Dear Editor,
I read Paul Mason's piece on Uber and the advent of self-drive cars (31st October 2016) which included the very plausible assertion that this kind of automation and networked services (digitalisation) will radically change our world with up to 47% of jobs being susceptible.
This point "came home to roost" with me yesterday when I learned that an international insurance company here in Cologne (where several friends of mine work) has started implementing outsourced, cloud-based systems and is now planning to shed 80 jobs (in the IT department).
Banks and insurance companies used to "pillars of the community" taking on apprentices and offering stable employment opportunities. But now they too seem to be on the "outsourcing, efficiency and rationalisation" bandwagon.
People talk of the "Creative Economy" but what is this? In the past there was space for people to be in creative professions (in fashion, carpentry/furnishings, IT and other fields) but now corporate players are implementing centralisation on a massive scale which means that creativity is concentrated in a handful of strategic design/planning departments with most people then either simply "serving the machine" or being left completely out in the cold. Outside this bubble "creativity" exists only in very precarious niches.
This reminds me of palm-oil plantations: Where previously vibrant forest provided habitat to vast numbers of species, now only sterile rows of oil-palms stand. So are we turning our whole economy (and society) into a massive "plantation"? Do we really want to do that? Surely this is a question that we should be asking!
Regards
