this post was submitted on 27 Dec 2023
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Imagine you want to produce something. Maybe you want to bake a couple 10,000 breads over the next few years. Whatever. You could hire 50 guys and buy some simple tools, or you could hire 5 guys and buy some advanced machinery. What do you do?
The typical business will pick the cheaper option. It will replace as much labor with machines as is cost-effective. A few businesses will make a thing out of being inefficient and expensive, like how Rolls-Royce cars are handmade.
If you tax automation, you make the machines more expensive. So, when someone has the choice between using machines or using labor, then it will be labor more often. So, you're right: It won't stop automation. You will just have less of it. Productivity will be lower. The country will be always be poorer than without such a tax.
People in such a country will either have to work more hours for the extra labor needed or do with less.
Maybe where you live...
Great example. It could perhaps happen like that where you live. It just so happens that I have an education in business with specialisation in administration. And I currently teach technology, math and machining, after my apprenticeship finished, at a niche company, that made automated bakery systems. Your example is not reality. Not here, and not businesses in the countries we had dealt with.
With taxation, the smaller companies can keep up, because the large companies, that have automated everything, and just one maintenance guy working there, have to pay a lot, not to have any employees.
It's surprising that your education in business did not include a section in economic efficiency. My American business education really leaned in on that concept, so maybe that's where our views diverge.
Having said that, your argument isn't compelling. Your entire counterargument is, "Your example is not reality". Can you provide a case study or a real life example of your suggestion in practice?
Oh shit yeah, america known for it's wealth inequality, homeless and bailing out big business. Hopefully not from Trump University?
Asking for case studies after spouting a hypothetical... "I would like to see documentation, if it's an argument against the thing, that I didn't present with any."
But sure, I'll just call up my old employer and ask if I can look through his files, because an american can't believe capitalism isn't the only way. Hope he remembers me. I will also look through my old phone to see if I can find pictures of the empty automated, highly taxed, leading bakeries (like Pågen) that made the bread with the machines we produced.
Okay so it seems I struck a nerve, sorry that wasn't my intention. I pointed out my different background to illustrate why I might have a different perspective than you.
Until now, I've never heard of a situation where an automation tax has been implemented, so a case study would be a great way for me to understand the circumstances that led to it working. I'll look into Pågen when I have a chance, since that seems like it could be a lead.
Capitalism certainly isn't the end-all solution, but arguably it's one of the best systems we've come up with so far.
I think that we in the US don't have nearly enough regulations to rein in the negative aspects of capitalism, but the most popular argument against further regulation is that it stifles innovation, and that's scary enough to people that we aren't taking enough steps to get ahead of it.
Also... Trump University 😂😂😂
Yes, so you need more labor to get the same amount of product. Isn't that what I wrote?
I agree that use of machines can give you economies of scale, which makes large businesses more competitive. So a tax on automation could indirectly benefit smaller businesses at the cost of society. I am not quite sure why a society would want that, though?