From the article: "Martin Ford saw it everywhere, even in his own business.
Smarter machines and better software were helping companies do more work
with fewer people. His Silicon Valley software firm used to put its programs on
disks and ship them to customers. The disks were made, packaged and delivered
by human beings. Now Ford’s customers can just download the software to their
computers — no disks, no packaging, no delivery workers.
… He suggests imposing massive taxes on companies, which would be paying far
less in wages thanks to automation, and distributing the proceeds to those left
unemployed by technology. That would give them money to spend to keep the
economy spinning.
To prevent the creation of a massive, idle underclass, Ford suggests paying
incentives for people to keep going to school and to behave in ways that benefit
the environment and society.
He admits his ideas are “fairly radical and political untenable ... But I
don’t believe there are any easy conventional solutions.” Read more
