[vijayboyapati]

I think Sam is incorrect when he writes "The great technological revolutions have affected what most people do every day and how society is structured. The previous one, the industrial revolution, created lots of jobs because the new technology required huge numbers of humans to run it. But this is not the normal course of technology"

Jobs were not created in the sense that people were previously doing nothing. Jobs were transferred from low skilled occupations such as tending to farms, to higher skilled occupations which more closely resembled the salaried jobs of today.

The industrial revolution was the same as other technological revolutions and not distinct from them in that it reduced the exertion and strain put on workers. The industrial revolution gets a really bad rap, but compared to the work and life expectancy that preceded it, the condition of workers improved dramatically in the 19th century.

The tendency in all technological revolutions is to reduce the amount of exertion performed by workers and increase the wealth available for consumption (and correspondingly reduce its price). So today "work" often means sitting at a desk, while occasionally checking facebook. Whereas to our forebears just 5-6 generations ago, this would have seemed extremely leisurable, if not entirely magical. Not to mention the average worker can now quite easily afford to keep a device in her pocket which lets her access all the world's information and connect with almost anyone else on earth for less than a day's salary.

[Brakenshire]

> The industrial revolution was the same as other technological revolutions and not distinct from them in that it reduced the exertion and strain put on workers. The industrial revolution gets a really bad rap, but compared to the work and life expectancy that preceded it, the condition of workers improved dramatically in the 19th century.

I think that is a bit over-enthusiastic. Life was extremely tough for the new industrial workers. I think if you look at measures of health/nutrition like BMI and height, they are static or even slightly declining throughout the 19th century. In the UK it's only after 1910/1920 that you start seeing dramatic increases (that's about the time of the introduction of old age pension, and when the Labour movement started to gain serious traction).

[pi-err]

> The industrial revolution was the same as other technological revolutions and not distinct from them in that it reduced the exertion and strain put on workers ... the condition of workers improved dramatically in the 19th century

Industrialization, massification, standardization of production and moving to big cities have had tough consequences on worker's life. Charlie Chaplin shows just that. It was a tougher life than traditional community life with flexible work amounts.

You could definitely argue that there was an improvement in caloric supply (except in some countries). For the general happiness, though, industrial revolution has been a tough time.

[civilian]

I doubt it. My mom's family was one of the first to get a washing machine in Sweden. As the story goes, my great-grandmother just stared at it while it was running and cried. Not to be out of a job, but out of joy for all those wasted hours that she had spent hand washing, and she had now regained.

I'd also factor in modern medicine into people's happiness. It is tough on families when you often have infant deaths and you often have horrible diseases like polio and MMR.

[agentultra]

I agree.

Dickens wrote many social satires critical of injustices he perceived at the time like workhouses (basically sweatshops backed by organized crime) and Yorkshire boarding houses (pools of child labor). His descriptions of city life were not pleasant: pollution, crime, and unrest. It may have been quantitatively better for society in the long run but I think that the people stuck in those workhouses might have chosen nothing instead of the job they had been so graciously provided if they were given some other means of sustaining themselves.