[mwnz]

> We're living in a lite version of that utopian world today, actually. It's pretty damn cheap to live in Canada or the US

Well, this is a prime example of why our trajectory is not converging to utopia. 'Things' are cheap, yet income inequality is extremely high in the countries. 'Things' will always come at a cost. Those who profit in the absence of labor will be a small subset of the population. The land owners, the farmers, those with political control. Sound familiar?

Welfare may be good enough in socialist democratic countries to live in relative comfort, but that is being subsidized by those who work (and I agree with this strategy). The assumption you are making is that if labor were removed from the equation, these countries would continue to exist as they are. I disagree with this premise.

We have always found new things to work on. But at the same time, jobs have become more monotonous as they are minified. The rate of automation is exponential, which hasn't been seen before. The assumption that we will all move into knowledge work is a poor assumption. Bob the builder wants to use his hands, not his brain. And good on him for being him.