Maybe you're right, but doing what?
I think more "life-enhancing" services would be....life-enhancing.
I touched on this earlier in this thread:
It would be nice if A.I. and other technology were just be used to enhance our lives.
It makes us much more efficient and productive.
We should already have made moves towards a 20-30 hour work week and retiring by the age of 55 at the latest.
And we should have many more life-enhancing facilities and activities available to us.
Imagine how much energy people would have when only needing to work 20 hours a week.
One example of an idea would be having an Art Gallery that is open every day of the week for viewing art, but also with a studio for artists to create, and a teaching area for people to learn fine art as a hobby. These studios are out there already, but we would need more as people had more free time.
We have become an increasingly service oriented economy. I think we need a well rounded economy.
I think that a well-rounded economy would be good in general for all areas of the world.
It used to be that some industries were very specialized, so it made sense that specialized tasks were done in only a limited number of locations. But as technology has advanced, this has become less and less relevant.
I contend that it would be good for the environment for areas to be more self-sufficient/dependent.
Here is an example off the top of my head:
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Say in Texas there is a factory that makes a product; call it a widget. They utilize a machine that is made in Japan.
A part breaks. It is a specialized part that needs to be machined on a CNC machine.
There was a time when that part would have to be manufactured in Japan and shipped to Texas. Now, by utilizing CAD/CAM software, the design can be transferred by Internet to Texas and the specialized part can easily be made in a machine shop in Texas. 3D printing has only made this more convenient.
One of the benefits of this is: Less pollution due to shipping parts all around the world.
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Sure, specialization is necessary for things like produce that only grows in certain climates and extracting natural resources that are only available in certain areas of the world. But because of technology, most sectors of traditional manufacturing can be done "closer to home".