We see from the example of the USA that the best people in the modern world are not those who produce the most goods. Of course, from time to time such a “strange” situation changes for the worse due to the crisis, but in general, not producing a material product in modern society provides the country with an excellent standard of living. The devastation, as Bulgakov said, was in the heads. And those who receive and produce more useful information live better in a post-industrial society.
We used the term, but what exactly does it mean? Western sources put it this way. A post-industrial society is such a structure of society in which information, services and high technology become the main factors of prosperity, and the production of goods themselves becomes not so significant. Not all modern economies can be attributed to the category under discussion, but there is a tendency to the spread of such ideas, and quite influential.
Why did the occurrence of such a situation become possible? The key factor is not services, as they say in Russian-language textbooks, but technology. The invention of effective methods of production made goods unusually cheap. As a result, basic human needs are met for a small price. And a large amount of funds remains for spiritual development, the search for interesting information, personal growth. While basic needs are not met, a person is not up to the search for unusual information. And if a person is fed up and protected, then other needs come into play - respect and self-realization. This area is very vulnerable, and therefore requires a lot of work both from the person and from the manufacturer of services and technologies. In a word, science fiction writers were afraid that a person would have nothing to do when the machines took over a lot. Well, it turned out that there is plenty of work in our world.
What else is characterized by post - industrial society? Signs include the transition of the economy from the production of goods to the production of services, knowledge becomes a form of capital, the generation of ideas becomes a driving factor in the economy, the decrease in the importance of physical labor while increasing the importance of the labor of highly educated people, the importance of the science of behavior and information, as a result of which the structure changes priority research.
The main thing that distinguishes a post-industrial society is a kind of cult of creativity, that is, the ethics of work is replaced by the ethics of creativity, an active person who is able to create information and objects of art. This is the only exception to the general rule that immaterial is more important.
In fact, post-industrial society is possible because there is globalization, and the work is given to employees who can be paid less than their own. For example, it is beneficial to transfer production to China. By the way, anti-globalists are fighting not only and not so much for the distinctiveness of individual cultures, but for the fact that not the most intelligent representatives of developed nations can get a job without having to study for a long time. And now there is a tendency for simple operations to trust the same Chinese, or Koreans. And Western people with low intelligence do not want to study. That protests against globalization. This is only one point of view, but it is quite logical.
Important for a new type of society is no longer quantity, but the quality of the product. And more variety. In general, the needs are endless. A person always needs "new products", and modern manufacturers try to keep up with requests. As you can see, the countries of the former Union also have signs of a post-industrial society. Perhaps this is for the better, because in such a society, human capital is becoming increasingly important . And this means that the needs of each person will be treated more respectfully.