Comment Can craft save the economic system [Re: The AI...] (Score 3, Interesting) 52
The entirety of the industrial revolution has been finding ways to use automation to decrease the amount of human labor used to make things (i.e., increase "productivity".) The problem is that we do not have an economic system in which a society works when there is no need for human labor, and a small but rich fraction of the population owns the machinery that produces everything.
You can choose to reject much of the industrial revolution. Most Westerners are able to purchase human-crafted personal goods. From 100% re-built autos to hand-woven suits and dresses, the items are available. The price? Consumption of a fewer number of "long term" purchases, and great self-satisfaction in identifying master-craft products.
You can choose a lot of different things. The question remains, is this a viable way to structure an economic system in a world in which all of the necessities of life are produced with no (or almost no) labor?
Are you seriously proposing a world in which eight billion people are employed in producing master-crafted articles (and these master-crafted articles are "long term" purchases, hence with a small output needed.)?
As a rule, let peons and sociopaths buy mass-produced items.
Where do the peons get the money to buy mass-produced items?
A handful are master craftsmen. What about the other seven billion?