Increased Automation in Review

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The economic principle I examined was scarcity and how all choices have an opportunity cost. Everyone in the world faces scarcity and opportunity cost on a daily basis. For example, one might want to spend time watching a new TV show but also take a nap to catch up on sleep but only have enough time to do one of these. This person has a scarcity of time and whichever thing this person decides not to do is the opportunity cost. This principle can be applied to just about everything including government and technology choices. While studying my research topic: What is the opportunity cost of increased automation and what should government institutions (e.g. Congress, SBA) do about it? I found a bunch of different opinions and possible solutions. In my second blog post I discussed how almost half of the work force is at risk of being replaced due to automation. I described how Companies have a scarcity of money and want to spend that money on the thing that will give them the most return for the price which is almost always automation. Second, in my third blog post I described how there's a huge opportunity cost to decrease the amount of driving deaths with automated vehicles. We must decide if millions of lost jobs is worth the potentially thousands of lives saved. Thirdly I blogged in my fifth post about how implementing a basic income could potentially be a good solution to solve a future with high unemployment. Giving citizens money will decrease there scarcity of money allowing them to spend more which stimulates the economy.Overall, you can see that there is a enormous dilemma that will continue to grow until something is done. There are hundreds of costs that need to be considered and examined before any conclusion can be made about how to proceed with the future of automation.