NSA, Pentagon, State, Treasury, etc.), Executive Branch officials and key private-sector players.

Membership in the Deep State class is not dependent on wealth so much as on relationships and power. One's origins matter less than one's ambition, moxie, smarts and ability to maneuver up through the political thickets of bureaucracies.

2. The Oligarchs. Oligarchy is in the news--for example We're Headed for Oligarchy--and a number of descriptors are somewhat interchangeable: corporatocracy, plutocracy, etc. I have used Financial Aristocracy to invoke the neofeudal structure of our economy.

Whatever word you prefer, this small class is more or less the top .01% who owns a majority of the nation's financial wealth. They essentially own the political machinery of the nation, writing the rules that regulate their industries, taxes, etc.

Anyone who starts another Google of Facebook (and quickly diversifies their wealth into political power) can buy their way into this class.

3. New Nobility. This is the super-wealthy class just below the Oligarchs. They own a significant percentage of all assets but do not directly manage the political process like the Oligarch class. They hire CPAs and attorneys to protect their interests and constitute an influential political-financial class with global connections.

4. Upper Caste. I use this term to describe the technocrat/professional class that manages the Status Quo for the upper classes. They serve in both government and the private sector. These are the people described in the link above, who work hard for their corporate/state masters and who can afford to live in San Francisco, West L.A. and Manhattan, and pay for all the tech-enabled services that have replaced a dedicated private servant with a small army of people delivering prepared food, groceries, Amazon Prime goods, etc.

5. State Nomenklatura. In the Soviet Union, the Nomenklatura were the key administrators in all sectors. In the U.S., the Nomenklatura are well-paid government administrators with security and power. Collectively, they administer their own share of the swag, gaming the system to maximize their pensions, benefits, etc.

Together, the Upper Caste and the Nomenklatura comprise about 9% of the 121 million households in the U.S.: roughly 8.7 million households who earn between $145,000 and $250,000 annually. This class is the bulk of the top 7%, i.e. the top 90% to 97%.Household income in the United States.

The top level of the Upper Caste (2.8 million households) earns more than $250,000 annually. The Nomenklatura and Upper Caste number in total about 11.5 million households.

6. The Middle Class. While others attempt to define the middle class by income alone (many see a household income of around $50,000 as qualifying), I define the middle class not by income alone but by purchasing power, benefits and assets owned. What Does It Take To Be Middle Class? (December 5, 2013).

By this definition, the middle class is the cohort between 70% and 90%--households earning $80,000 or more. Even this is problematic, because in high-cost cities $80,000 is not enough to sustain middle-class conventions (owning a home, reliable vehicles, retirement funds, etc.) while it may be ample in lower-cost regions.

This 20% comprises about 24 million households.

The lower middle class--what I define as having some but not all of the attributes of full middle class membership--is the cohort between 50% and 70%--households earning more than $55,000 annually.

This class also comprises about 20% (24 million) of all households.

If you think this is too restrictive, please read my above analysis of middle class membership. It may change your view of what constitutes middle-class.

7. The Working Poor. Roughly 38 million households have earned income but it is not sufficient to secure the basics of middle class life. Many qualify for social welfare programs such as food stamps and Medicaid.

This class is about 30% of all households.

8. State Dependents. Though often labeled "poor," those with minimal legal employment may be living better than the working poor, due to generous social welfare benefits such as Section 8 (housing), Medicaid (healthcare), child care, food stamps, disability, etc., and black-market sources of cash income. This class is comprised of the bottom 20% of households.

9. Mobile Creatives. This is an emerging class that ranges across many income classifications and thus cannot be described by income alone. Some earn Upper Caste incomes, others are Working Poor. This class is self-employed, free-lance, entrepreneurial, sole proprietors with adaptive skills. They may collaborate with other Creatives rather than have employees, and may have part-time jobs.

There are roughly 5.5 million incorporated self-employed people in the U.S.; these tend to be professionals such as attorneys, engineers and physicians. These self-employed are generally members of the Upper Caste.

The Mobile Creatives (which include small farmers, craftspeople, independent programmers, etc.) number around 10 million, or 8% of the workforce. I use the word mobile here not to suggest mobility between physical places (though that is one factor in this class's flexibility) [hipoteca inmobil-iaria? para qué?] but mobility between sectors, skills and ways of earning income.

Members of this class might take a short-term paying gig if the pay and circumstance is attractive, and then return to self-employment. They tend to foster multiple income streams and in general operate by the principle trust the network, not the corporation or the state.

Some members of this class joined the cohort involuntarily, as the result of layoffs; others pursue this livelihood for its freedom, flexibility (important to parents of young children or those caring for elderly parents) and potential for self-expression.

This is the "wild card" class that falls outside all conventional class/income hierarchies. It includes those seeking outlier wealth and those who have chosen voluntary poverty as a means to an independent life that they "own" lock, stock and barrel.

Though this class wields little conventional financial or political power, it has a potentially large leadership role in social and technical innovations. This is the 4% Pareto Distribution that can exert outsized influence on the 64%.

The other eight classes are hidebound by conventions, neofeudal and neocolonial arrangements and a variety of perverse incentives, false choices and illusions of choice, including democracy itself.

I will end this examination of the Nine Classes of America with these questions:which class is having more fun? Which has a future as the Status Quo unravels? Your answer may say more about your aspirations and worldview than the class/employment/income hierarchy itself.

[muyuu]

Life after the 4th industrial revolution
http://motherboard.vice.com/read/life-after-the-fourth-industrial-revolution

ABB YuMi
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2KfXY2SvlmQ

'The market is rigged' - Michael Lewis
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-32246655

Will robots destroy our livelihoods?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-32258427

[muyuu]

http://factor-tech.com/robotics/17437-robot-chef-that-can-cook-any-of-2000-meals-at-tap-of-a-button-to-go-on-sale-in-2017/

[lectorhinfluyente1984]

http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2015/04/economist-explains-12

AMERICA’S unemployment rate is 5.5%. By historical standards, that is low. It is also falling rapidly: unemployment is down more than a percentage point from a year ago. Economic theory suggests that in such circumstances, workers should begin to enjoy healthier pay rises. Low unemployment means that employers have to try harder to find new workers, while existing workers can threaten to move elsewhere. As a result, workers should be able to demand higher wages. Yet firms in America seem not to have got the message. Inflation-adjusted wages for typical workers are stagnant. In fact, they have barely grown in the past five years; average hourly earnings rose 2% year-on-year in February of 2015: about the same as in February of 2010. Why hasn't America's falling unemployment translated into faster wage growth?

To understand current patterns one first has to remember how American firms behaved during the 2007-09 recession. At that time, they were desperate to cut costs. They would like to have foisted pay cuts on their staff. But cutting pay is harder than it sounds (just imagine what would happen to workplace morale if your boss tried to cut everyone’s pay by 10% overnight). Instead, employers reacted to the deep downturn by firing as many workers as they dared, beginning with the least productive. Better workers, meanwhile, were squeezed in order to boost their productivity, so as to manage too-high wage rates without having to lay off the cream of the payroll. As conditions improved after the recession ended, firms' prior response left them with a wage hangover. Rather than continue to pump workers for extra productivity, firms preferred to return to more normal management conditions, and to let too-high wages adjust over time: “pent-up” wage cuts have been achieved simply by not granting raises. Wages, in other words, are not rising by more because in many cases they are already too high.

Yet there is also evidence that many workers are not demanding high wages. Oddly, that may be down to a reform to America’s unemployment-insurance scheme taken at the end of 2013, which slashed the maximum time for which Americans could draw unemployment benefits. About 1.3m Americans were affected immediately. With nothing to fall back on, the wage expectations for many unemployed people fell. In economic parlance their "reservation wage"—or the threshold pay rate needed to coax them into and keep them in employment—declined precipitously. To take advantage of the growing pool of cheap workers, employers in certain sectors went on a hiring binge. Indeed, a big chunk of the 3m extra jobs created during 2014 were in low-wage sectors.

The biggest reason for sluggish wages, however, remains what it has been for most of recent history: America’s sickly labour market. Unemployment is low, but other measures of labour-market “slack” paint a much bleaker picture. The number of workers who work part-time but would rather be full-time (so-called “part-time for economic reasons”) is still much higher than before the recession hit. This is important: a recent paper from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago found that even after accounting for other measures of unemployment, the number of workers counted as “part-time for economic reasons” exerts a very strong effect on wage growth. (That is probably because such workers would rather push their employers for more hours than for higher pay). Policymakers should not be fooled by the unemployment rate. The American labour market is much more robust than it was, but it is a long way from full health. It will take many more months of strong job growth to generate rapid and sustained growth in pay.

En el foro:

http://www.economist.com/comment/2710345#comment-2710345

In order to have anything like a serious conversation about low wage rates you have to include something about the lack of unions, particularly for college educated, white collar workers. Since we've moved into the information age, we have lots of fairly low paid, college educated workers that culturally cannot unite and ask for better hours and better pay. The firms use a wink and a nod between themselves to keep wages stagnant, and then fill in skill gaps by lobbying for more immigration to get immigrants to come in, work cheaply, and depress wages.

Hence, you have the upper management class making millions, the CEO class making 10's to 100's of millions and then the nicely pacified workers(i.e., marketing, engineering, programmers, etc.) at the bottom scraping by w/ high hours and comparatively low pay. The upper crust then just keeps dangling the carrot of advancement while the gerbils keep hammering the wheel for the golden carrot that will come to 1 in a 10,000. And, they ply them w/ meaningless titles and head patting performance reviews (as Napoleon observed, "A soldier will fight long and hard for a bit of colored ribbon.") to keep moral up.

So go sell your GE sponsored BS somewhere else about pay being too high. You're the one that's high.

http://www.economist.com/comment/2710259#comment-2710259

In my situation I could easily job jump, make a lateral move, and find work that pays tens of thousands more dollars. However, this would be a move from a permanent job that pays adequately and offers a lot of flex time. And the new place would start me out as contract and put me in the usual trial period. Who knows if I would have a job a year...I've done that kind of move before and had whole groups of managers and divisions just disappear from above me!

What I an not seeing is high raises and bonuses for those who have been working hard and performing. Or, the availability of permanent, upward in status positions, being advertised.

A big problem is the terrible rate of new business formation that would offer more advanced profession and middle level management positions. Everything is so centralized and controlled that there is effectively very little labor competition.

[lectorhinfluyente1984]

Sin drogas no hay trabajo

[wanderer]

Sin drogas no hay trabajo

"Smart pills" para listillos que se creen lo más de lo más. Qué poca pena me darán cuando caigan, just for being too smart...

Beyond contempt, ya saben...   

[Taliván Hortográfico]

A los esclavos se los ha drogado desde siempre. Ahora toman drogas voluntariamente porque no saben que son esclavos.

[wanderer]

A los esclavos se los ha drogado desde siempre. Ahora toman drogas voluntariamente porque no saben que son esclavos.

Creo que para éstos ya tengo el motto que los define:

Vivieron por encima de sus habilidades...

P.S: Y por supuesto, una de las reglas básicas del buen control de los esclavos, es que éstos se crean que no lo son.

[Republik]

Megaurbes como NY seguramente es imposible que funcionen sin fluido suministro de coca y anfetamínicos.  Me cuenta un amigo que trabaja en un hospital de gran prestigio que allí la carrera por jubilarse a los 50 es la coartada para todas las locuras imaginables en cuanto a forzado de los límites físicos del ser humano . Porque un americano  no se retira cincuentón si no ha juntado unos cuantos millones, que las buenas casas en Florida o Samaná baratas no son.

[Mad Men]

Pues yo cuando iba de disco, allá por esos locos años del boom, la gente se metía unas rallas de palmo, y os digo que lo hacían con mucho placer, no veas, al domingo ya esperaban con ansias la llegada del próximo sábado.


Entre semana, se llevaban más los canutos, de relax.

[El afilador]

Megaurbes como NY seguramente es imposible que funcionen sin fluido suministro de coca y anfetamínicos.  Me cuenta un amigo que trabaja en un hospital de gran prestigio que allí la carrera por jubilarse a los 50 es la coartada para todas las locuras imaginables en cuanto a forzado de los límites físicos del ser humano . Porque un americano  no se retira cincuentón si no ha juntado unos cuantos millones, que las buenas casas en Florida o Samaná baratas no son.

Doy fe de ello. Y no es necesario cruzar el charco para encontrarte con esto en centros/hospitales/empresas ultracompetitivos. Un par de mis exjefes eran unos desequilibrados mentales no sé si por genética o por consumo de lo que no debían. Y amasan pasta a base bien entre su trabajo público, sus empresas privadas de las que son CEOs o miembros de la dirección, su plaza en la universidad (pública o privada), miembros de consejos editoriales... Con una diferencia MUY española: ni de coña se largan a su casa a los 50 a contar millones. Mueren con las botas puestas, mafioseando y estorbando hasta el final. Porque alrededor de los 60 ya no se dedican a hacer nada productivo, sólo a vivir la vida del consejo consultivo, evaluador de propuestas de planes de i+D, evaluador de calidad de no-sé-qué... Hay todo un universo de mamandurrias premium a las que aspira esta gente, cuando podrían estar con su tercera mujer tomando margaritas en cualquier urbanización pija de la costa patria.

Es gente a la que el café (perfectamente dos litros al día) no sólo no les hace nada, sino que les da sueño. Un efecto rebote de libro. Pero nada se queda sin sus consecuencias. Yo ya conozco un par de suicidios de mi generación por forzar la máquina de la manera que fuera, no conseguir lo que se quería y entrar en una espiral de frustración sin otra salida que el quitarse de enmedio. Y no hemos llegado a los 40...

Pero es lo que nos venden en cine y series de éxito todos los días desde EEUU, ¿no?. Estoy hasta las narices de series de abogados, médicos o científicos que no duermen nunca, comen mal y follan a capullo descubierto. ¿Qué me quieren vender? ¿Que para tener éxito profesional mi vida personal tiene que ser un desastre mientras me llevo mi salud por delante?. Venga hombre... la gente con pasta de verdad vive como dios. Esto no es más que pienso para pobres aspirando a ser ricoh.

Mis meditaciones.

[Mad Men]

Han visto ustedes American Beauty ?

Pues me da la sensación que la vida  cada vez se parece más a esa peli.

[El afilador]

Han visto ustedes American Beauty ?

Pues me da la sensación que la vida  cada vez se parece más a esa peli.

Por mi parte intentaré no acabar igual.
Aunque ya tengo vecino y compañeros de trabajo zumbados 

[muyuu]

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-21/step-step-guide-how-crash-entire-market

[wanderer]

Más sobre el tema de los trabajos de mierda, de nuestro bien conocido David Graeber:

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-04-22/practical-utopian%E2%80%99s-guide-coming-collapse-david-graeber-phenomenon-bullhit-jobs