When the Future Catches You: Chapter Three

Summary

In the past, the major way to make money is by selling commodities such as gold or food. This has been the case from the time agrarianism began and on through the time of industrialism. Nowadays, according to Juan Enriquez, this is no longer the case. The new way to make lots of money is to be in the idea business. As an example of this, take software companies such as Microsoft. They do not sell a tangible product, but have made billions of dollars over the past decade or two. The key to success, in the idea business, is growth of the company and spreading of the product. When products are easier to improve, their company grows faster. Also, the people are happier when they get better products, which makes the products spread faster (through advertising via word of mouth). There are two ways to make good products (ideas): educate your nation’s people or bring in educated people from other nations. Nations who do not have educated people tend to fall behind economically quite quickly.

Political Application

No less than one third of this chapter is spent comparing several countries to each other. Taiwan is compared with Mexico. Before technology became a major factor in economics, Mexico had a superior economy. This was reversed after Taiwan began to manufacture computer parts and Mexico didn’t. Comparatively, other nations (such as the U.S.) who produced many more computer parts were much bigger than Taiwan economically. Studies by the author show that countries that have high technology capability are more likely to be successful than those who don’t. This idea is highly relevant to politics today. A major topic of discussion is what a presidential candidate intends to do with education in this country. If they succeed in bettering the school system, we will be able to compete in more areas of economics with other countries. For instance, science is a big industry. If this nation was on the cutting edge of technology, we would be able to make and sell advancements in technology.

My Position

Personally, I do not like this new form of economics. This new form is one that puts less emphasis on physical work and more on mental work. In the past, if someone wanted to be prosperous, they advanced themselves by the sweat of their brows. In the future, according to this system, the only thing that you will need to make a good living is the capacity to think abstractly. We are already seeing the foreshocks of this system. Anyone who does manual labor, for instance a construction worker, is looked down upon. In the future, these people will probably make less and less and no one will want to do these jobs. This has serious repercussions. Without people doing the physical work, academics would not be able to do their work. As for my part in this new system, I guess I would have to fit into the academic crowd, because that is what I am good at. I am able to do physical work, but I prefer not to.

Economics

The economy of the future, if it goes the way When the Future catches You says it will, we should focus on things that have little immediate physical application. In other words, we should make innovations in all things theoretical, and let the practical applications come later. Genetic engineering, advanced forms of medicine and data storage devices, among other things, will probably be important in the future. Essentially, if a country wants to be prosperous, it should educate their people in science and math. The first country to make technological advances will be able to make lots of money from those advances.