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Comment by jacobwilliamroy | Hacker News Reader

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jacobwilliamroy

Why would you want to unemploy a bunch of people doing a cushy, fun, do nothing job? What's wrong with you?

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To provide lower prices to the millions of people who need medication? That money has to come from somewhere

labor costs are not the root cause of skyrocketing drug prices

Now is not the time to start pretending like we care about sick people.

Pharmacy revenues will remain constant. The only difference is that instead of paying pharmacists, all that money is just going to sit in the caymans, with all the other automation gains.

Should we bring back telephone operators too? The price for phone service (especially long distance) has dropped since phones were invented, surely some of that is due to automation and tech advances.

Honestly? Yeah.

Do you think technical progress is making life worse for the average person? I realize it's popular opinion (and I tend to agree) that it's disproportionately benefiting the richest. But that doesn't mean most people aren't benefiting from the cost/time savings that new technology has brought. Curious to hear why you think that way.

I have serious doubts that tech is making us happier, overall, and that is’s actually significantly improving productivity, outside a few areas where is has done so massively such that the effect is still strongly positive.

Exceptions for certain areas like medical research, obviously, but really, things were fine before Netflix and free long distance and such.

I'm just talking about pharmacists and telephone operators. I dont mind pharmacists and I didnt mind telephone operators. My life isnt much better now that telephone operators are gone.

Life’s not much better?

I used to pay $0.30/min in long distance charges to call a city 3 hours away in the same state!

What were you calling a city 3 hours away for?

To talk with a relative.

To save 6 hours of driving?

It is absolutely not a do nothing job. Every one I've ever interacted with seemed overstressed from the insane work load/hours, if anything. 12-14 hour shifts are common.

retail/pill counting is fun?

Probably not but $110k a year can buy a whole lot of fun. Pill counting is not soul crushing, work to live don’t live to work.

As someone whos worked both blue collar and white collar jobs, pharmacist is one of the better gigs out there.

It's an okay gig on average, currently. Chains keep buying the smaller guys out, reducing hours and support staff, increasing demands of metrics, and offering lower and lower pay to new grads. It doesn't help that new schools keep opening and applicant numbers do not increase in quality or quantity. The BLS anticipates 0% job growth in the next 10 years.

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