Changes following coronavirus - Infrastructure

[Dave2002]

The Covid-19 pandemic has changed our lives. It seems unlikely to revert back to "normal", though some may want it to. Some of us may actually want a rather different "normal".

However, some infrastructure changes might make sense whatever direction we take. Also some behavioural changes - which may be related to infrastructure, may be very desirable.

One would be home delivery of food and other products. Many supermarkets are now offering home delivery, but delivery slots are hard to get. There could be a significant shift of business emphasis towards home delivery. A lot of that could be automated, with boxes or crates packed in dedicated centres, rather than having people doing picks off supermarket shelves, and the packed boxes/crates could be loaded by robots onto transport. There would still be a need for drivers for the foreseeable future, but with minimal contact with people, the delivery processes for food could be much safer if social distancing measures are to be preserved.

In recent years there have been changes in the design of some transport systems, and vehicles. For example, on the London Underground, many trains now have end to end connectivity - it is possible to walk from one end of the train to the other. The response to the virus and disease spreading could reverse such trends.

There may also be merit in a strict segregation of flows of people on/off trains, so that people coming off trains do not meet peole coming on. Whether this would actually help I don't know, but it would mean that stations might have to be redesigned.

We are already seeing more use of home working and the use of technology to support that. Possibly many people would still prefer to work "normally", but we might see a greater acceptance of home working, not necessarily exclusively, but as part of the general activity mix. This may lead to the development, marketing and adoption of new tools to make such home working easier. Communication tools which are easier to use may become the norm, and we might expect to see more use of video cameras etc. There would be shifts in product and systems development, and production.

The pandemic doesn't necessarily mean that every business will have to close down, or that the economic "damage" will be severe - though that would probably be the case if people expect things to carry on as before. There could be new opportunities, as businesses and people adapt. It's possible that some of these will actually be helpful, not just in the fight against viruses, but also in terms of getting more helpful ways of working.

These are - of course - simply kite flying ideas, for discussion and further elaboration.

[Old Grumpy]

Drachenfliegen ist verboten!

[Dave2002]

Drachenfliegen ist verboten!

Bara drönare - kanske!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=noJrVkj_Ua8

[MrGongGong]

We are already seeing more use of home working and the use of technology to support that. Possibly many people would still prefer to work "normally", but we might see a greater acceptance of home working, not necessarily exclusively, but as part of the general activity mix. This may lead to the development, marketing and adoption of new tools to make such home working easier. Communication tools which are easier to use may become the norm, and we might expect to see more use of video cameras etc. There would be shifts in product and systems development, and production.

.

For many years I have done bits of work as an external examiner at a few institutions
when I started doing this about 15 years ago I would turn up and be let into a room with tables round the edge each of them covered with books, CDs, DVDs etc that were the submissions from the students.
We would then spend a day going through these, listening to music, watching videos, leafing through books full of images and text etc

Gradually everything moved to be online.
Even though it is possible to do (and some of the institutions I visit specialise in interactive and multi-media work) the images gradually vanished to be replaced by text, the DVDs went as well and even the beautifully designed CDs of work....

Last time I did an external examining job I was sent a link to go through everything online, pages and pages of text and not much sense of the fact that it was a MUSIC course.

The assumption that young folks are somehow technologically fluent does need challenging in many respects (I know someone at a UK University who has been doing extensive research into this in relation to how technology is used in education).......

What needs thinking about (IMV) is the whole idea of what we mean by work in the first place.
What I see at the moment in some places are lots of folks flapping about trying to cope with being in charge of their own timetables and finding it tricky... try writing a symphony, novel or building your own house?

[Dave2002]

What needs thinking about (IMV) is the whole idea of what we mean by work in the first place.
What I see at the moment in some places are lots of folks flapping about trying to cope with being in charge of their own timetables and finding it tricky... try writing a symphony, novel or building your own house?

I have for a long while thought that what many call "work" is for the most part unnecessary. However, the current situation does show that it's very useful and helpful if some people do do "it" - though what they do may be very basic, and the people doing that are often paid relatively poorly. So perhaps 30% of work really is pretty necessary, after all - with maybe 10% being absolutely essential. The remainder doesn't necessarily need to be done in offices, or dedicated places of work.

One issue is that there is probably a significant proportion of the population who can't motivate themselves, or get things done by themselves. There are also others who really do need to work collaboratively, or cooperatively. A very simple example is lifting heavy objects. I can lift some things, but if I wanted to make a shed I might need others to help me with things which I am physically incapable of. It wouldn't necessarily need many people, but a few helpers would be useful, from time to time. I might be able to do a lot of the other tasks myself, such as design, and possibly even buying parts, and constructing components, but assembling the whole caboodle might still be too much of a challenge for one person.

There are also many people who seem to be happy enough just being cogs in a larger system, without even thinking about what they do, or why.

So I am revising my own views about what work is, and what is necessary, and how to do it, but I think more people ought to think about what they themselves are doing, and whether it needs to be done, or done collaboratively, or whether it can be done differently.

[Serial_Apologist]

I have for a long while thought that what many call "work" is for the most part unnecessary. However, the current situation does show that it's very useful and helpful if some people do do "it" - though what they do may be very basic, and the people doing that are often paid relatively poorly. So perhaps 30% of work really is pretty necessary, after all - with maybe 10% being absolutely essential. The remainder doesn't necessarily need to be done in offices, or dedicated places of work.

I'm not at my best today, but being surprised no one has followed up on this thread I thought it about time someone had a go.

I think that, behind the question of why work is necessary is another concerning wealth creation, without which (in any money-driven socioeconomic system) there can be no infrastructure. One of the problems is that while infrastructure is indispensable to any system that produces goods and the values attaching to them that can be translated into money terms, and then taxed to pay for essential functions, its returns are only expressed through any added value it gives to the profit-making businesses which are then taxed to pay for it over longer periods of time than the short-term nature of investment realisations and business cycles that essentially drive our system determining the fortunes of all who live under it, allow. The "virtuous circle" that can be quickly achieved at the business end of operations when the cycle is working optimally, i.e. at times of boom, takes longer to filter through to infrastructural affordability. This is why, periodically, politicians and economic theorists bemoan the short-term objectives inbuilt into a system designed to serve profitability and "efficiency". In Adam Smithian terms the system, as run under these terms, is being drained by the necessity to pay those working in non-profit making infrastructural projects, which, for the above reasons, are as much a brake on the system rectifying itself over time on the pure supply equalling demand model its apologists of Monitarist persuasion bang on about. The amount of money that it has been needed to be accumulated and sustained to pay for the non-profitable and long-term has reached astronomical levels, taking up an ever-increasing proportion of GDP in simply redressing many of the problems directly attributable to it, such as crime, mental illness, drugs use, poverty and anti-social attitudes and behaviour. As a starting point I don't think any discussion on Infrastructure can overlook these facts.

One issue is that there is probably a significant proportion of the population who can't motivate themselves, or get things done by themselves. There are also others who really do need to work collaboratively, or cooperatively. A very simple example is lifting heavy objects. I can lift some things, but if I wanted to make a shed I might need others to help me with things which I am physically incapable of. It wouldn't necessarily need many people, but a few helpers would be useful, from time to time. I might be able to do a lot of the other tasks myself, such as design, and possibly even buying parts, and constructing components, but assembling the whole caboodle might still be too much of a challenge for one person.

But why is it that some people function better than others when working collaboratively, or, on the other hand, alone? Most people, I would argue, gain most in terms of "inner enrichment" and the capacity to contribute to "the greater good" in social circumstances perceived to benefit those around them and the circumstances of their own existence - the clearest example being the workplace - work circumstances allowing for situations in which working away from the production line notwithstanding, since ideas and innovations are often arrived at in conditions of quiet where the mind can operate better than amid clamour: the inventor in his or her garage or home laboratory being a prime example. Then again, history demonstrates that irrespective of the kind of society or its level of development, people are in general terms divided between leaders and led. As you point out:

There are also many people who seem to be happy enough just being cogs in a larger system, without even thinking about what they do, or why.

And this applies to any situation, whether germane to the issue of infrastructure or not. Surely the most intelligent way to make use of this fact would make accommodations for it, maximising the benefits of each, and wider society in terms of the resulting positive feedback, by means of structures promoting inclusiveness. The present system, for all the above reasons, favours those who are encouraged to trample others on their way up the various greasy poles to self-perpetuating financial security and its associated benefits.

So I am revising my own views about what work is, and what is necessary, and how to do it, but I think more people ought to think about what they themselves are doing, and whether it needs to be done, or done collaboratively, or whether it can be done differently.

The above are some of my ideas on the subject.