Alex Castellanos: In modern industrial societies, we've stripped away immense amounts of labor through the substitution of machines. He says it doesn't make workers were left productive because they have very little work to do and their skills are relatively low. The net result is an enormous drop in the price of eggs which means that the workers who work elsewhere have a bunch higher stare.Castellanos: If you introduce automation technologies, you reduce costs prices will decline. That may under some conditions also increase real wages. But if that's all that's going on, he says, labor share with declines steadily.
Economist and author Daron Acemoglu of MIT discusses his book Power and Progress with EconTalk host Russ Roberts. Acemoglu argues that the productivity and prosperity that results from innovation is not always shared widely across the population. He makes the case for the importance of regulating new technologies to ensure that the benefits of innovation are distributed equitably.