As Creators We Imagine We Have No LimitsIn the United States employers generally accepted the 8-hour day as of 1912. Increases in productivity since then indicate that a further reduction in working hours is long overdue. Cutting the work week again could spread scarce jobs around, and it would reduce welfare.A reduced work week does nothing for the many people who are unemployable. Also, imagine if all jobs were only a few hours a week. There would be a vast waste in commuting, training, and dispersion of information. Perhaps extended years of education and early retirement would be a better method to spread jobs among workers. Where would that leave the income distribution problem? We must return to very old ideas about economics to solve the distribution problem. With our machine-slaves we must someday return to seeing ourselves as thankful guests at nature's table, rather than as proud creators of wealth. Sacrifices to the Gods will not be required, yet thankfulness is not dead. Humility struggles to survive in the custom of giving thanks for the gift of this food. The amount of work we must do to harvest nature's wealth depends on our knowledge and organization. Robots will make us rethink our role as the proud creators of wealth. We will come to see ourselves as the planet-parasites we really are. (Offended by parasite? Too bad. The truth hurts.) Once we have given up on being proud creators of wealth, we can begin to rethink economics from a new perspective. As creators of wealth we imagine we have no limits. More work will always create more wealth. As thankful guests at nature's table we can see our limits, but we can also see new possibilities. From that new perspective it's easy to see that the goal of getting people to buy cars is wrong. It shows how confused economic policy has become. If people have a car they don't need to buy another when we should be conserving resources. If people don't have a car they will need one, but after that the car factories will not need to keep producing more cars than needed for replacement. If we make the cars more durable to save money and resources the number of cars we need to buy will be very small. The goal of stimulating the economy to produce more than we need is wrong. We should stimulate the economy in a way to produce what we really need, no more, no less. Well...maybe a little more than we need would be best. That kind of stimulus must go directly to people to support the consumption they require; not to business to produce things they can't sell, things we don't need and can't afford, using credit we can't repay. We need cash money in our pockets to buy the basics. That will allow the market to provide the goods and services we need without a need to waste enough resources to stay busy. Why would we expect to have full employment when machine unemployment is about to be dwarfed by robot unemployment? Why would we assume that we must keep all labor busy when we have a vast surplus of productive capacity? A direct stimulus to the people is the best response to the robot economy, which must operate with limited resources. A stimulus to producers will not work, because they would never produce any more than they can sell, and if they did produce more it would not bring full employment like it did before robots. Let's really accept capitalism. Dividends are at the heart of our system. A direct stimulus to people would be like a dividend, a form of unearned income. A basic income would start as only a supplement to wages, the ultimate stimulus. Over time that basic income would rise and fall as the need for labor and the nature of the economy varies. When we have better robots, wages may only be a supplement to a basic income. If capitalism was democratic people would be getting unearned income, just like the capitalists we have today who want to keep it all for themselves. With basic income awful jobs would pay well, and the unpaid work of caring for others would gain an adequate labor supply. Barry Brooks LinksSustainable EconomicsAndre Gorz The Inheritance Economy Wise Old Men Population denial The truth about earning a living. If consumption means use up- The house passed an income plan in 1970 by a two-to-one margin, but the Senate blocked it. The Coming of Deindustrial Society: A Practical Response The Gospel of Consumption Consumerism: an Historical Perspective Keynes, Capitalism, and the Crisis Huey Long senate speeches Defining Moment for Climate Basic Income Guarantee For the Common Good Monbiot, What Denial Does 
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