Page 44 - The Drucker Lectures

The Problems of Maintaining Continuous and Full Employment [ 25

IN )TALY FOR INSTANCE BUT ALSO IN 'REAT "RITAINˆIT IS TO BE SOLVED
by social legislation or government supervision.
!NOTHER BASIC CHARACTERISTIC OF THE !MERICAN APPROACH IS IN-
CREASINGLY AT LEAST FOR RANK AND lLE EMPLOYEES STABILIZATION OF
income rather than guarantee of employment is in the center of
OUR EFFORT &INALLYˆALBEIT WITH SIGNIlCANT EXCEPTIONS ESPECIALLY
in such industries as the railroads—there has been very little or
no attempt to slow down or to limit technological or managerial
advance and change in order to preserve jobs.
To a very large extent these are characteristics that typify
American economic conditions and industrial relations. But they
MIGHT VERY WELL EXPRESS SPECIlC EXPERIENCES OF GREAT IMPORTANCE
not only to this country but to all countries.
&IRST THEY ARE LIKELY TO EXPRESS OUR EXPERIENCEˆWHICH ORGA-
NIZED LABOR IN THIS COUNTRY HAS BY AND LARGE LEARNED TOOˆTHAT
technological progress and greater productivity do not endanger
jobs but create jobs. This is not to say that there is no such thing
as “technological unemployment.” But it is a marginal rather
than a central problem. And our experience has been that by
and large increased productivity means a larger rather than a
smaller labor force.
)T MEANS HOWEVER VERY OFTEN JOBS REQUIRING GREATER SKILL OR
KNOWLEDGEˆTHAT IS AN UPGRADING OF THE LABOR FORCE 4HIS IS PAR-
ticularly true of the shift to automation. One of our experiences
IS THEREFORE THAT MAINTAINING JOBS AND EVEN MAINTAINING IN-
come are no substitute for managerial effort to retrain employees
FOR NEW RESPONSIBILITIES ARISING OUT OF TECHNOLOGICAL ADVANCE IN
FACT ANY ATTEMPT TO USE GUARANTEES OF EMPLOYMENT OR INCOME AS
a substitute for such a constructive approach toward making the
worker ready for new and usually better-paid and more respon-
sible jobs would be a serious and dangerous misuse.
4HE SECOND SPECIlC EXPERIENCE THAT UNDERLIES THE !MERICAN
approach is probably that the easiest way to make “technological