For this post, I read Landscape with Invisible Hand by M.T. Anderson. The novel takes place in America after aliens (the vuvv) have landed and taken over the country with their technology. Most Americans have a very hard time finding a job because nearly every job has been replaced by vuvv tech. The humans and vuvv who own this tech become extremely rich while the average American becomes extremely poor. Many people have trouble even with getting enough food to eat. The main character, Adam, is no exception. He is an older teenage son in a very poor family.
One large theme in the novel is how capitalism is a driving factor in increasing wealth inequality. In the novel, vuvv are unbelievably wealthy compared to humans because they own all of the tech that is used in everyday life. Adam says at one point that even the most destitute vuvv makes more in one week than his whole family does in a year. This same thing happens in the real world, too. Due to the way the system works, the richest people in the world who own massive corporations make way more money than any one person could ever even have a use for.
In the novel, the concept of wealth inequality is closely entwined with the concept of greed. Adam has developed a disease from drinking unsanitary water that is slowly killing him. Vuvv tech could cure him in a matter of minutes, but he doesn’t have the money to pay for the treatment. In the world of the novel, even such basic things are not given out for free because the wealthy are very greedy. In reality, the situation is not as bad as it is in the novel, but there are some similarities. Compared to most other countries, healthcare in America is outrageously expensive. Of course, there are downsides to making healthcare cheaper (namely increasing taxes), but this might be a necessity if wealth inequality continues to increase to the point that lower-class individuals can’t even afford basic treatments. This is what the novel warns us of.
The other big theme is technology’s ability to do more harm than good. In the novel, new tech caused unemployment to skyrocket and there were no longer nearly enough jobs for the number of people living in the country. In the novel, it is presumably a form of artificial intelligence that is taking the people’s jobs. As I’m sure you can recognize, this is an ongoing debate in our world today. If machines do everything for us, what jobs will remain? We must make the right choices regarding this issue unless we want to end up like the characters in the novel. Perhaps this means slowing down development of AI, but more likely it means increasing education for these growing technology fields so that everyone has the necessary skills to enter the jobs in the workforce that do remain. Even in this case, the number of jobs will still decrease, so we could decrease working hours to have more people work fewer hours instead of having fewer people work more hours.
This post makes me want to read “Landscape with Invisible Hand!” You outline the major troubles faced by the main character in an interesting way that makes me more curious, without spoiling the book. I appreciate hoe you don’t overlook the relevance of this storyline to the present situation of the United States. Wealth inequality and political polarization show a significant divide in our democracy, and this book appears to address those issues in a creative way. I will have to check it out!
The books that you discuss on this blog are all very interesting and thought provoking. As someone who does not generally read many sci-fi or dystopian novels, I have really enjoyed reading your posts to get a better taste for this genre. I’ve grown to appreciate the power of this genre to shed light on some of our most pressing civic issues.
I think it’s really interesting that this book hi-lights both capitalism and greed. As we all know, people have many different opinions about capitalism. However, most people would probably agree that greed is problematic. It’s a tricky issue too, because there is no way to truly “outlaw” greed; it’s a personal issue.