Jumping the Gun.

--- In spacesettlers@yahoogroups.com, sraj wrote:

> (P.S. Since we were on the subject of trade as an impetus to space
> exploration it is worth reading Drucker's 'The New Realities',
> where he suggests that we are shifting from trade in goods and
> services to a 'Knowledge Society'. If Knowledge is what we
> exchange in Post Modern society, the settlement on Mars will pay
> for itself!).

It's been a while since I read that Drucker title but I'm fairly
certain that his point, which he makes quite clearly in "The Post-
Capitalist Society" is that knowledge work isn't just managers and
programmers but also manufacturing where the steel mill worker is
using his knowledge of plant and process to work more efficiently.
That worker isn't just applying muscle to add value. The application
of his knowledge far surpasses the value gained from muscle power.

This broad definition of knowledge worker is applied to the US
workforce and isn't so easily transferred to the manufacturing base
of Chinese workers who lack that knowledge. Their advantage is a
lower wage, and the lower wage reflects their lower productivity.
They're mostly applying muscle rather than knowledge. Of course,
this analysis doesn't apply so much to computer peripheral types of
manufacturing but more to textiles and other durable goods.

The point I'm trying to make is that on Mars, when we apply the
knowledge metric, it won't be a whole bunch of programmers and
scientists who are creating value. A large part of knowledge workers
still work in making things, they just use their brains to a larger
extent than their muscles. Mars will be left with a large demand for
goods and an insufficient level of demand to warrant domestic
industry. They will need to import virtually all of their goods and
have nothing to offer Earth in return. Their knowledge economy will
have a hard time finding a comparative advantage compared to Earth.

TangoMan