In my work I have dealings with a lot of miners and the following event should have us very worried.

A guy told me of a mate who drove a dump truck in the mines.

While on night shift, this guy fell asleep and the first he knew of it was when the control office contacted him to wake him up. The truck was being monitored, in fact it was being controlled by an overriding controller in a remote control room.

Now the worrying part of this is that the control office was in Singapore. So this got me thinking, if they can not just monitor from the likes of Singapore, but control the machine, what does that tell you.

Of cause with the NBN one would assume this would be more appealing to multinational miners and should have alarm bells ringing because what costs $150 K here, would cost tuppence over there.

This page is an interesting example. The first post included the word 'mine' and lo and behold the ad that appears above it is for coal mining exploration!

So what do you suppose we do about it. Trains are being remote controlled as well.
The way work is carried out has been changing since someone invented work.
Drones and remote control is all the rage at the moment so people will use it.
Singapore has one of the worlds fastest broadband systems.

What has the Australian NBN got to do with it. It's not going to be a patch on world standards. Unreliable at the best, we are saddled with the old copper wires that Howard flogged for 12 billion which Abbott bought back for 12 billion $, so your remote driver will stay in Singapore.

Abbotts free trade agreement with Communist China means that zero Aussies will be working in Australian mines or in primary production before the end of the decade so remote control trucks are the least of our problems.

One of the mines has already got driverless dump trucks.
They are monitored from Perth.
The new rail line being built ib Sydney will have driverless trains.
What transport do you think carries more people per day than any other
system and is also driverless ?

Lifts !

When my son worked at the ABC some of their digital video and switching
gear was serviced by the manufacturer from Britain for some functions.
Nothing new !

Everything is going to change and everything will become local as
solar and wind just cannot do the job, and we won't be able to afford nuclear.

I have been around long enough to have heard - in the fifties and sixties - how computers were going to take up so much of our work, that we would have a problem knowing what to do with our leisure time. And here it is, fifty years on, and I am busier than I have ever been, despite owning and using more technology than I can shake a stick at.

Yes, we will have driverless cars, buses, trucks and tractors within the next decade. Does this automatically mean that everyone who uses a car or a bus or a truck or a tractor to earn a living will be out of work?

Somehow, I doubt it.

Computers were going to bring in the paperless world.
The immediate effect was to produce more paperwork.

The future will be different again and the lower available energy will
mean that less energy intense processes will be used in manufacturing
and food will be produced closer to consumers.
Transport will be restricted to the most important purposes.
Aviation will end.
Have a read of this, covers the whole future energy problem.

http://www.resilience.org/stories/2015-01-21/our-renewable-future

it will be more difficult than many expect.

One of the greatest conundrums is our human desire to work, and not just the economic necessity to work and produce our daily needs, but the need for work as an expression of oneself, who we are, our personality, and our human dignity is expressed through work.
Work is far more than a pastime, it is the way in which we fulfill ourselves, and it allows us to establish relationships with others. Through work we are able to participate in society. If one does not work then one needs to have a legitimate reason not to work, too young, too old and so on. One of our greatest personal development drives is gained through work and those things associated with work.
Unemployment is not just an economic indicator, it is more than that. No one should be surprised that in times of high unemployment social problems come to the fore, ill health increases as does family break ups and anti social behavior. There is even an increase in suicides among the unemployed. Many of the problems caused by the lack of work are not just economic; they are also an indication of our failure to satisfy the human desire of self worth, which is achieved through having a job.

Yes Paul, I agree with you.
In the future there will be less work booth jobs and more people
working in agriculture. Other big employment areas will be clothing
manufacturing, appliance repair and manufacturing.
Import volumes will be very much lower than now. International trade
will also have reduced to fit with the end of growth.
Sustainability will be the buzz word that will be most heard.

Do you get a sense of wind down in this ?
Well that is what it will be, but no doubt there will be a lot of
research into newer energy sources, such as thorium reactors and
hopefully geothermal sources.

Some of this might happen a lot sooner than we would like.
Recent opinions being expressed is that the tight oil production
might not restart when the oil prices rises again.
Apparently the financial people are very disappointed in the returns.

I'm glad advancing technology is getting rid of mindless monotonous service jobs like driving trucks, trains etc...
This in turn free up humans to be more creative with their lives and get into occupations that facilitate or encourage creative, lateral thinking and expression. Think of the Arts industry as one example..
No one knows what the jobs of the future will be, although some self proclaimed "futurists" like to volunteer those predictions.

The really deep problem is how money is distributed around society while these occupation & industry changes take place. I think we will see more people being self employed & self promotion will be the call card, competition will take on new dimensions never seen before.. (I hear those right wingers screaming with joy!) more global population makes this unavoidable, so many of us doing the same type of thing to get noticed and thus business.

All this means more and more business for social media outlets no doubt.

What?

>>This in turn free up humans to be more creative with their lives and get into occupations that facilitate or encourage creative, lateral thinking and expression. Think of the Arts industry as one example.<<

Oh. Please. No.

It is the productive members of society who create value that can - if there's enough of it - be spent on "the Arts Industry".

We are presently paying for "the Arts Industry" through our taxes. With fewer people in work, it will be seen as the ultimate decadent luxury that it always has been. Finance by the public will dry up, and - with the odd rich-patron (think Charles Saatchi) as an exception - so will "the Arts Industry".

Face it. We are, globally, facing a slowing of real growth, which will eventually make each and every one of us "poorer", in comparison with our current lifestyle. No way out.