Consider two of the most popular historical examples of technological innovation: Eli Whitney’s cotton gin and Henry Ford’s assembly line. Each of these innovations improved speed of production, while at the same time lowering production costs (i.e., reduced labor costs). Each of these advances helped make for profitable businesses.
A more recent example of technological innovation would be the self-checkout lane you see at nearly all grocery and retail stores. While some may argue that scanning and bagging your own groceries is eliminating jobs, the businesses that employ these systems are implementing them in order to increase efficiency by decreasing costs and increasing profitability, which as I stated previously, is a cornerstone of capitalism.
Another technological innovation that came along somewhere between the cotton gin and the assembly line is the oil pipeline. Pipelines, like all other innovations based on the sound science of research and development, have improved productivity and profits for the oil and gas industry. The implementation of oil pipelines, much like the self-checkout lane, is designed to decrease labor costs therefore increasing profitability. Capitalism.
Currently, the railroad industry is at an all-time low for jobs. In January 2019 rail transportation employed 183,000 workers. In 2020 that number dropped to 160,000. As of February of this year 141,000 people were employed by railroads in the United States.
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A large part of income for the railroad industry comes from transporting oil, and transporting oil by rail is more expensive than transporting it by pipeline. Building oil pipelines reduces the need for costly railroad transportation, but in turn decreases income going to the railroad industry further decreasing jobs in an industry already hit hard by layoffs.
I guess my point being, are oil pipeline construction jobs more important than railroad industry jobs? Also, if you support the increased productivity that would come with building an oil pipeline, although it would eliminate railroad jobs, why do you not support increased productivity in other industries, for example, industries that implement self-checkout lanes?
If a capitalist economy, like that of the United States, was only concerned with keeping people in jobs that currently exist just for the sake of someone being able to stay employed, we would still be using typewriters instead of computers just so we could keep typewriter repairmen employed. Innovation wouldn’t exist.
I'm not opposed to building a pipeline, just be prepared to tell those railroad workers to find another job when it happens.
Travis Nelson lives in Fargo.
This column does not necessarily reflect the opinion of The Forum's editorial board nor Forum ownership.