I recall a comment by Hari Seldon, the principal protagonist of Asimov's Foundation Trilogy, to the effect that Trantor appeared to be less efficient than it had been, that things were not working as well as in the past. That thought has resonated with me over the years when I review the successes and failures of the post-historic world to make broad-based advancements.
For the most part, the self-appointed futurists of the 1960s and 1970s really got the twenty-first century so incredibly wrong and, personally, I am sincerely disappointed in what actually got accomplished. I was prepared for this century to be a little more fun, for heaven’s sake! The futurists had us riding in programmed cars on computerized superhighways, working or playing while the computer got us to our destination. Rudi Gernriech was the designer of choice, with androgynous uniforms and shaved heads the rule, with little insulated toupees for when the elements required it. But we were going to be able to spend a weekend at the bottom of the sea, or take a shuttle to the Moon. We were only going to work three-four days per week. It makes one wonder if these people of vision simply watched too many episodes of the Jetsons!
Surely, there are socio-cultural differences that have made some economic systems a little more adept at making large-scale advances. For example, refuse to energy projects have been a standard approach for more than fifty years in Europe. Here, because of a confluence of events, primarily overreaching and conflicting regulatory bodies designed by the titans of industry to constrain innovation and shore up existing technology, to powerful landfill lobbies, to violations of interstate commerce laws, many of the municipally-financed refuse-to-energy projects mandated by States and the federal government, have been on the brink of default and are hardly viable entities. Nuclear energy has played an important role in fueling the European economy, yet the United States has poured billions into projects that were ultimately deemed unnecessary or mothballed indefinitely.
I am certain by now almost everyone with access to the internet has seen that much-forwarded phunny ‘what it would be like if Microsoft made cars.’ Well, if Microsoft or even (dare I say it?) Apple made cars, cars could be coming down in price, rather than going up! People would be paying less attention to the road, and getting work done or even taking time for personal enjoyment – and think of the decline in road rage! Texting while driving might not be the perilous folly it is today. Of course, this all presupposes that our nation is up to retooling the highways to permit computerization. What were our tax dollars doing in the mid 1960s, when we had a Big Government Congress? Oh, yes, that’s right – we were buying bullets for an unconstitutional foreign conflict we steadfastly refused to call a war, and we started a little pilot project called Medicare. Based on what the US dollar bought in that era, had some vision presided, our highways might have been upgraded so that we were ready for the Jetson age. Rail was atrophying, adding long-haul trucking to the load on the roads. Is it any wonder that our infrastructure is crumbling and why did I not take out stock in the company that makes those ubiquitous safety-orange cones that are litter most interstates, as they are all in some semblance of repair?
Nevertheless, personal technology has made quantum leaps for quite some time now. Cell phones are the size of hearing aids, and some think they are smarter than their owners. As someone that refuses to give up on the SLR, I cannot begin to bring myself to take my phone out and upload an image! Andy Warhol’s fifteen minutes of fame has come of age. Buy a computer and in about six weeks’ time, you could buy the next generation so exactly what is the point of upgrading? E-books exist, and I daresay it won’t be long before there will be procedures by which readers will be attached to our retinas so we can bypass the computers. One can be as wired as he/she desires. Gosh, there are hot boites in EU nations that you can avoid the velvet ropes and buy drinks without money, just because you are sporting an RFID chip! All hail the coming Singularity! On the other hand, televisions have gotten bigger, so that we can be treated to life-sized images of aging quarterbacks hawking diets that will bring back one’s sex life! We have on-demand programming to go with pizza delivery, ensuring we never have to leave home. In effect, the local cineplex is going the way of the drive-in movie in no time flat.
As a student of economics, I do believe that self-interest is an important driving force and underpinning to the health of our economic system. Small businesses only come about by dint of hard work and a desire for self-reliance, balanced with a personal vision, and small business formation is at the very core of our capitalist economic survival. Yet I remain concerned about the focus of our limited economic resources on the betterment of a self-obsessed subculture to the detriment of large-scale advances that would improve an entire generation’s economic wherewithal. No generation before ours has done so much for so little.
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