Comment by u1hcw9nx
4 hours ago
Also note: Labor share has declined similarly across OECD countries for several decades.
Automation, robots, software etc. they are all capital share.
4 hours ago
Also note: Labor share has declined similarly across OECD countries for several decades.
Automation, robots, software etc. they are all capital share.
> Automation, robots, software etc. they are all capital share.
I highly doubt automation and robots are a meaningful factor here, but IP and outsourcing have the exact same as automation.
New factories use very few people, part of the reason why it's difficult for many countries to industrialize like South Korea or China did (climbing manufacturing ladder).
> New factories use very few people
That's both true and false. Yes they need very few people to operate, but building and maintaining still need a lot of people.
Employee compensation comes from capital. And employees are working at companies that provide robots, etc.
There's a return on capital than is not spent on employees. That reflects how much capital is growing and how much can be spent on employees in the future.
>And employees are working at companies that provide robots, etc.
Just as are the top executives. And the shareholders that have put money into companies that provide "robots, etc.". All these people, including labor, are stakeholders. If there was 5% GDP growth that got reflected as 5% growth in net earnings for the company, one would expect that all the stakeholders would see roughly a 5% increase in their personal earnings from the company. The dollar amount would be higher for higher earners (5% of $1M is greater than 5% of $50k), but the percentage increase would be roughly in line. The real world results are not even close to this "rising tide lifts all boats" ideal.
> Employee compensation comes from capital.
All human collective endeavors (with few exceptions) require 3 kinds of human-related input: capital, labor and ideas.
Nobody puts their capital into an endeavor in which the plan is for the that capital to provide renumeration for the labor for more than the shortest possible time (*). The goal is always to generate revenue in sufficient volume to pay for the labor, and when that goal is met, that success is a function of all 3 kinds of contribution.
So no, employee compensation does not come from capital, but from revenue that results from the successful interaction of capital, labor and ideas.
(*) non-profits would be an obvious exception, except that nobody actually talks about investing capital in such organizations, we just make "donations" or "grants". That money plays the same role as capital, however.