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C00002 00002	A collection of all the remarks about unemployment
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A collection of all the remarks about unemployment

	4. Whenever, it is proposed  to  increase  productivity,  the
question  of  unemployment  arises.    The hard-boiled answer is that
increases in productivity are always eventually absorbed in either an
increase  in  goods  and  services  or  in  an  increase  in leisure.
Certainly, more than a ten-fold increase in productivity has  already
been  absorbed  in  this  country. This answer is inadequate, because
even  temporary  unemployment  produces  considerable  suffering  and
anxiety  even  when  the  direct  hardship  is  mitigated.  There are
several policies that might contribute to a solution.  In  the  first
place,  part  of  the  cost of the conversion of an industry to a new
technology that uses less labor is the readjustment of the  displaced
workers.    The industry should buy the jobs at a price that reflects
the age and length  of  service  of  the  worker,  the  re-employment
opportunities,  and the bargaining strengths of the parties.  For new
workers, the government should see to it that there is an  excess  of
jobs  in  each  major  area of qualifications.  Part of such a scheme
might be government financing  of  inventories  as  is  practiced  in
agriculture as a means of smoothing out fluctuations.  Certainly, the
government must do more than simply juggle the money supply  and  the
interest  rate  or even control wages and prices.  All this is out of
my line as a technologist,  but  somebody  has  to  demand  that  the
economists make their contribution too.