Still, none of that outweighs the inflationary pressure.

Increasing automation and therefore productivity means an increase in profits to the owners, not a drop in prices, except in the most competitive industries.

Unemployment is already extremely low. There aren't tons of Americans waiting to step into these jobs. If unemployment were 10% that would be a different story, but we're close to full employment. So instead of the jobs going to Americans, the produce rots in the fields, and prices go up.

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bluefirebrand 3 days ago | parent [-]

High unemployment would mean companies would have to offer more money to attract people

They want unemployment to be low so they can keep wages and salaries suppressed

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kergonath 3 days ago | parent | next [-]

Except, of course, that this is completely backwards. Low unemployment shifts the balance of negociating power towards workers as companies have to compete to get them. See the massive growth in AI engineers’ wages for a nice illustration of this.

High unemployment helps employers because they can put pressure on the workers, who are less likely to find a job with better conditions or at all.

The fact that low unemployment is associated with stagnating wages these days is a massive failure of the capitalist system. It means that the situation is deteriorating and some of the levers cannot be used. There is no way out without pain.

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bluefirebrand 3 days ago | parent [-]

This is my bad. For some reason I got "unemployment rate" twisted in my head and thought it was related to the number of unfilled jobs

So my reasoning was "if there are not many unfilled jobs, it makes it tougher for people to find work, meaning the unemployment rate is low" which of course does not logically follow

My mistake

	▲	kergonath 3 days ago \| parent [-]
		Then we agree :) There are signs of upwards wage pressure in the last couple of years, we’ll see how sustainable that is.

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margalabargala 3 days ago | parent | prev [-]

What? That makes no sense, did you mix up your high/low words? Or could you elaborate on your opinion that is perfectly opposite all accepted economic understanding?