September 18, 2009
Wars Of The Future Might Be Fought For This
What do you think of this proposition: "From 2020 to 2080, the scarce resource that inspires the most war on Earth will be labor rather than either oil, food, land, or fresh water; thus, nations will tailor their policies and fall into conflict with one another, in order to attract immigrants."
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I very much doubt that is in the cards. The value of labour falls dramatically with modernization, which is spreading to more and more places. See the displacement of labour-intensive industries to increasingly cheaper countries, and the corresponding mechanization that both decreases the value of human labour and provides a solution when no human labour is cheap enough.
The value of human labour will continue to drop as technology advances, so no, wars of the future will not be fought to obtain this deprecieating resource.
I half agree with nanani. The value of human labor drops in the sense that we are not willing to pay much for certain tasks. But, we are also not willing to do more tasks of these tasks ourselves.
Technology and lifestyle changes change and thus changes the value of certain labor. But, new tasks emerge of which we are only willing to pay so much to have completed. I predict a gentle ebb and flow to the value of labor and no large trend.
I do see a big problem for whichever countries that have consumption-based rather than production-based economies. Those who produce will come out on top. But, I digress.
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