Humans vs. Efficiency. Guess who loses

When I go to Bangkok I'm always pleased by the number of jobs that would drive American efficiency experts crazy. Way too many department store employees. Greeters everywhere. Men in spiffy uniforms watching parking lots or, in one case at Q House Lumpini, a man whose job it is to stand near the parking garage exit and make sure people crossing the lane don't get hit by departing automobiles.

These humans do not appear to feel bad about their employment. No, to the contrary, they all seem to be quite happy doing what they're doing.

I don't know why many other countries are so "inefficient" but I'm glad they are. Efficiency is a fine goal, but there's only one reason to make it a singular goal: to make more money for people who already have a ton.

And like so many corporate mantras, efficiency is a short-sighted, short-term goal that needs to be tempered. A planet on which humans are worked out of the equation is madness.

Machines will always beat humans in the efficiency race. Machines will always beat humans when it comes to health costs and the like. And that's fine. Can't argue with that.

But humans can adapt and make judgments that machines can't. Humans are reliant on an electric grid. And humans are good for other humans. Our interactions make us better humans. Our ability to pay attention, to investigate, to see each other is unique.

But, just 10 years into the smartphone age, it looks like we're giving more and more power to gizmos and servers and programmed machines. The Amazon Echo and the Ask Google thing scare me. To me they represent step one in the race to let machines do our thinking for us.

In California, after an earthquake, the poorer neighborhoods always get back on their feet more quickly than the richer hoods. Why? Because an earthquake is just another in the long list of challenges that these people have to deal with creatively and immediately. Rich people lose their shit when they have to do basic things for themselves.

So I say let's ease up on efficiency. Let's pick places where it's good (energy use for example) and avoid places where it's not so good (the replacement of humans).

Companies will still make profits. Rich people will still be pampered. And human beings will still have a reason to live.