A large part of the problem is simply social inertia. We are so used to working to produce goods and services that we have not yet adjusted to the possibility of automatic operation.
In Australia, social commentators have identified what they call the ‘aspirational class’. These people usually have professional qualifications, and take pride in ‘getting ahead’, which includes working long hours. I think what we call the aspirational class fits the phenomenon of overworked professionals in the US.
The laws of nature allow automatic operation. If I stand up and walk about, my heart rate rises automatically, as does my breathing. If I turn my gaze from the computer screen to the view out of the window, my eyes change focus automatically. My food is digested automatically. My body is a miniature automated economy.
Scientists began to understand the basics of automatic operation in the 1950s, together with the understanding that automatic operation fits into the laws of Nature. Making an automated economy is an intelligence test set us by Mother Nature, and nobody wants to fail this intelligence test, do they?
Many people, including economists and the aspirational class, live in a parallel world, and do not even understand that Mother Nature has set us an intelligence test.
Economists propose methods of keeping economies growing endlessly, just to soak up labor. In a finite world we cannot grow indefinitely, so a MMM type economy makes sense.
I suspect that the delaying tactics of economists and other reactionaries will be temporary, and that when automation hits in a big way, perhaps 15 years into the future, a lot of this reactionary behaviour will go.
In the future, astute people will stabilise world population and live the good life supported by an automated economy, like Jane Austen’s landowners, but supported by machines rather than peasants and workers. How many people are astute?