This article from The Economist examines the darker side of the technological revolution: the stagnation of wages for less skilled workers and increased threat of rising unemployment as improving technology allows for employers to lower their labour force in favour of computers and machinery. Unlike the industrial revolution of the 19th century, where firms required massive work forces to operate new technologies and fill assembly lines, the digital revolution is allowing companies to conduct business with significantly smaller work forces than ever before, and is making entrepreneurship easier than ever; one example given is Facebook’s recent 2 billion USD acquisition of Oculus VR, makers of the Oculus Rift virtual reality headset, which employs only 75 people. Technological advancements are allowing firms to significantly decrease their costs by operating with a smaller workforce than ever before, creating huge profits for well educated CEOs and executives, while resulting in unemployment and stagnant wages for the less skilled members of the labour force. This begs the classic economic question of where and how the government should intervene to ensure that unemployment does not rise beyond acceptable levels and workers are still able to make a living. Interestingly, this article advocates for not increasing minimum wage or taxes on the upper class. I agree specifically with the idea of not increasing the minimum wage as the biggest problem bound to arise out of the tech revolution is unemployment as low-medium skilled workers are swapped out for machines, and increasing the minimum wage and therefore costs to employers is only going to accelerate this process and cause unemployment to rise. However, I disagree with the idea of not increasing taxes on the upper class because if this revolution plays out as expected (stagnant wages for the middle/lower class, increased unemployment), then increased government support for those left behind by the tech revolution will be necessary, and who better to get funding for this than those reaping all the benefits?

http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21621800-digital-revolution-bringing-sweeping-change-labour-markets-both-rich-and-poor

Article on effect of minimum wage on unemployment

:http://www.cato.org/blog/minimum-wage-unemployment-0