Re: It's like it's "The Industrial Revolution is the Devil's Work" again.
Define "living standards improve".
For a lot of people in sub-Saharan Africa living standards have gone backwards since the 1950s. The downside of our improved living standards in the West is that some of the improvement has come off the backs of poor people in the Southern Hemisphere.
And; "living standards improve". Some things are vastly better; modern medicine has better outcomes than it did in, say, the 1970s. Roads are safer. Life expectancy is a bit longer. The smoking ban has been wonderful for asthma sufferers. But...
Houses and gardens are smaller and more expensive. Traffic is heavier. Social stratification is more rigid and inequality is a lot more visible. I know I'm an old fart, but my grandchildren live in a society which has in some ways regressed relative to the 60s, when I grew up. Sure, they go to State schools, but they go to highly desirable State schools in an area where the house price premium is probably around half a million pounds. The parents are going to be expected to fund their degrees, instead of a grateful State paying me to go to university and relying on me to pay more tax later on. Meanwhile, that housing bubble means that my taxes are going to the Duke of Westminster et al in housing benefit, and the people priced out of the market are blamed for this as if house price hyperinflation was something they caused.
Economics professors have tried to value intangibles, and it isn't easy. But simple minded capitalist progressivism isn't, in my view over a 50 year timescale, an adequate philosophy.
Biting the hand that feeds IT
