Is IT Culpable in the Decline of the United States?

Think about the application you are working on right now. What does it do? I don’t mean whether you’re writing some fancy bit of technological wonder. I mean what does your application *do*? Does it automate monitoring a factory production line to monitor for a mechanical failure or maybe you’re working on an application to allow people to work through an expert system to self-diagnose some issue they are having with their washer-dryer. Both of those are interesting and useful applications of technology. They make the business owner happy and they make the customer happy that they were able to figure out what the flashing H7 on their dryer means.

Making the business owners and system users happy is traditionally the primary goal of any IT initiative. We make them happy through improved automation, reduced manual intervention, and streamlined business processes. Investors money is saved, profits for owners are increased and users have a better experience. Those are what I care about as a developer, making my employer and users happy. So my action is to streamline processes and increase automation thereby making my customers happy.

Lex III: Actioni contrariam semper et æqualem esse reactionem: sive corporum duorum actiones in se mutuo semper esse æquales et in partes contrarias dirigi.
”To every action there is always an equal and opposite reaction: or the forces of two bodies on each other are always equal and are directed in opposite directions”.
– Newton’s 3rd Law of Motion (wikipedia)

If you were to apply the 3rd Law in this context you may see that there is an inverse to my actions. The energy of my actions isn’t being applied to an immovable force there is a reciprocal force being felt on the other side of my efforts.

If by increasing automation I am making my employer happy on the other side of the equation there is someone who was previously doing that automation that is no longer happy. She is no longer needed to do that work and has become redundant. Maybe not exactly that person, but maybe a chain of effects that reverberates down a hierarchy that ultimately ends up with someone not getting a job because it was eliminated by my automation. Action eventually leads to reaction.

If by streamlining a process there may have been a manual step that would have required a human interaction for the customer. That probably would have been by a phone call or a visit to a store. That means that somewhere down the line that salesperson or call-center representative would be eliminated due to increased efficiencies in the process. Again, eventually the action leads to a reaction.

For years my father has been pointing out this fact to the very workers who’s jobs are at risk. If a store implemented self-checkout counters he would go up to the cashier, point to the automated counter and say “There goes your job.” He also felt compelled to say this to the bank clerks with regards to ATM’s. The truth of these observations appear to be coming more and more apparent each day. As we see more stores adopting self-checkout counter and ATM’s have become ubiquitous.

This brings us to the question of whether the has been sufficient impact caused by IT initiatives of the past 10-20 years that has helped put the United States economy at risk? Has the reduction of the manual work force been sufficient to facilitate the current economic decline? I don’t know, but I believe it is an important question that needs to be asked. And if there has been an impact what can we do as IT professionals to responsibly continue in our careers? How can we achieve a balance between maintaining social integrity and advancing our industry?

I believe that it is possible. Individually we must respect our role in our industry and approach our day to day job with as much professionalism as possible. Learn your trade inside and out so that you can work as correctly and efficiently as possible. By focusing on professionalism, quality and correctness we will help our employers save money on failed projects and redundant systems. I believe that saving money on failed projects will help companies to continue to employ as many people as possible while still achieving higher efficiencies. As an industry we need to emphasize methods to augment the manual labor forces efforts versus replacing them. I would even call for our government to completely review our H1-B system to ensure that employers are correctly using and applying the system to only hire non-citizens for specialized work where there is a shortage.