What's the problem exactly? Job growth has been stagnant for 5 years?
Productivity is the ratio of units of output per unit of input, where you can abstract input as being either capital or labor. Indeed, productivity continues to grow as a consequence of technological advances. When mankind started using oxes to plough fields, landworkers' productivity rose significantly. As we develop more tools to aid us in daily tasks, less labor - and sometimes even less capital - is required to perform those tasks.
During the relatively prosperous past decades, organizations have grown heavy, and were able to do so because of a continuously rising product demand. People started over-working and over-consuming. Then there was an external shock, media started talking about a financial crisis, people started being more considerate of their consumption in the face of job insecurity, and businesses that grew too heavy needed to get back into shape. This is a process that has significant feedback effects. The process of business getting back into shape means the cutting non-contributing jobs (think of excess layers of management), which by itself causes a growth in productivity. In this sense, employment growth and productivity growth can be negatively correlated, and it is not necessarily "technological advances" that drive productivity growth.
Telling us that technology is destroying our jobs is the same as telling us that China is stealing our jobs, though they may affect different industries (I don't see Chinese laborers replacing our butchers.) The thing is that the working population is very flexible, and despite offshoring certain jobs the average American still works over 50 hours a week. Population growth hasn't justified job growth in the US for the past 40 years, so perhaps a stagnant job growth is a good thing in that it draws things back to "normality".
The problem is the very real human suffering caused by these economic dislocations. It is totally unnecessary and a failure of politics and morals. Our social "safety net" is anemic at best. We could use some of the profits from increased automation and efficiency to improve the social safety net, but instead we have allowed the vast majority of it to flow to the already wealthy owners of capital.
One problem is that we have trained people to do (and are still training people to do) jobs which are being replaced by computers and technologists who can do the same job more productively. This is beginning to have a significant impact upon all industries.
The economy is doing great, productivity is doing great, but there are increasing numbers of people with obsolete skills who can't find work and are struggling to survive this improving economy, through no fault of their own. A small number of people are taking all the benefits of the new economy - entrenching inequality.
The replacement of muscle by automation was 20th century. In the current wave, we see a replacement of office workers with a mix of more productive office workers outsourced, online or in house.
I think we are seeing a restructure of skilled work generally as technology becomes able to do portions of skilled work. For example, look at education.
Interestingly, muscle jobs are more-or-less immune as they have already been automated as much as is reasonable.
The problem is that jobs will be worth less and less compensation and the balance between work and capital is turning towards capital.
There will be new jobs, but fewer and fewer people qualify. Network effect and superstar economy mean that the distribution of workforce compensation will change dramatically. Majority of workers will be worth less. More of them will drop below the point where it's not worth to hire them.
Productivity is the ratio of units of output per unit of input, where you can abstract input as being either capital or labor. Indeed, productivity continues to grow as a consequence of technological advances. When mankind started using oxes to plough fields, landworkers' productivity rose significantly. As we develop more tools to aid us in daily tasks, less labor - and sometimes even less capital - is required to perform those tasks.
During the relatively prosperous past decades, organizations have grown heavy, and were able to do so because of a continuously rising product demand. People started over-working and over-consuming. Then there was an external shock, media started talking about a financial crisis, people started being more considerate of their consumption in the face of job insecurity, and businesses that grew too heavy needed to get back into shape. This is a process that has significant feedback effects. The process of business getting back into shape means the cutting non-contributing jobs (think of excess layers of management), which by itself causes a growth in productivity. In this sense, employment growth and productivity growth can be negatively correlated, and it is not necessarily "technological advances" that drive productivity growth.
Telling us that technology is destroying our jobs is the same as telling us that China is stealing our jobs, though they may affect different industries (I don't see Chinese laborers replacing our butchers.) The thing is that the working population is very flexible, and despite offshoring certain jobs the average American still works over 50 hours a week. Population growth hasn't justified job growth in the US for the past 40 years, so perhaps a stagnant job growth is a good thing in that it draws things back to "normality".