Saturday, April 24, 2010

Technology vs Jobs

Remember when you could go out and look for a job, fill out an application, give it to the manager, and even a same day interview? Perhaps you remember a time when there were plenty of cashiers to cash you out at the grocery store. I am pretty sure you would rather speak to a life representative when handling your affairs rather than an automated voice or someone who barley speaks English. Although modern technology had afforded us great opportunities, take a closer look at how technology helps to deteriorate the economy. Did you know the creation of the online application has help to eliminate thousands of jobs? Online applications save on human resource expenses, lowering mailing costs and eliminating the need to advertise job openings in newspapers. Some people prefer the self check out machines. These machines did not come without a cost. This machine eliminates the number of cashier jobs available. This makes it a little harder for your teens to get those seasonal and part time jobs. A friend of mine told me about a company that provided customer care for Capital One. A week later the company notified employees that Capital One would be outsourcing their calls to a foreign country and in three weeks their jobs would end. These are just a few examples of how technology has affected our economy. I realize that technology is here to stay. I am using twitter right now. How do you feel about it?  

22 comments:

  1. I think you are one to something. I just wanna say "I hate using that darn self checkout machine." Give the cashier her job back.

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  2. The self checkout I can deal with!! But give me the live representative. I just press zero until they get someone or hang up on me.

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  3. We should save energy and go back to mechanical Cash Registers and pay by cash or produce. The more things they made easier the less jobs were created.

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  4. Technology is mostly wicked and eliminates people from their jobs. The tech remains but so do the people. Where do they GO???? One of the dilemmas of destroying peoples lives with technology nobody has taken any of that into consideration. Outside of the automation over the last 4 decades, the desktop PC has and what it does has eliminated MILLIONS of peoples jobs due to application efficiency, It allows 1 or 2 people to do the work of 8 or 10 before. The whole Internet job application process is so dehumanized, it may make it EASY for CORPORATIONS and cut their cost but it reduces us to NUMBERS. We are at the tip of the iceberg with this problem and the problem is, What happens to people in all this? Corporations are mostly responsible in their greed of the bottom line. Now they can have both. Technology that uses less people and the people used are from 3rd world nations for slave wages. They got a sweet deal all around. Twisted Evil

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  5. I respectfully disagree. Fighting technology is like getting in the ring w/ Mike Tyson. Or putting on your Luddite cap and destroying textile machinery in Britain between 1811 - 1816, w/ the hope of saving jobs. It's wasted effort. Better to look things in the face and adapt.

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  6. Far easier said than done, though. I had a thread proposing a 30 hour work week here, and encountered some fierce opposition to the idea even from members here.

    How do you think corporations are going to feel when they have to be taxed to help government pay an income to people for doing volunteer work? People are going to have to have an income somehow, and there aren't going to be sufficient "real" jobs to provide that.

    Automation presents a tremendous opportunity for humanity to liberate itself from much of the toil of work. Getting there, though, is the problem.

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  7. Far easier said than done, though. I had a thread proposing a 30 hour work week here, and encountered some fierce opposition to the idea even from members here.

    How do you think corporations are going to feel when they have to be taxed to help government pay an income to people for doing volunteer work? People are going to have to have an income somehow, and there aren't going to be sufficient "real" jobs to provide that.

    Automation presents a tremendous opportunity for humanity to liberate itself from much of the toil of work. Getting there, though, is the problem.

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  8. I Don't wish to battle technology. Just notice things that come with it. I also know there are companies having meetings right now to us this at their advantage. Technology is a companies best friend. Did you see the movie "Up in the Air"? His job was to fire people and then they created a computerized why of laying people off. Lol, Anything to save the mighty dollar. The trailer for the movie is here http://americasunemployed.blogspot.com/2010/03/up-in-air.html

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  9. Well, this is complicated. I'm trying to stay optimistic, and hoping technology will create more jobs than it destroys. For example, new products like the Apple iPad should create ecosystems that spawn new companies that employ people.

    As far as a 30-hour work week, I prefer a 0-hour work week. That's why I buy lottery tickets. Very Happy

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  10. Very good read americasunemployed!!!! mrmunster summed up what I feel, yes we all do have to learn to adapt but whats going to happen 100 million unemployed and living on the streets. Then what?? This article really made me think and its very scary!!! Thank you americasunemployed and thanks for starting this post

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  11. I would not make technology the scapegoat. I think technology is cool. I do agree w/ you that many corporations today do not give a hoot about their employees. I have not seen the movie yet, thanks for the reminder.



    P.S. Great thread, this is fun!

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  12. Well I dont' know how technology affects outsourcing. It is all the same tech. Its the accents on the other side which pisses me off. I had to get some things straight with BESTBUY and had to beg to speak to someone I could understand. You have to adapt with technology. Don't worry the CYLONS and the T1000s won't take over. The developement of new tech and factories to create machines makes jobs. I went to the self checkout and got a free mustard and pineapple. The self checkout would not work right and the manager gave up and gave them to me. They had to call someone to fix the machine ANOTHER JOB CREATED.

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  13. Outsourcing has alot to to with it. Look at all the white collar jobs being shipped overseas, because they too have a PC and internet and are paid LESS. So whats the reason to keep jobs here? Nothing. The technology is there for them to send work and jobs to lesser places for lesser wages.

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  14. lol at the free pineapples. You are right it's your job to adapt. I don't have a problem adapting to technology. I love technology. What would I do without my GPS? I use twitter more than a teenage girl. As far as those reps that don't speak good English, Id actually rather speak to the automated Voice.

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  15. americasunemployed wrote:lol at the free pineapples. You are right it's your job to adapt. I don't have a problem adapting to technology. I love technology. What would I do without my GPS? I use twitter more than a teenage girl. As far as those reps that don't speak good English, Id actually rather speak to the automated Voice.



    Amen, I would rather speak to an automated Voice myself after I figure out what number I am supposed to hit for English

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  16. At the toll booth I would rather throw my change in the basket. Toll booth people seem not to happy, it must be all the fumes. If I get lost I would rather stop at a gas station so I can get some snacks.

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  17. lol. I moved to a new state and I need that GPS to go almost everywhere. I love that thing. I even named the voice Susan. lol I just pray her wires don't get crossed and I end up somewhere that look like a scene from a horror movie.

    @ magsmald67 You are so funny, I almost spit up my water.

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  18. I realize that you can't unring a bell and we have to make peace with technology, but I refuse to worship it. It has produced miracles, but it has also changed the quality of life for the worse in many ways. It has dehumanized many areas of our lives. This has been painfully obvious to most of us here.

    The kind of people who invent technology are not always actually trying to solve a problem or help humanity. Sometimes they are just addicted to the psychological thrill of proving that something can be done. And others pay the price. For example, the ones who invented the atomic bomb. Oppenheimer described it as "a sweet problem" to solve. I am currently reading a book "The Dark Side of the Moon", about the space program from it's earliest origins. The European scientists who were trying to invent rockets just wanted to be able to work on rockets, no matter what it took. So they joined the Nazi Party and worked for Hitler. Their labor was largely from Camp Dora, a little known concentration camp related to Buchenwald. Some of these men actually participated in working the prisoners to death or killing them. The US was so determined to get their know how before Russia did that the government broke it's own immigration laws about bringing in criminals and falsified documents to bring these scientists here.

    This is how out of balance things can get when people worship technology for it's own sake. I wish it could be limited to setting a goal of something that was actually NEEDED for the good of humanity, then working toward inventing the solution to that problem. This is more honorable than constantly inventing things people are happy having never heard of, then setting about to make people think they are necessary.

    I have made peace with computers and enjoy some of the things that they allow me to do, but I will NEVER feel the same way about reading on line that I feel about my treasured walls of books, or the smell and peace of a library. I do not want any mechanical digitalized version of "books" to carry around and "read". Until I die, I will glory in the feel of a book in my hand, the smell of a particular book's paper or ink, the sight of it on the shelf when I pass by. I make use of email, but it can't replace the feeling of receiving a real letter in the mail, and getting a cup of tea and heading to the porch to enjoy the experience of reading it.

    I guess you could say I am a defiantly unreconstructed twentieth century woman at heart.

    Americasunemployed, about modern cars...I keep seeing that commercial for the car that can park itself. I keep wondering what happenes when its' circuit board goes nutty and the car starts ramming cars.

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  19. @paulaf I agree with you in more ways than one. I'm not messing with the car that parks it self lol. I can't help but to see how the children are affected by technology. When I was little, I use to ask my Dad a million questions. Now kids can just Google whatever comes to mid. Technology is helping us Raise our kids. Now that is scary. I can't believe some of the things I see on the News. Like now kids are sexting.

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  20. Thats just the beginning! I saw an interview last night with Richard Clarke and he said the next terrorist threat is cyberspace. Its very scary where things are going but I am not going to dwell on things I can't change right? I will say this if it weren't for technology I would be here with all you wonderful people

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  21. Why are companies sending jobs to India if they have automated voices? Think how simple life be if they went back to mechanical cash registers and paid by cash.

    We all are bunch of Cyber terroists this Friday and following Monday. Now, only we could jam their cell phones.

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  22. No MON the Idians are speaking. We out source jobs to actual people not automated voices.

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