My own theory in the widening income gap between well paid people and badly paid people is very simple. It is not very much about politics and mostly about economics, IQs and productivity.
As computers become smarter, more and more people are being pushed out of the economic bandwagon and fall on the fringes. They simply cannot contribute much that is within their abilities.
This is significantly different from the past industrial revolutions, where people replaced by machines simlpy learned to operate such machines and overall, produced more. Now, there essentially is a lesser need to have anyone operate any machines, as computers do it better.
I do not know what the future holds, and possibly, we will stumble on the answer on what to do with such displaced people, and the society will continue happily employing them for something useful. Possibly, we will be forced to improve our education system, with some minor gains due to that.
It is also possible that we will not stumble on any such solution and more and more people will be pushed to the fringe, as computers can substitute for a greater percentage of population every year. The bleak social consequences will be easy to imagine.
I find this trend to be very disturbing, as eventually almost everyone will be eventually displaced from productive activity. Remember that even now, world chess champions barely win chess matches against computers. For more food for thought, read
The individual answer to this is that to be successful, it is important for young people who are not wealthy, to become sophisticated, focused and highly educated individuals. This is, clearly, not feasible for everyone, but it is important to at least try.
I do think that this issue will be a fundamental source of instability for decades to come.
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