Editor’s note: This commentary is by Steve May, an elected member of the Richmond Selectboard and a candidate for the Vermont House (Chittenden-1). He is also a former member of the Vermont AFL-CIO executive board and served previously as vice president of the Champlain Valley Central Labor Council. May also is a clinical social worker with a private practice in Shelburne.
[B]efore our eyes we watch a transformation no less grand than the way Gutenberg and the printing press or Eli Whitney and the cotton gin transformed civilization. In the near future, we will exist in an age with cars driven by computers.
This is not the proclamation of heretics, but rather a bygone certainty. We are witnessing the return of manufacturing jobs to Vermont and the United States so sophisticated that they require workers to excel with specialized knowledge and an advanced degree. Because it is convenient, cheaper and more efficient, workers are being replaced by mindless machines. The return of these jobs means that machines so efficient that they have replaced throngs of workers are supervised by experts who make sure these same machines stay on line and productive.
These machines — they don’t get the flu, they don’t call out or play hooky, and they certainly aren’t prepared for juggling between ballet recitals, scout jamborees or soccer games. They don’t need health benefits and aren’t going to need much more than a software update and some lubricant to keep things in good working order.
We stand on the cusp of the digital age. Automation is changing the basic underpinning of our daily lives. The sweep of change this grand happens maybe once a century. As a civilization we need to reflect on the most basic of assumptions. Vermonters already have been touched by the way our relationship to work evolves; and Vermonters stand to be more greatly affected by the depth and breadth of change through the emergences of new technologies.
Competitiveness in the 21st century demands that we free individuals up to be creative, dynamic and entrepreneurial.
These realities demand of us a much different approach than that which has come before. We need a coordinated plan to take advantage of the advantages that Vermont can channel in deepening its commitment to New Manufacturing. Let’s be clear, 3D printing may represent the leading edge of a creative revival in manufacturing, but this is fundamentally different than creating widgets. Those old manufacturing jobs are lost to the ash heap of economic history. Farm jobs which once were held by migrant laborers are increasingly being done by machines. After all, this was inevitable. Nobody was going to pay $7 for a head of lettuce. No family could reasonably be expected to pay $15 for a bushel of apples, not to mention the rising cost of producing corn or milk or soybeans. Automation means millions of Americans who drive for a living will also eventually be put out of work, thanks to Uber and Lyft and other ride sharing services. If these automated car services can safely deliver us from point A to point B, certainly they can deliver our stuff. Our on-demand world is sped up even further, with widgets for the asking whenever and wherever. Delivery by drone and nameless faceless machines are just the beginning.
It is clear that Vermont desperately needs a manufacturing plan to support the kind of opportunity presented in this unique moment. But, equally important, we as a society need to recognize that transition on this scale is not easy. Government in moments of large-scale economic transition has an important role setting the floor for citizens adversely affected by rapid change. As such it is essential that we provide workers a basic income. Basic income is the idea that all people by virtue of being a citizen are entitled to a basic payment which is intended to supplement individual income. This payment is part of the economic safety net increasingly around the world. More and more developed economies have adopted the idea of freeing individuals from the cruelty of the economic cycle in the wake of automation driven job losses in the digital age. Competitiveness in the 21st century demands that we free individuals up to be creative, dynamic and entrepreneurial. A basic income would permit risk takers to pursue their self-interest on the way to channeling new work opportunities and re-training.
Increasingly — routine activities are being assigned to robots and while some are overseen by humans many if most are not. We watch as computer-aided surgery has become commonplace in medicine today. Equally important, big data and massive server farms have started to dot much of rural America. Server farms by comparison employ relatively few people, and consume extraordinary amounts of energy to support their operations. While there is a commitment to infrastructure where these locations are created, these server farms have little actual effect on economic development. Through gains in productivity actual labor is marginalized. The actual impact on workers is relatively shallow, especially after the facility comes on line.
Automation has in reality created throngs of workers both in Vermont and across America, and turned them into strangers in a strange land. These workers have effectively been dispossessed by their former employers, and stranded without having been retrained, or with the prospect of future retraining. Stuck someplace in between with few prospects and little hope. These workers and their families deserve far better. Automation will only cast a deeper, longer shadow across the Vermont economy as more and more parts of the economy are pressured by the business cycle. While it is true that elements of the Vermont economy have already been deeply affected by the rise of automation and new machines, parts of the Vermont economy like agricultural labor which historically have been resource-heavy will increasingly rely on automation. This reality underlines the need for a coordinated approach to manufacturing in Vermont, and amplifies the need for new thinking which supports a type of “person–centered economic development.” Adopting a vision of person-centered economic development is critical to the renewing Vermont economic promise.
