Wealth Distribution Revisited

Although the term, Wealth Distribution has a bad political connotation, the impact of a faulty distribution system on a consumer economy is a real life issue. If the consumer has little or no discretionary income, who will consume the products and in turn produce a return on investment in manufacturing and services?

Henry Ford instinctively realized the importance of wealth distribution on consumption in the early 20^th century. He posited that,” Workers are paid higher "living" wages, so they can afford to purchase the products they make”.

At base this is not a fairness issue. That subject can be taken up by social system designers.

Globalization and multinational business has taken it's toll on the U. S. working class's standard of living (reduced non credit consumption) in recent years. A much bigger challenge to the conventional model awaits in the near to mid term time frame.

Item: Amazon is within a few years of connecting automated distribution centers with automated delivery vehicles. Where will the money come from to purchase the services and products that now comes from the wages of warehouse and delivery workers.

Item: Google is making a huge investment in automation, concentrating on machines that replace humans in the manufacturing process and “replacing people that walk around factories, pick up and sort goods in distribution centers and work in the back rooms of grocery stores.

To quote a Google founder,”technology should be deployed wherever possible to free humans from drudgery and repetitive tasks”. That's a noble concept but what will those drudges do for financial resources?

Paul Hunter paulhunter45177@gmail.com