>The discussion among Allin, Duncan, Jerry and Hans
>raises some issues.
>
>1. If rising real wages cause capitalists to introduce
> labor-saving and capital-using technologies, will
> falling real wages give them cause to switch back
> to the old techniques? Are there examples of this?
>
There was a good example of this reported in Pugh's book
on the history of the IBM 360 computer. During the early
60s there was a tremendous demand for core memories for
computers and IBM developed highly automated machinery
for making them, even opening a factory to produce
the machinery that made them. They then found that
labour could be had in asia at a fraction of US rates, closed
down their automated factories and had them assembled
by hand in asia.
Paul Cockshott
wpc@cs.strath.ac.uk
http://www.cs.strath.ac.uk/CS/Biog/wpc/index.html