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Comment by Ancalagon | Hacker News Reader

I mean, no, this is very probably wrong.

As long as birth rates remain low, we will see worker powers continue to expand. As long as education remains expensive, we will see the supply of actually good knowledge workers decrease.

The only reason it appears employers have the upper hand at the moment is a concerted effort to drive down salaries - a power grab while interest rates are high that they can use as an excuse.

Looking to new disruptors in tech/finance over the next 5-10 years. As we saw with Meta and the other big tech co., it only takes one powerful disruptor. We will see which way the wind blows.

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It is total bullshit. The US unemployment rate stands at 3.4%, which I believe is the second lowest since we've been counting it. For the record, the lowest unemployment ever was 2.5% in May of 1953.

Here's the author's blurb: Gene Marks is a columnist, author and small business owner. His company, the Marks Group PC, provides technology and financial management services to SMBs in the US and abroad.

Mr. Marks respectfully, I hope you are advising your clients that to increase their potential hiring pool in this historically tight labor market, they embrace remote work.

Subthread citation supporting labor force assertions: https://www.axios.com/2023/05/08/us-labor-shortage-older-wor...

What if the disruptor is some sort of LLM service like ChatGPT and related AIs/robots that do other physical jobs? That potentially blunts the impact of low birth rates.

> That potentially blunts the impact of low birth rates...

Not at all, society literally breaks down if that is the case because those services would displace 2/3 of the work out there.

Hungry people riot, unrest ensues, and most people have been taught (as a core identity) that if you work hard you will be better off and have a good future for yourself and your children. Those core identity promises being recognized as lies would drive a mass movement of mostly irrational people. You then get the law of reverse effect (psychology) driving this. Who is responsible, who is to blame.

Someone will always have that answer and it need not be true because at that point they won't care.

Also, at 2/3 the population, you are also dealing with intelligent irrationality, a misnomer but the potential risks from that group are much higher, complex, and more costly.

Intelligence is speed and planning.

All of this has been happening for a while now yet nothing changes. The US population has been mostly been beaten down and they know that they will be shot down where they stand if they rise up. We see it in the increased militarization of the police. In my opinion I think the US ends up like Brazil. Small well protected enclaves of wealth surrounded by oceans of abandoned poverty.

> I mean, no, this is very probably wrong.

Right now the market for sv caliber engineering talent is incredibly hot.

If workers have so much power why did the capital owners capture overwhelming majority of economic development over last decade?

Workers didn't have the power until recently, and most of them don't know they have the power yet. Covid and retiring boomer generation, followed by a smaller GenX only happened in the last 3 years.

But to answer your question, regulatory/government capture.

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