What Keynes had expected of work hours didn’t happen but the broad logic of the idea holds good A column of mine in Mint (‘Ban overtime premium to save manufacturing jobs’, 14 May), highlighted the persistence since the 1950s of the slightly over 40 hour manufacturing workweek in the US, coupled with sharp rises in productivity due to automation.
This damaging combination has led to job losses and a voter backlash against globalization, culminating in Trump’s victory and trade wars with China, well before covid-19 struck.
This damaging combination is present globally, although not as starkly as in the US and Western Europe. While robots make blue-collar jobs redundant, Artificial Intelligence is doing the same to white-collar jobs: