Tech 6, Past, Present and Future -- 1

 What is written below I wrote to post on a list for psychologists:  I am putting it up here too because, if I get off my ass, I expect to use this space to see if I can explain what I am talking about in a way that makes sense.  Almost everything runs differently in the world now than when I grew up. In most ways, the people in it are the same creatures they have always been, but it is still very unclear how we will all live and prosper peacefully, as the result of all these changes.



When I began to write this post I tried to explain the reasoning behind all my thinking. After about 4000 words I decided I may have to write that all for a different forum.  But here are some bullet points.

After all the screaming about debt ceilings and deficits is over in Washington, The USA will still be left with an uncertain economy, and the major difficulty that will remain is from high unemployment.

The underlying causes of the current high unemployment is not from the Democrats or Republicans, it is from  major changes in how the world works. 

The two biggest ones are globalization and, even more so from technology.  Every profession, and I use that word in its broadest sense,  in the world today is performed differently than it was even ten years ago because of technology.  Many professions have completely disappeared.  Many jobs in the professions that remain have been eliminated, and are no longer necessary.

We are living in a world that could produce all that needs to be produced by employing about half the people who are working now.  About 120 years ago 75% of American were farmers.  Today that number is 2%.  That is what is happening is many other professions.

Our job, which did not really exist during the last time of great unemployment, is probably one of the ones that is least impacted by technology.  We base our skills on dealing directly with people, not machines.

But we, in our profession, are going to have to deal with this increase in unemployment, underemployment, and with those who have jobs, but are pushed to the breaking point by their employers who know that people are desperate to keep their jobs.

Those hardest hit by this change are men, and mostly men who are not that educated.  Those are men who had jobs in manufacturing or in the trades.  The trades held up well during the housing boom, but now that too, is over.

A rise in long-term unemployment of middle and working class men will result in a domino effect of bad things:  depression leading to anger, leading to domestic violence, divorce, poverty, fatherless kids, addictions, lawlessness, and then more unemployed men.  This will be even more true for the less educated and racial minorities.  It is also effecting non-specialized recent college graduates, who have $70 or more in student loans and can only find work for $12 an hour.

We will see an increase in helplessness and hopelessness that may be labelled as psychiatric disorders but is really much more the result of social factors and global changes than it is an kind of inter-psychic or biological disorder.

There will be a much greater demand for treatment from people who will not be able to afford it.  The treatment will be much more difficult because many of the factors that underlie  the difficulties are way beyond the control of any therapist.

Perhaps I will be proven wrong, and things will improve and the advances in technology will somehow offer a way to keep everyone earning a living.
But, from what I am seeing in my own practice, what I have been reading, and even what I am hearing from my friends, the entire world economy is being restructured, and how this will effect this generation and the ones that follow is far from clear.

The Difference

This was an interesting week.
Last week I was away, lolling around, stretching, eating, making sure the tide ran on schedule.

This week I was back at work. It was interesting, and mostly predictable to see who had done what while I was away. Some people worked hard to make their lives better. They thought about the things we had talked about, they tried to make some changes. They are the ones who make this job worth it.

Some people worked hard, and thought about things, but are still stuck. Their attempts at changes, both internal and external/interpersonal/environmental, did not make much difference. I feel badly, because they are trying, and maybe I should be figuring out things better.

Of course, others did little. They came to see me again, and tell me the same stuff, with a few new excuses about why it was too difficult to take their finger out of their nose. "I know," I tell them, "life's tough, but, in the end, it's your life to do with what you will."

The differences between groups one and two is usually somewhat apparent. There could unmovable people in their lives, their may be physical impediments, or financial ones, or sometimes it is a real brain thing. But, there is a reason that I think I understand.

Why the folks in group three choose, and I use that word intentionally, to suffer, I don't know. Mostly, they don't see it as a choice. Usually, I do. Sometimes, I can see what the choice gives them. I try to change it, but I can't. Sometimes I really can't tell why they just continue to wallow in their own psychic mud.

The people in group three seem to love coming to therapy. But coming to therapy isn't going to make changes in their lives. They have to use what they get from therapy to make changes. Sometimes that's a tough sell.

obviously

We are down here near the water for the 4th of July. We saw some fireworks, ate some burgers and dogs and even watch families run relay races carrying eggs on a spoon. It couldn't have been more All-American.

Yet, today, being on vacation I had time to read most of the Sunday paper. I read how Americans have been unwisely using up oil since 1973 when the price started to rise. I read that job security has almost totally vanished in this country for almost everyone. That came as a result of the capitalism that also gives a chance to everyone to become wildly wealthy.

I read how global warming is causing extreme weather, and that is leading to crop shortages, and that already has led to wars, which will get worse in the future. I also read about how our health care system is a mess, and the only real way out will be to get a single-payer national system.

These things are obvious, and they all have been for at least twenty years, most for forty years.

What is also obvious, is that we are still spending billions of dollars to send young men across the world to kill people they don't know, for reasons that are unclear.

But it's tough to change things here in America, as it is anywhere else in the world.

Despite all of our freedoms, which are many, and which should not be taken for granted. It is certainly true that living conditions are certainly better and more free than they were two-hundred years ago. But one thing has not changed: people with money and power will not give those things up easily, despite how unjust the conditions that their holding on to their means of acquiring that wealth might cause. Just look at how difficult it was to get rid of slavery.

As one soldier fighting in Afghanistan was quoted as saying: "It's been true for thousands of years: old, rich, powerful men talk tough -- young, poor, strong boys die."