The first advance in productivity was most likely the Club allowing primitive man to bash in the head of his prey.
Advances were slow and advanced through the spear, knife, bow and arrow, to the invention of fire, the lever, and the wheel.
The first really great increase in productivity however was the harnessing of animal power.
Productivity through most of succeeding time was slow, you could do no more with your muscle power and the ox pulling your plow than your great-great-grandfather could do a century earlier.
In the late 1700's Watt improved the steam engine to where it became a practical source of power. Advances in this and other fields began to multiply. Still by 1860 approximately 80% of the workforce was employed in agriculture. There began a huge decline in the percentage of the workforce employed in agriculture such that in the next 100 years the number of agricultural workers declined by a factor of 5 and in 1960 only 16% of the workforce still worked on farms. Presently that number is less than 2% and rapidly falling. With Computer and GPS control tractors can now operator Autonomously, at a 20% greater efficiency that with the best human operator.
Manufacturing jobs employed about 8% of the 1860 workforce. By 1960 manufacturing employed 45% of the workforce and office and service employed 39%.
Today Manufacturing has either been automated or exported such that manufacturing now employs just 16% of our workforce.
In the Interim due to difficulties in automation and communication office work has just begun to be exported. Office/Government/Service now employ 80% of the workforce.
Computer processing power is surging and computer storage is exploding. Transistors are the number one product manufactured. 2 quintillion will be manufactured this year at an average retail price in the 10's of nanodollars each. Other advances in technology are Proceeding apace. Nano-technology advances are producing new cheaper, better products such as new television screens, etc. Artificial intelligence is advancing with new neural network procedures and equipment allowing more and more intelligent learning and processing by machines, as well a great advances in "natural language processing", genetic programming, self programming, etc.
The ASCI-Purple soon to be released IBM computer will have the processing power of the human mind. 36 years ago all computers in the world combined first matched the math processing power of humanity combined. Your desktop greatly exceeds that capacity today. Moore's Law predicts that the Equivalent of the ASCI-Purple will be on your desktop in less than 15 years.
Add it up if a PC can exceed your total processing power, the functions of controlling your body, thinking, breathing, walking, eating, sight, sound, speech, etc., etc., and super computers have literally thousands of times this power will there be a job for you? McDonald's? Even McDonalds is in the process of automating their kitchens. I guess you may still get a job as a Walmart greeter.
Rod |
