Camp A believes the "function" is a line that always "goes upwards". It has done so in the past, does so in the present, and will continue to do so in the future. The trend will continue as always; no matter how many jobs will be automated by a new generation of machines, enough jobs will be created that are more cost-effective to be performed by humans than the current generation of machines.
Camp B believes the "function" is a curve, that so far has been going "upwards". On that, like everything else, we agree with Camp A. Our difference is that we believe that, eventually, we will reach a tipping point, when most of the jobs created by the new generation of machines can (and is cost-effective to) be performed by the very same generation of machines that created them in the first place. The curve will "slow down", and eventually "go downwards". And, at that point, a new situation, a new "quality" will arise that humanity hasn't dealt with before.
I think that this is a question of recursion. Recursion definitely exists, so the "Camp A" type of prediction cannot necessarily hold forever.
I'm more interested in having a contingency plan in place in case that new "quality" you mention arises.
Well, if you ask me, that contingency plan is socialism - and I when I say socialism I don't merely mean "tax the rich" or "social welfare" and "basic income" - those are all well and good reforms to make life a bit better until capitalism. Social democracy basically. Of course, for some people, it's all the same - damn commies want to steal my stuff.
I mean : common ownership of the means of production(so, basically, a large army of automatons). Of course, democracy, as open as possible. Work less, play more. If you have to work, invest in large-scale projects that benefit mankind; pool resources in order to do that, don't waste them in developing technologies in parallel. Don't think I imagine a "paradise on earth". Humans are heavily flawed; every society they'll build will be heavily flawed. But still, we can be heavily flawed while at the same time finding a better balance.
(Btw, that "new quality that arises from changes into quantity" is a classic marxist/dialectics method of seeing things - so I don't take credit for it).
But the problem is, undoubtebly, the "good name" of socialism has been besmirched in the 20th century - and I'm not saying it's completely unjustified. Some people in the left even propose we abandon the "brand" altogether - they use some other names, like Michael Albert's "Participatory Economics" - Parecon; my god what an awfully-sounding name. :P
Anyway, it is a fact that today you can't mention socialism/communism, even to people that are willing to hear, without the inevitable question : "So what about Stalin or Mao".
And we get to the fact that the socialist revolutions in the 20th century all happened in backwards, agricultural, largely feudal countries: Russia, China, Cuba, etc.
And we get to the tenet of marxism, that really, all those revolutions "sidelined" :
https://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Karl_Marx No social order ever disappears before all the productive forces for which there is room in it have been developed; and new, higher relations of production never appear before the material conditions of their existence have matured in the womb of the old society itself. Therefore, mankind always sets itself only such tasks as it can solve; since, looking at the matter more closely, we will always find that the task itself arises only when the material conditions necessary for its solution already exist or are at least in the process of formation.
In the countries that socialist revolutions happened, there was just too much "inertia", both in material in social conditions. Too much force was used to overcome that inertia. And that force did lead to atrocities and crimes and dictatorship.(let me just say that it's highly hypocritical of the capitalists to cry "oh what attrocities were commited in Soviet Russia or Cuba!", like they ever left them alone to develop more freely; right after the mostly peaceful 1917 revolution they send their armies to crush it, resulting in the utterly destructive Civil War).
Let me give a telling passage of "Darkness At Noon" - a very much anti-communist, or at least anti-Stalinist and anti-Bolshevik book, but one that its author, as an ex-communist himself, at least really understands the "objective conditions" that led to all the ugliness :
"Several years ago," said Gletkin after a while, "a little peasant was brought to me to be cross-examined. It was in the provinces, at the time when we still believed in the flower-garden theory, as you call it. Cross-examinations were conducted in a very gentlemanly way. The peasant had buried his crops; it was at the beginning of the collectivization of the land. I kept strictly to the prescribed etiquette. I explained to him in a friendly way that we needed the corn to feed the growing city population and for export, in order to build up our industries; so would he please tell me where he had hidden his crops.
The peasant had his head drawn into his shoulders when he was brought into my room, expecting a beating. I knew his kind; I am myself country-born. When, instead of beating him, I began to reason with him, to talk to him as an equal and call him ‘citizen,' he took me for a half-wit. I saw it in his eyes. I talked at him for half an hour. He never opened his mouth and alternately picked his nose and his ears.
I went on talking, although I saw that he held the whole thing for a superb joke and was not listening at all. Arguments simply did not penetrate his ears. They were blocked up by the wax of centuries of patriarchal mental paralysis. I held strictly to the regulations; it never even occurred to me that there were other methods. ...
"At that time I had twenty to thirty such cases daily.My colleagues the same. The Revolution was in danger of foundering on these little fat peasants. The workers were undernourished; whole districts were ravaged by starvation typhus; we had no credit with which to build up our armament industry, and we were expecting to be attacked from month to month. Two hundred millions in gold lay hidden in the woollen stockings of these fellows and half the crops were buried underground.
And, when cross-examining them, we addressed them as ‘citizen,' while they blinked at us with their sly-stupid eyes, took it all for a superb joke and picked their noses.
"The third hearing of my man took place at two o'clock at night; I had previously worked for eighteen hours on end. He had been woken up; he was drunk with sleep and frightened; he betrayed himself.
From that time I cross-examined my people chiefly at night. ...Once a woman complained that she had been kept standing outside my room the whole night, awaiting her turn. Her legs were shaking and she was completely tired out; in the middle of the hearing she fell asleep. I woke her up; she went on talking, in a sleepy mumbling voice, without fully realizing what she wassaying, and fell asleep again. I woke her once more, and she admitted everything and signed the statement without reading it, in order that I should let her sleep.
Her husband had hidden two machine guns in his barn and persuaded the farmers of his village to burn the corn because the Anti-Christ had appeared to him in a dream. That the wife had been kept waiting on her feet the whole night was due to the carelessness of my sergeant; from then onwards I encouraged carelessness of that kind; stubborn cases had to stand upright on one spot for as long as forty-eight hours.
After that the wax had melted out of their ears, and one could talk to them. ..."
Anyway, as a socialist, I can't say the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917 "shouldn't have happened, because USSR in the end collapsed and now we're left with a tainted reputation". It did. That's history, and whatever happened, happened. And it happened because people were hungry and desperate and wanted bread. Lenin promised bread, and land, and peace, and they followed him. The sure thing is, USSR is dead, god bless her sinful soul, and China is very much capitalistic now, just without "democracy". I just think, with 20/20 hindsight of course, that it did end giving socialism a "bad name", and in final analysis, it made the "recruiting job" for us socialists of the 21th century more difficult, because we always face the same question : "What about Stalin". A common theme in "Darkness At Noon" is : "does the end justified the means"? Or, more accurately, "does the end justify
all means"? Turns out, you should at least be careful with the methods that you use to change the world...they will end up changing you too.
All of this is theory of course; and theory usually goes out of the window when people are hungry and want to be fed
now. They don't want to wait for when "the conditions are better". So I won't judge the revolutionaries that in their time thought this was the best for their people. In the end, without Stalin and his "brutal methods", we might be living in the world of Wolfenstein:New Order today.
Anyway, it's an ugly situation right now. Many people, as you say, want a "plan", because they can see the whole thing going off the rails. But most reject socialism, because "what about Stalin". And, deep down, I don't really blame them - from their point of view. So...I don't know. My personal opinion is that the Western World in 2017 is not the half-feudal Russia of 1917 - not only we don't have nearly as much social and material inertia as then; but even people like the OP who rejects communism can still see that the system pretty much "begs" us to change it.
So, I don't know. We socialists have a "contigency plan", but the "brand" unfortunately is tarnished. So...we'll see.
That's all as far as the "First World" goes - something a fellow socialist said the other day made an impression on me: "The world is not on the same page". 3rd world countries have much diffent, much bigger problems. Even the working class of the 1st world countries, while being exploited by capitalists, still benefits by the exploitation of the working class of the 3rd world, which lives in utterly tragic conditions. It's a pretty f-ed up situation. So...I guess we'll see.
(End of TLDR; socialist rant) :P
