He wrote his book in 1992, before the dotcom boom, before the massive webification of the
infrastructure. It's uncanny how correct Reich was in his predictions on the impact of
globalization.
I remember reading it when it came out, and thinking, this is like futurism. Mostly
speculation. But by 96-97, the symbolic analysts were clearly the new winners. The in-person
services, which were so important up to the 70s and 80s (doctors, teachers, etc.) all lost
status and income.
yrs, andreas www.andreas.com
Cross-posted from bestoftheblogs.com with permission of the author--me.
======
Are you above average?
That's the headline for a Motley Fool analyst Selena Maranjian's discussion of the growing polarization of American families' net worth. Here is a bit that stuck out for me.
"The following data is from the Federal Reserve's Survey of Consumer Finances. It's released every three years. The latest survey covers 2001 to 2004.
"The median net worth of the bottom 40% of families declined, while those at the top experienced gains in their net worth. Want specifics? The average family's income fell 2.3%, from $72,400 in the 1998-2001 period to $70,700 in the 2001-2004 period (adjusted for inflation). Part of this can be attributed to the stock market's slump during the period. During the boom years of 1998 to 2001, average income soared by 17.3%. Another factor is a 6.2% decline in median real wages."
It's been more than a decade now since Bill Clinton's Secretary of Labor Robert Reich predicted in The Work of Nations that globalization would lead to a polarization of incomes as repetitive labor,a.k.a, assembly line, jobs were exported to cheap labor companies and more workers were driven to compete in the personal service sector, driving down wages there as well, while only top-class "symbolic analysts" (managers, designers, financial manipulators and other bullshit artists—I do include myself) would prosper. I read these figures and say to myself, looks like Reich was right.
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